Deer Season 2014, Opening Weekend

Deer season for modern firearms opened on October 11^th. I hunt deer with a modern firearm, a 30.06 (thirty aught six) to be precise. On a trivia note, the .30 caliber cartridge that this rifle fires was developed in 1906, hence the name “aught six”. I have covered my reasons for hunting in a previous blog post (Deer Season on 10/23/13).

Hunting with a modern firearm means I have three weekends, the last three in October, to get a deer. I do know of some places where I can hunt in November but they are relatively far away. I prefer to get my deer locally, it saves on gas and travel time. Having only three weekends to hunt sometimes makes it challenging to get a deer. I’ve seen quite a few this year and some were nice bucks but this was all before the season was open. If you don’t see them in season it doesn’t count.

Conditions looked good for the opening weekend of modern firearm deer season, overcast with rain. Rainy weather seems to be the best for getting deer out during daylight hours when it is legal to hunt. I don’t know exactly why this is. I have heard it speculated that, when it is clear and the moon is bright, most deer feed at night and hole up during the day. At any rate, overcast and rain or rain mixed with sunshine seems to be prime weather for seeing deer during daylight hours.

I didn’t stumble on to a legal deer right off the bat like I did last year. While that would have been nice because I have a long list of things that I need to take care of, it also means I got to poke around some more and do more exploring.

I did see deer, which is always encouraging. I saw a spike (one point) on Saturday and a doe and two tow-heads on Sunday. Tow-heads are young bucks, usually the spring of the year’s fawns that don’t have antlers yet. The spots on their heads that will grow antlers in the future are lighter colored, hence the name tow-head.

The spike was in a GMU, or game management unit, that requires a two point minimum for a deer to be legal. If he had been a few miles farther east, it would have been legal to take him because that GMU only requires any buck.

I know a lot of people who won’t shoot a spike or even a “Y” (two point). Though I love hunting for the sake of hunting, as far as I’m concerned, whether or not to take a deer, if it is legal to do so, is a calculation: $66 for a hunting license and deer tag, $30 for fuel for my pickup. We would have gotten 60-80 pounds of meat off that deer, so $1.23 to $1.65 per pound, not counting the time it would take to process the meat. That is a pretty decent price. If the season stretches out, that means more fuel and more of my time and the meat gets more expensive. I would not have taken the tow-heads if they had been legal because they were too small.

Added into the calculation, besides the price per pound for the meat, are all the projects I need to take care of, finishing the calf shed, winterizing things, finishing the clean up of the old house. And I would be able to spend more time with my family. 

Finally, yearling deer are much more tender and tastier than older deer that are rutting. It would have made practical and economical sense to take that spike if it had been legal to do so. All that being said, I am not kill crazy and it was nice to just watch the deer for a while. I might get a crack at him next year when he will be legal, that is, if he survives the bow hunting season, cougars, the highway and starvation this winter.

So, I poked around some more and, in the process, I learned a few things. I found Pacific silver fir (Abies amabilis) and Alaska yellow cedar (Chamaecyparis nootkatensis) at an elevation of about 370 feet. I also found Alaska cedar at another spot that was pretty low and rather isolated from other populations of Alaska cedar of which I aware. The funny thing about this last place is that I have hunted through this particular spot many times and walked past the Alaska cedars I don’t know how many times but this is the first time that I noticed them. 

I heard rock rabbits or pikas (Ochotona princips) at another low elevation site, well below the timber line at about 1600 feet elevation. I saw a lot of interesting things, mushrooms and stumps to name a few.

I also observed an interesting phenomenon. Deer with usually use most logging units heavily for a year or two after the logging. Then they apparently abandon many of these sites. When I say abandon, you still might see some passing through but they don’t linger. This year I went back to a site that was about six or seven years old and I figured would have most likely have been abandoned. To my surprise there was deer sign all over the place, much more than when the unit was new. It was almost like the site had “matured” as far as deer habitat is concerned.

