Winter Mule Deer Hunt

December 20 - 29, 2007

The whole crew on our December mule deer hunt in Idaho.

I left Friday for my folks’ place in Weiser, ID - our jumping off point. Grandpa was there at Mom and Dad’s and we loaded up the pickup and trailer and headed south. In Middleton, we picked up my brother, Todd and I transfered vehicles to ride with Todd the remaining 9 hours to Salmon, ID where we would spend the night at the Suncrest Motel. It was the beginning of the college football bowl season, and we were at the end of civilization, so we figured we owed it to ourselves to stay up and watch the Memphis Tigers get trounced by the Florida Atlantic Owls. Not exatcly your football powerhouse teams, but a very entertaining game, none-the-less. A good nights rest, a healthy breakfast at Pierre’s Pancake & Steak House (a big hearty Denver Omlet was my choice to fatten me up on the morning of our big day) and we were ready for the remaining trip to base camp. We arrived in just a few inches of snow on a beautiful bright, cold, sunny winter day. Our first chore was to clear a spot for our very large tent (for which we were all glad for when it was all said and done). The snow was shoveled away, the ground swept, and paths were shoveled to all important areas - such as the bathroom, the fire pit, the pickups, and the archery target.

Mom, Todd, and I clearing a spot for the tent.

Once the tent space was cleared and the bulky canvas home was unrolled, it was time to figure out how this thing was to be erected. Grandpa had made the tent poles his hobby, and we were all set for the best looking camp ever! That is, if we could get the tent up and standing. Some pieces of rebar with a two inch “T” at the top would serve as our stakes - and keep that in mind. After some finagling, jostling, grunting, and grumbling, the tent began to take shape. Once it was finally standing, it was time to pound our stakes in - into ground frozen solid. Out came the eight pound persuasion hammer and the stakes were not so gently driven into the ground.

Todd and I driving the stakes into the ground.

Once the tent was set up, it was time to get the place set up as “home sweet home.” Grandpa had made tables and kitchen cabinets, which were super handy. Todd and I had been introduced to indoor horseshoes, or ring-toss, and we quickly made up all the pieces and by Saturday night, we were playing ring-toss in our cozy tent while a fire roared in the stove. Of course it is unnecessary to mention that Todd and I beat Grandpa and Dad 10 out of 15 games. Unnecessary, but interesting information just the same.

Preparing to fire.

We came to the conclusion that if a tent is large enough to play ring-toss in, said tent is large enough. Sunday afternoon Mom and Dad went scrounging for firewood, while Grandpa, Todd, and I went off to look for deer. Grandpa, Todd, and Mom all had tags, while Dad and I were just along to see what we could capture on video camera. We hadn’t gone far when we spotted a huge herd of elk, and so we pulled off the swithback trail and began to glass them on the far ridge. Soon, Grandpa told us he’d spotted a bunch of deer. By the time everyone had them spotted, someone mentioned they spotted a giant buck among them. Sure enough - there was a big, wide three-point that was a true monster. Of course as far as a score goes, he wouldn’t get very high because of his being just a three point, but his frame was every bit as big as anything I’d seen to this point in my life. We watched him for an hour or so and noted the canyon and vowed to pay him a visit at some point during the season. A little further on, we came upon a group of does with a smaller four point, and they happened to be close enough to put a hunt on. We discussed, and finally, Todd decided he’d go after the buck. So, off he went, with me and the video camera following, as we tried to close the distance on this guy. With so many eyes and such little cover, we were getting our first lesson of what was to be a frustrating week in trying to stalk these deer. Todd ended up getting to within fifty yards of this buck before deciding it was still the first day (technically it wasn’t even the first day yet, we were only up here to scout this day!) and with five days of hunting still in front of him, he decided to let this buck walk.

Sunday night we decided to have our turkey dinner. Here we are miles away from civilization, and we’re preparing turkey, stuffing, rolls, mashed potatoes, and beans (I use the term we loosely, in reality, I was just reminded of what an awesome mother I have during this trip). A few years ago, a friend gave me a recipe for something called trash can turkey, and I’ve since found it to be the best way to cook turkey. I’m not sure if this is completely in line with the FDA regulations, as it does involve cooking a turkey inside of an overturned trash can (preferably an unused one). This makes it possible to cook a turkey anywhere you can pack a trash can to - and it does it in about half the time a conventional oven would. Sometime I’ll have to get the recipe from my mother and post it on here - although everyone will have to agree to the disclaimer that says I have no clue what the long term effects of eating turkey cooked in a galvanized trash can could be. I do know the short term effects are a full belly to the point of bursting!

Mom checks the biscuits as the trash can cooks the turkey in the background.

