October 25, 2015 by Shawn Chittim
It has taken my Dad 13 years to draw his first choice deer tag in California. We have bounced around units trying to time the luck of the draw with the expectations of what is currently going on in our hot list of units. His 1st choice this year was the M9 Devils Garden Muzzleloader Hunt; we are hoping to put him on a quality buck worthy of the wait. It's been a very busy fall so we haven't been to "The Garden" until this weekend, although it was the opener for us it was more of a scouting trip, but since it was open we packed the muzzleloader just in case. With the minimal Shelley, Dad & I headed Northeast, our intentions were just for a quick up and back, nothing too serious but we needed to take a quick look around.
We were greeted by a heavy layer of smoke from a prescribed burn to our south, it was just enough to burn the eyes and the smell was almost palpable. We spent the evening covering ground and getting the feel of the landscape. The hazy smoke made for an amazing sunset.
Sunday morning, we had a 10-15 mph south wind, we started picking up deer shortly before sunrise. We continued to cover ground in the unit as the sun rose in the East. We continued to mark deer throughout the day but the South wind was really picking up speed and by 1:00 p.m. we were faced with a steady 20 mph wind.
It was a quick 24 hours in "The Garden", while we didn't locate a potential shooter, we were able to locate several pockets of deer and several small bucks. In windy, warm, dry and dusty conditions our deer count was over 70, it didn't seem to deter the younger bucks from trying to start the rut a little early.
We'll keep you posted as we progress through the season, we are looking forward to an exceptional hunt.
Posted in: California Deer Hunting