I don’t know the reason for this but I did notice that the site was very rocky with poor soil. There was a lot of salal (Gaultheria shallon) which is an indicator of nitrogen poor soils. The replanted trees were eight to ten feet tall and seemed to be growing fine though there was a lot of space between them. There was some fireweed (Epilobium angustifolium) present but not tall, dense stands of it. There is an aster of some kind that I have noticed in the last ten years or so growing in dense stands in logging units after several years and this was absent.

It appears that the fireweed and aster are growing in so thickly that they outcompete other plants that deer use for browse. Deer browse young fireweed but I rarely see browsing on the large six foot or taller plants that grow in dense thickets. At this stage the fireweed is very stringy and probably not too palatable, kind of like string beans left too long before picking.

It seems to me that deer used logging units for longer periods of time back in the days when the slash was burned after logging. I know that fire can make a lot of nutrients available in many soils, enhancing plant growth. It might have also initially inhibited the growth of fireweed and other plants like the aster, giving browse plants a chance to get established where the current practice of spraying herbicide does not. Of course the frequent burning under the current timber harvest rotations of 50 years or less on private land, would probably create problems in addition to the air pollution which caused this practice to be stopped. All of this is pure speculation. There is no way to know without doing some scientific studies and probably such studies have been done.

I hunted on old homestead site, one of the remaining few of my youth that hasn’t had a modern house, or even a development put on it. It is always cool to hunt a place like this. I know it is purely my imagination but, at dusk this time of year, it seems like you can feel the spirits of yesteryear in the air. I have also had this experience hunting in different places throughout the mountains.

Probably the coolest experience of the weekend though was the still hunt I did Sunday afternoon. I have found a spot where deer travel through the general area in the afternoon or early evening. So I staked out a likely spot overlooking a deer trail and sat down and watched and listened and waited.

Sitting as still as you can and using all your senses to take in what is going on around you in the woods is a very cool experience. After a while you pick up a rhythm to the sounds, kind of like the normal sounds of human neighborhood in the city, except you are listening to several different species of birds and animals. In this case, I was close enough to the highway that the sound of traffic was also a background noise. At the point where you get the rhythm of the background sounds down, you can then pick out sounds that are a little different from the background.

Deer are very quiet but sometimes you can hear their light steps through heavy patches of leaves. Sometimes what you think is a deer is actually a Douglas squirrel (Tamiasciurus douglasii) or a bird like a rufous sided towhee (Pipilo erythrophthalmus) that has a habit of making a lot of noise in the leaves.

This particular afternoon I heard Stellar’s jays (Cyanocitta stelleri) and squirrels scolding something in the distance. Quite often I am the one bearing the brunt of this type of scolding, the perennial frustration of hunters, because it alerts everything in the vicinity, including any deer, that you are there. This time I had settled in and remained still for long enough that the nearest squirrels had finally ignored me. The scolding I was hearing was farther away so I knew it wasn’t for me. It remained to be seen what it was though.

I heard the scolding progress nearer and nearer before it finally stopped. About five minutes later a little tow-head buck appeared as if by magic. As I said, deer are very quiet creatures and if they don’t have to go through anything particularly noisy, like dry leaves, they are pretty much silent. This one seemed to appear out of nowhere.

The deer was maybe thirty feet away from me when I first saw it. I was close enough to hear the crunch when the deer picked up and ate a leaf. It glanced briefly around, in the kind of nonchalant manner that often means there are more deer in the area and sure enough, a couple of seconds later, a saw his twin brother.

The first deer continued on, walking within ten feet of me. Deer are color blind, or so I have been told, but they are very sensitive to movement. So if you stay perfectly still, you are almost invisible to them. If you move or they smell you though the jig is up. I blew my cover by trying to get out camera to take picture. I was carrying my camera in a plastic bag to protect it from water and the rustle of a plastic bag is very out of place in the soundscape of woods.

The second little buck spooked and first one followed. They were out of sight in seconds. I remained in place for another half hour or so. Quite often another deer will come along on same path. I didn’t see anything else though. I heard something behind me not too far away, maybe 30 to 40 yards. It sounded like footsteps but wasn’t able to see anything.  