Time for Dinner!

From here, the story pretty much focuses on Todd and I, as I followed Todd around the next five days, while Mom and Dad hunted elsewhere. I hunted one day with Grandpa, but his bow busted on the second day of our hunt, and he had to call it quits. He took it incredibly well as I know how much he’d been looking forward to this trip, our hearts ached for him.Monday, Todd and I got right on a herd of deer, and among them was a nice four point that we proceeded to hunt the rest of the day. We took off up the mountain, and I was to get my first glimpse at what is by far the toughest hunting I’ve ever participated in! The country is nearly vertical here, and the snow made everything super slick. I was having a very difficult time getting traction, staying upright, and not dying. Once, I lost my foothold and started sliding on my back headfirst down the canyon. I grabbed at a nearby branch and it snapped off. I grabbed at another and it snapped off, as well. I finally smacked into a four inch tree that effectively stopped me, but also felt not so wonderful. We had been in the process of stalking that buck when this all happened, which caused my sympathetic brother to tell me, “Maybe you can film from here and I’ll go the rest of the way alone.” We were still four hundred yards from the deer! I could hardly blame him though, it was hard enough to try and sneak up on a deer in this country by ones self, let alone trying to get two people close enough for a shot. That first day really shook me up though. When we got back to camp, I was soaked (my waterproof pants ripped during my fall, plus sliding on my back shot snow up underneath all my clothes and effectively made me miserable). The sheer steepness of this country I could handle in August, but the slickness on top of it made each step a nerve racking tense step. At the end of the day, my leg and back muscles were incredibly sore.

Tuesday was the day I went with my grandpa. I was still trying to recuperate from day 1, so I thought I’d sit in a blind with Grandpa on day 2. However, while setting up our blind, Grandpa’s crossbow fell from a tree limb and the fiberglass holding the sight casing busted off. We were early in the morning, but had been dropped off by Todd, so nothing for us to do but sit in the blind for eight hours with a bow that doesn’t work. It got cold, there was no game movement by our blind, and I felt horrible for Grandpa who would be done hunting the rest of our trip.

Wednesday I was back to following Todd around. We spotted our big buck from Sunday evening early on Wednesday morning. He was feeding with a group of does and three other bucks. We figured out the direction they were feeding, and instead of trying to sneak up on them, we decided to try and cut them off and wait for them to feed by us. We spent a couple hours getting into position, and then when we got within two hundred yards of the herd, we watched them bed down. There was no cover between us, so we had to wait for them to make a move. We crouched behind a pile of rocks and hoped they would feed towards us when they got up again. Three hours later, Todd announced they’d gotten up to feed again. Thirty minutes after that, he announced that they were not feeding our way. We waited another twenty minutes for them to feed out of site, then we proceeded to close the distance again. When we next saw the herd, the herd also saw us. The big three point had disappeared, but we saw a nice four point cross a ridge and decided to try a hunt. Todd went up above the deer, and we decided I would come up from the bottom of the draw and hopefully drive the deer past Todd. As I hurried up the bottom of the draw, my foot slipped and I came down with my full weight on top of my binoculars. I don’t know exactly what happened, but my ribs hurt like they’ve never hurt before - it still hurts to sneeze or twist at the waist three weeks later. I do know that this mountain was slowly killing me. I climbed just a little ways further and spotted the buck on the right side of the draw - I knew Todd was on the left side of the draw, and I knew we were in trouble. The buck saw me, and eventually moved out, of course he went the wrong direction and Todd never got a shot. Todd and I then discovered a pretty easy way to get down the mountain as we turned our boots into skis and slid down the mountain. My chest was really hurting from my fall and I took a little while to get down while Todd raced on ahead. He raised his voice slightly to ask where I was, and when I popped up out of the draw, he motioned frantically to get up where he was. Apparently, when he’d raised his voice, he’d jumped the big buck out of the bottom of the draw, and we watched him feed over the ridge we were now on - we were ecstatic that we had not pushed him out of the country.

