Deer Hunting!

Last weekend, I spent a lot of time carrying my gun around, up and down a bunch of canyons.  That is probably the best way to describe it.  I have yet to shoot my gun, though I have had a (legal) deer in my sights, but more on that later.

Saturday morning started out, or rather continued on from Friday night (I worked until 4:30 am and then took a shower then went out to hunt with no sleep), with a trip just about 15 miles from here to a spot called Almota creek.  Here, there were a few forested canyons that has a creek flowing through the bottom of it.  I saw a lot of does and a lot of Blaze orange vests, but no bucks.  There was one point, though, that a buck called after a whole stand of does for about 7 minutes so loud that the whole canyon could probably hear him.  Unfortunately, he was probably about 1000 yards away all the way across the canyon, not to mention I couldn't find him, despite seeing the 12 does.  Anyway, after walking around for long enough, and getting irritated with so many other people out there, and falling asleep in a wheat field for about an hour, I decided to call it a day and go home.

It has been cool enough lately to give some great fall colors.

This was in the bottom of the canyon here and a pretty cool tree by itself.

If my camera was better, you would be able to see all the of the orange speckling the hillside.

The next, having been so frustrated with how many people were at Almota Creek, I decided to try another spot.  On Sunday, I headed down to Rimrock Canyon.  It was a little farther away at 25 miles away, but it is a pretty sweet spot with canyons that start at the elevation we are at here in Pullman (actually a little higher), and go straight down to the Snake River Canyon 2000 feet below.  Right when I got there, I already knew it was going to be better because there were a lot less people.  Or maybe there was the same amount, but it seemed like less because there was about three times as much land.  Then, only about 10 minutes into being in the canyon, I saw my first buck.  He was running down the canyon, so I started to stalk him and tried to get close to him and above him in order to set myself up to take a shot.  After he disappeared behind a ridge line, I was able to get him in view again.  I brought my gun up just as he paused for a second.  But he was about 250 yards away and started to walk again.  I wasn't confident enough for my first shot to be so far away while he was still moving (not to mention I am not sure I completely trust my $35 rifle scope at that distance).  After that happened at the beginning of the day, I thought for sure this was going to be my day.  But after that, I saw a whole lot more does, and a couple coyotes, but no more bucks.  I heard a few shots, so I am pretty sure there were some other successes that day.  I also ran into a couple guys who were hauling their deer out from the day before, so it is pretty clear that this is a place where you can get a buck, which I was unsure of at Almota Creek.

Overall, it was a pretty awesome day.  I already like hiking, and this is just hiking plus the added potential of stalking and killing something that I can use for food for the winter.  It is just more time I get to spend outside in this awesome place that I live in.  I actually never realized that there were so many farms on the edge of town that had property lines that jump straight down to the river.  I love it.

I can't wait to get back out this weekend.  Hopefully I can make something happen because this weekend is my last chance to get a muley this year.  

The canyons here were crazy steep and much rockier than the day before.

Here is a picture showing the steepness of the canyon.  It was a little harder to walk up and down this one like the day before.

Once I was about 1/4 the way down, I finally had a nice view of the Snake River, 1500 feet below.

This was the canyon right next to the one I spent most of the morning in.