Deer season has its own feel. My legs and feet are quite often soaking wet after a day of hunting and they are usually aching too. I don’t hike nearly as far hunting as I do in the summer but the walking I am doing is very different and uses different muscle sets.

Imagine trying to walk around for most of the day on uneven ground, carefully placing your feet and trying to constantly maintain your balance when you feel stick after stick under your feet that you can’t put your full weight on because they will break and make a lot of noise if you do. In this case you have to keep your balance while shifting your weight off the stick foot and place the foot in a spot that won’t make noise.  

After the pleasant experience with the two little bucks, I came home to find out that, through the course of the day, Vashti had had her nap interrupted and poor Sacha spent the afternoon with two screaming children and was worn to a frazzle. At this point I don’t know what to say. Everybody in the house likes venison so it would seem that the time investment would be worthwhile but Sacha needs a break too. She has the hardest job in our household. I feel bad about not helping Sacha out more but there is a part of me that would be wild and grumpy, or worse, apathetic if I didn’t get to hunt.

Scene from one of the first areas I hunted this year. 

There is an image out there of logging units being scenes of total, unmitigated devastation but they also create openings for deer browse and things like wild blackberries (see Wild Blackberries and...). You can also see a lot of things from a dendrological standpoint. This tree, a Douglas-fir (Pseudotsuga menziesii) was wounded at some point in its history and grew back around the wound. The swirling areas below and to the left of the patch of rot in the center are formed by the layers of wood added each year as the tree grew around the wound. 

This tree grew back so completely that there is no evidence of a scar. Quite often the wound is a point where rot starts, leaving a permanent open scar in the tree bole. Even when a tree does grow back completely around the wound there is usually a very visible scar but there is none evident on this stump. A quick count of the annular rings on a nearby stump about this size indicated this tree was about 120 years old. It looked like a these were some trees left behind after a previous logging episode. 

An old Douglas-fir stump in the same unit as the stump above. There were quite a few stumps like this in the unit, indicating that the area had been logged before the current logging. Unfortunately I didn't include anything in this, or the previous photos for scale but this stump was about half to two thirds the diameter of the stump above. 

Douglas-fir stump from the recent logging episode. A quick count of the rings on this stump indicated that this tree was about 55-60 years old. Douglas-fir is a shade intolerant species so this tree most likely seeded in or was planted after the previous logging episode, giving us a rough date of that logging episode. So the evidence on the ground indicates that a stand of timber about 60 years old was logged in a thinning or partial cut about 60 years ago. The trees that were about 120 years old at the time of the present logging episode were about 60 years old 60 years ago. 

Partially knurled Douglas-fir stump. Knurling is the result of root grafts or mycorrhizal fungi connections between neighboring trees. When a tree is cut, the tissue in the stump keeps getting resources from its neighbor and/or the mycorrhiza and continues to grow. This stump was in another logging unit where there was a partial cut. This tree was cut but its neighbors were left behind. You can get a rough date of the partial cut from this stump. It was a while ago, ten years or more probably because the stump is weathered and beginning to decay. But you can tell this tree was cut since about the 1960's because the cut used to fell it is called a Humboldt cut or face where the undercut is taken out of the stump rather than the bole of the tree. This type of cut has been regularly employed in this area since about the mid-1960's. This was probably more recent though because smaller stumps like this one and others nearby, which are a little less than 2 feet in diameter usually decay to the point of losing their form within a couple of decades.  

Another stump completely knurled over in another logging unit. This stump, in the background, was at the edge of an old grade and the tree was cut during the initial logging event. The stump in the foreground was probably left during the initial logging event. It was cut with a machine called a feller-buncher or something similar during the most recent logging event. Feller-bunchers cut the tree straight across the trunk, leaving a flat stump with no undercut and no hinge, the line of wood left near the middle of the stump in a hand cut stump. Because the saw employed by a feller-buncher has much larger, coarser teeth than a hand held saw, they also tend to leave frayed or splintered edges on the stump. 