Thursday was an exciting day. We got on three bucks early in the morning and decided to make a drive. I tried to push the bucks to Todd, but they walked just out of bow range from him. We circled around and watched them feed most of the morning and in the process, we jumped our big three point - and it would turn out to be the final time we saw him. Today I found out that I had pause and record mixed up and therefore did not get footage of him - which makes me SICK. He was only about fifty yards from us when he bolted and we had no idea he was anywhere around. I thought I got great footage of him from close up though, only to find out today as I watched the footage, it wasn’t there. So the only footage we have of the big boy is from about five hundred yards. We watched the three bucks from early in the morning feed right back to the exact spot they were in when we spotted them first, so decided to try the drive again. The country is so wide open that stalking the deer is sometimes impossible - especially with so many pairs of eyes on the hill - and the snow was quickly becoming crunchy as the weather was warming up in the day to melt it, and freezing it hard at night. This time, Todd set up on their previous route and I stepped out to make myself visible to the deer. They got up from their beds and began heading up the ridge towards Todd. They only made it as far as the big buck, though, and when he got up, they all veered off and headed down the draw and eventually moseyed out of sight. By this time, Todd and I decided that maybe we’d exhausted this area and we tried some new territory. One of the cool things happened there as we came upon an old mine that is still being worked. It was all gated off with “danger” signs all around - a musty smell permeated from the dark hole. It was a pretty neat experience.

Friday was our last day of hunting, and it was the best day as far as close calls. Twice Todd was within bow range of nice bucks, but he didn’t know it either time. The first was early in the morning. We spotted some bucks bedded in the same draw where I’d tried to push them to Todd twice the day before. So, we decided that sooner or later, this plan HAD to work. He got set up and I allowed myself to become visible in hopes that they would get up and move towards Todd’s setup. This time the plan seemed to work perfectly. The deer (two bucks and about seven does) started to head away from Todd and I panicked and shouted to him “They’re heading to your right!” The deer looked back and me, and when they started to move again, they started heading straight toward where Todd had just moved to. I shouted again, “They’re heading straight toward you!” This shouting trick seemed to work as the deer were focused on me, and Todd slid into position, and yet the deer were in no way panicked. What I didn’t realize is that where Todd was set up, he could only see about thirty yards down the ridge. The deer got to within about forty yards of him and started to mill around. I’m not sure if they suspected that something was up there, or if I was just making them too nervous. Whatever the case, they milled around below Todd for two or three minutes and I still don’t know why I didn’t just yell for him to draw and step over the ridge. Instead I just watched and wondered why Todd wasn’t shooting. I could see that he was plenty close enough. I tried to push the deer by taking another step closer, but I slipped and slid a little ways down the draw. The deer came racing back towards me and squirted out the side of the draw out of bow range. When we met again, Todd let me know that he never knew where the deer were exactly as the terrain prevented him from seeing them.

Later that day, we spotted a nice 3 x 2 bedded down, but he’d spotted us, too. When he got up to run, we noticed he was not using his left hind leg. We knew he wouldn’t go far with a bum leg, and sure enough, he crossed the draw and found a sage to lay up under. As he bedded down, Todd decided he would try and make a hunt on this wounded buck. I sat where I was across the wide draw and watched the entire thing play out. When Todd appeared over the ridge above the buck, he was only about 55 yards away. I watched him slowly creep closer while the buck had no clue he was there. As the distance narrowed, I again began wondering why Todd wasn’t drawing and shooting. Finally Todd stopped and crouched. He stayed like that for five minutes and I finally put my camera down to look through the binoculars to see what exactly was going on. As soon as I put the binos up, I saw Todd coming to full draw. I dropped the binos like hot coals and started scrambling to find the record button on the camera. I video taped the buck running down the draw and around a bend and out of sight. When I caught up to Todd, it was a familiar story. He’d gotten to within 35 yards of the buck, but he couldn’t see him. He could just see the tips of his antlers through the sage and he thought the buck was looking right at him. I was across the draw and could have told him that the buck was oblivious to Todd’s presence. He was never locked in on his position. When Todd drew back, the buck stood up and bolted and never offered a shot.

That evening, we got on a nice 4 x 3 and tried to cut him and his herd off as they fed down the canyon. Again, though, we got too far in front of them and had to watch helplessly as they bedded down a mere 80 yards away. There was a forked horn that bedded eighty yards from Todd, but we’d lost sight of the 4 x 3 and no way to search for him with so many eyes around us. We were hunkered down behind a pile of rocks - the only cover around - and then we got pegged by the forked horn. When we were next able to take a peek over the rocks, the 4 x 3 was feeding away at 90 yards. He had to have been bedded directly underneath of us, but no way to have even looked because the forked horn had us spotted. With daylight fading fast, we had to simply watch as the last buck of the trip gave us the slip.

It was a trip full of frustrations, adrenaline, excitement, and memories. Already, I can’t wait till next year - and hopefully I’ll be carrying a tag myself.

Remember those rebar stakes that we pounded into frozen ground? We had to use the handyman jack to pull them back out after we chipped a couple inches away with a pickaxe.

Me at work with the pickaxe.

When we got the tent down, there was a bare spot where the stove had been sitting for a week that had made the grass think it was springtime. Notice how the grass was trying to turn green - I thought it was pretty comical.