Drove up Friday; passed a coyote sauntering along in the middle of the pavement just 3 turns up the road from Milpitas at 3:45 in the afternoon! Spotted a doe followed by a 3-pointer as I went thru Water Company gate; it just stood there staring at me from 20 feet away. What next?! Noticed that some rain some day before had speckled the dirt road. At Rancho Hondo gate, I dressed down into camo, and hunted the top, setting up at the rock at the very top of Minnich's Ridge, watching Water Company Ridge (I believe it's called). Saw a doe and yearling, no bucks, but sure was lookin'. Air cold, breezy; my fingers were numb and clumsy with the cold; sniffles, too, and shivering. A-a-a-fter d-d-dark, l-l-loaded up into the Blazer and drifted down to the cabin. Tried to light a Coleman lantern--out of fuel! The next one, too!! Gzr--bzr--Rmm--breh!! Some people's children--!! Got one filled, got the fire lit, got out my bed n' things, got out a big bag of cookies Bill had stashed, popped a can of Rosarita Refries into the skillet and settled into my thick jacket with a three-some of outdoor mags and had a high old time. (Did I mention this was a solo trip?) The cookies and soda being hors-doovers, toasted tortillas and a slug of beans was dinner.
The wind was fierce that night, and cool-to-cold, but clear. Acorns, branches and leaves peppered me most of the night and banged on the cabin roof. (Three days later, I still was dumping leaves out of my boots.) Next morning, warmer, slipped out to Hummingbird and sat at the tree from which Sandy lowered the boom on her first-ever-solo deer (Way to go, Sandy!) and watched Matteoni Ridge. Just before sunlight hit the ridge, a doe walked out onto the first plateau below the top of Matteoni, crossed the open space in my direction and disappeared. She was followed by a forked-horn who stayed on the far side of the ridge, thrashing away at the low-hanging branches of an oak, showing only from the neck up. After a minute of this, he just sort of faded away back on the side he had come from, just tantalizing me. No shot: distance, constant movement, limited target kept him safe. Much later, a coyote appeared, down below me, and worked at the head-n-hide of Sandy's deer of the week before. From where I sat I could hear him crunching the ears! He worried at that carcase for an hour, finally quitting it after a little urine-marking beside it, and trotted up the jeep trail and finally on over into Prune Ridge Swale.
I made my way back to the cabin, passing a big limb fallen from the massive Valley Oak growing in the bottom of South Flat. It was quite 24 inches in diameter and almost thirty feet long. I'm pretty sure the night's wind storm brought it down.
I scattered corn for the turkeys, re-lit the cold fire and learned what Bill meant when he warned me about some firewood that wasn't really dry yet. I generated almost as much smoke as David does--only I didn't try. I read and napped and read some more and finally fried up some chorizo sausage and had tortillas, beans and chorizo for afternoon snack. I also unlimbered my new dutch oven and browned some venison from last year and set it simmering. It works quite well to perch the oven on the corner of the fireplace, its three legs straddling the bricks, and every once in a while pushing a burning stick under it to keep the liquor hot.
Another nap brought me to huntin' time and I opted for Hummingbird, again. Sometimes deer are creatures of habit, and that buck just might make a mistake. So I sat at the tree, ducking away from the wind and scoped the hillsides, just a-waitin'. Well, along comes a bobcat, who sniffed at the (diminished) deer, but distained to scavenge it. HE marked territory, scratched and threw up some dirt like the bold "bob" he was, and HE sauntered up the jeep trail and into the Swale! Just before he passed out of sight, I saw him make a try for some rodent in the grass: he readied, then leaped easily his standing height and length to make a pounce, but was unsuccessful. Beauty in motion; almost like defying the law of gravity. Wonderful!
Well, no deer came out that night. It might have been due to a coyote chorus from 6 to 7 o'clock from the far side of the Ridge...wha-da-ya think? Back at the cabin, I was snorted at by two deer coming to water. Bozos! Twenty minutes later, with the fire shooting up, the lantern pumped and blazing and me dragging chairs around, and they are still snorting at me, trying to figure me out. Bozos!
Once, twice, third time's the charm, isn't it? So, I opted for Hummingbird, again, Sunday morning. Cool, again, with a light breeze. I sat 'way over against the fence, this time, to get a slightly different view. Just as sunlight touched the mid-point of Matteoni Ridge, there was movement down, down, far down at the lowest clearing one can see. Well, what I could see was antlers, so I ups and pulls down on this vision, but some twigs ten feet in front of me are in the way! So I scoot uphill a smidge and go into stance again, but by this time I'm wavering too much. It is FAR down there, thirty or more degrees downhill and all I can see is this slowly-walking deer's back, and it is big and I'm all nervous--yeah, buck fever. I don't want to miss--it's not fair to me or him, so I stand up and settle my forearm into the crotch of the tree beside me, steady down and...and...the buck passes out of sight! AAARGH! Of course, it never shows again.
I had my chance, I'll admit it. This was a BIG buck...maybe it was Sandy's big forky that she had a chance at the week before; I don't know. This is what went wrong: I hadn't made sure of my firing lanes to every possible deer site; I hadn't planned my shooting stance for extra steadiness for some of these very far shots, and I was hesitant because I hadn't prepared for a shot down into a deer's back...you know, you plan for broadside, and quartering to and away, but...DOWN? And I never thought buck fever would affect me to such an extent. Ah, well. How do you make good decisions? From experience. How do you get experience? From bad decisions! I had a window of opportunity only about four deer-lengths long, and now I have experience. And it WAS tremendously exciting! Breed, me buck-o, and I'll see you next year!
LATE that morning, hot, discouraged, I trudged back to camp, and had more burritos. (By the way, there was a travelling tarantula on Prune Ridge.) After nap, the turkeys showed up.
I cleaned up camp and added veggies to the dutch oven (yes, still cooking), threw on another chunk, and headed out to....Hummingbird. I moved slowly from one to another perch, watching keenly. This was, after all, the last day of the season. I thrilled to find, low down, a doe and yearling loitering in the open as evening wore on...boy, was I watching for any sign of a buck! My eyes were glued to the binocs; gave myself dents in the eyebrows (pilose soft tissues overlying the supra-orbital ridges, Tom??) from the constant glassing, but to no avail. Night dropped softly, the woodpeckers were 'keeking' and I stayed on-station much longer than was practical. (Sigh!) This year, I'm skunked.
I bellied-up to cupfuls of savory dutch oven stew, bagged the trash, grated the fire, latched the door, tipped the water out of my cooler, slammed the tailgate, and I was gone. Up at the top, the view of the glittering valley was, as always, achingly beautiful. I locked the gate and I was off, down the long, dusty road to home.
Mike