Another view of the stump above. Most of the places where I have seen knurling are rockier with poorer soils. Evidently, there is more root grafting occurring or mychorrhizal fungi present in soils of this type. 

Heavily browsed thimbleberry (Rubus parviflorus) in a new logging unit. I have heard that the browse in logging units is less nutritious but deer and elk flock to them for the browse. Either the information I got is not true or the browse is just so abundant that it makes up for the lower nutritive value. I have noticed that the majority of the browse is on young plants or shoots just growing back after being damaged or getting an opportunity to grow because there is more light. Young shoots and plants are probably much more palatable and even nutritious because there are a lot of resources for growth present in the new leaves and buds. In this instance, the new growth is occurring at a time of year when most plants are beginning to senesce and send all of their resources from the leaves back to their roots, stems or buds. 

Large thimbleberry. Older, larger plants like these are beginning to channel the nutrients from the leaves back into the roots, stems and buds for the winter. You don't see much browse on plants like these. The senescent leaves probably have few nutrients and lots of fiber that is hard to chew and digest. The buds left behind for the winter are high in nutrients and often get browsed but they are only a fraction of the size of an entire leaf. It seems to me that deer quit using a logged area after a few years when the vegetation becomes dominated by larger plants like these.   

An unmapped wetland I stumbled across while poking around hunting. This is a spot that I wouldn't have visited ordinarily. 

Cracked-Cap bolete (Boletus chrysenteron) with a parasitic fungus. In one of my references, Mushrooms Demystified, by David Arora, the author states that cracked cap boletes are "prone to attack by a powdery white to bright yellow parasitic fungus (Hypomyces chrysospermum) which eventually engulfs the entire fruiting body, making it look like a very sick puffball."

Fly agaric or fly amanita (Amanita muscaria). These are pretty but poisonous. I the toxins in this mushroom are hallucinogenic and concentrations vary from mushroom to mushroom. Human reaction to eating this mushroom varies as well I understand. In some cases I have heard it can cause erratic, violent behavior. Some believe the Viking berserkers ate these mushrooms before going into battle. It might be possible to eat enough of these mushrooms to receive a fatal dose of the toxins. I wouldn't try eating any. They are quite striking to look at though. 

Red alder (Alnus rubra) snag populated with oster mushrooms (Pleurotus ostreatus). These are edible. I have noticed that they seem most likely to populate wood that is not in contact with the ground, either snags or logs are suspended above the ground. If the log is in contact with the ground some other species like turkeytail fungus (Trametes versicolor) seem to populate the log though occasionally I do see oyster mushrooms on downed logs. 

Alder snag populated with clustered woodlover or sulfur tuft (Hypholoma fasciculare or Naematoloma fasciculare) and scaly pholiota (Pholiota squarrosa) neither of which is edible. I ran across this snag and the one above in a place I wouldn't have ordinarily gone if I had not been hunting. 

Bear scat. While this isn't particularly appealing, it does tell us that this bear has been eating apples, probably in an abandoned orchard nearby to get ready for winter. 

Old homestead. This is what remains of what was a field of about five acres when I was a kid. The forest is steadily encroaching. The house sat just out of the frame to the right. It was finally torn down and burned because it kept getting vandalized and the owners didn't want the liability if someone got hurt in it. As I said in the text, I like going through places like this right at dusk this time of year. It is my imagination but it feels like you can feel the spirits of yesteryear in the air. 

Vinca (Vinca minor), the scourge of home sites old and new. This stuff grows well in the shade, crowds out native plants and is hard to kill. It was growing at the old home site. 

The spike or one point I saw. This guy was probably run off by his mother just this summer. There weren't any other deer in the area. Quite often you will see young spikes or "Y's" or does of this age by themselves or with a companion of about the same age. 

Western toad (Bufo boreas) I came across while hunting, again in an area where I wouldn't have gone otherwise if I hadn't been hunting. This toad appeared to be melanistic or darker than usual. I saw one with similar coloration only a few weeks ago. This coloration change might be seasonal. I doubt this but I don't know for sure.