The Blacktail Coach Podcast
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The Blacktail Coach Podcast
Coastal, Valley, & High Cascade: How Habitat Shapes Blacktail Deer Behavior
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A blacktail buck in coastal rainforest doesn’t live like a blacktail buck on a High Cascade ridge, and pretending they do is a fast way to waste a season. Aaron and Dave dig into the real-world differences between coastal, valley, and High Cascade blacktail hunting across Washington, Oregon, and Northern California, using one simple lens: every deer is hunting for food, safety, and the opportunity to breed, but each landscape delivers those needs in its own way.
We talk about how “thick cover” changes from a wall of brush on the coast to small, high-percentage bedding spots in steep mountain country, and why that drives everything from visibility to stalking tactics. We also get into regional genetics and what hunters notice in body size and antlers, including why heavy coastal vegetation often produces more basket-style racks while harsh Cascade winters can reward the strongest survivors.
Then we zoom in on movement and patterning. Valley bucks can hold tight to small home ranges, but High Cascade bucks may expand their range and shift elevation with the snow line, meaning one storm can reset months of scouting overnight. We wrap with practical food and habitat insights: blackberries, vine maple, fresh green shoots, trail vines, abandoned orchards, acorns in scrub oak country, plus how logging, clearcuts, and controlled burns can create the groceries and cover that help deer thrive. If you want more consistent results, this one helps you match your approach to your terrain.
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Coastal Valley And Cascade Differences
SPEAKER_03Welcome back to the Blacktail Coach Podcast. I'm Aaron. And I'm Dave. Okay, this week we are gonna talk about coastal valley and high cascade blacktail hunting. We've kind of mentioned different styles of hunting in different episodes, but I wanted to talk more about the differences. Okay. And I would say that there's probably some differences between what I'm calling northern black tails versus southern black tails. So kind of that, I would say just a little south of Eugene, the habitat starts changing. Roseburg area.
SPEAKER_04Yes.
SPEAKER_03Down Medford, Ashley, Northern California.
SPEAKER_04A lot more pine, scrub oak, manzanita. Manzanita, yep.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. So it ends up being a lot different down there. So those bucks end up are a little different potentially. That's what I'm guessing. Then this is me. I'm I'm going to be picking your brain throughout this episode to know the difference. And we've had people who've reached out to us because there are similarities between the different absolutely.
SPEAKER_04I think all deer have the same similarities as far as because blacktail or blacktail. Yep. Deer love edges and you know, so blacktail, white tail, even mule deer, you know. Yeah. So there's that commonality between the three species. So there's obviously going to be commonalities between the different I won't say subspecies, but different regional species of black tail that between, you know, Southern Oregon, Northern California, all the way up to British Columbia.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. And so you've mentioned liking edges, and I would also think thick stuff.
SPEAKER_04Yeah.
SPEAKER_03Now the thick stuff looks different.
SPEAKER_04It looks different in in different areas.
SPEAKER_03Yes. And one of the things, so this was what was eye-opening when I watched one of Born and Raised videos on YouTube. And he, I think it was when he got his blacktail this last year. And watching where that buck went after he got his first shot, I think they took a shot and missed, and then they they had to wait for it, but it ran into the really thick stuff. Now, granted, thick stuff down there, southern Oregon, is looking a little bit different, but that meant security. Absolutely. Safety.
SPEAKER_04Absolutely, yep.
SPEAKER_03And so one of the things I was also thinking about what's true for each. So you talk about in the classes, they're looking for three things the food, the safety, and the opportunity to breathe.
SPEAKER_04Yep.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. So that's going to be true, but those would potentially look different.
SPEAKER_04Yes, absolutely. So uh and and you're kind of touching on it here, as far as like you talked about Trent, mid to southern Oregon, versus up here in the southwest Washington in the valley here. When I say valley, I mean be you know, between the coastal range and the cascades, where we're hunting valley bucks, versus say what Nathan Endicott hunts as far as a high cascade hunt, you're gonna have different, obviously, habitat, foliage, and thick thick is gonna look different in each of those areas.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_04And I mean, we haven't even touched on coastal.
What Thick Cover Really Means
SPEAKER_04So we just went up to forks last weekend. That's a whole different that's a whole different kind of thick. I mean, that is just a wall of thickness, you know, and and there's very few openings outside of clear cuts, but those bucks are huge because there's so much vegetation, there's so much food versus Southwest Washington, where we're at in the valley. I'm not saying there's not huge bucks, but you compare our bucks as far as what we see here versus in the same valley down mid to southern Oregon, they're gonna have larger racks because the foliage, it's different, it thins out a little bit more down there. They're not in the heavy stuff all the time. A lot of coastal bucks, they get huge, they get big, but there's a lot of basket rack bucks too.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_04Because of that heavy foliage, it affects how their antlers grow.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, sitka black tails being the prime example of that. Yeah, big bodies, small basket racks. Yep. Whereas, and that's the thing with Sitka is I think they're the numbers lower for getting them like Pope and Young, isn't it?
SPEAKER_04Yes, it is. Yeah, it is, yeah. Because the racks are smaller generally, yeah. Versus high cascade bucks like Nathan Endekat. Yeah, you know, so up where Nathan's hunting and stuff, it's survival of the fittest. Those winners are much more harsh than they are down here in the valley, you know. So it's it's the strong who survive. So that gene, when they get a gene that that carries on year after year, that's a strong gene. That's a strong deer. And you know, when you see, let's say you see a three and a half year old, a three and a half down here in the valley. Yeah, well, the three and a half up there is typically going to be bigger. But and that's not to take anything away from anyone who hunts anywhere. It's all dear to me, and it's it's all fun.
SPEAKER_03It's interesting because you mentioning that, thinking about these online when people post their bucks online.
SPEAKER_04And you start hearing the bench leg and all this.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, you start hearing things like that, but also so somebody had posted from Mendocino County, posted a black tail picture, and everybody's like, Yeah, you you need to learn what a mule deer is. Those are our true black tail, it's the genetics, but understanding the genetic genetics in different different areas, so right, yeah, each of these are gonna have different genetics to them. Now, one of the things I was wondering, they all as a true for all of these, they all have a range. Yes. That really only changes if there's like an outside pressure predator or logging or things like that, but they all stick with their same range their whole life. Because we talk about you've mentioned a lot of times that study that Washington did years ago that the average was 51 acres for a Washington blacktail.
SPEAKER_04Correct. And I would say that would be a valley buck.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_04Because again, going again back to Nathan Endicott saying as far as cascades, and you and I have talked about it off air several times, that range that that cas that high cascade buck has is going to be greater. Because they have to follow that snow line, they have to follow that snow line, and the food sources aren't as plentiful as you know, the higher you get up into that alpine, I mean, food sources become more and more scarce.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, not as much undergrowth. Exactly.
SPEAKER_04Exactly. And so their range has to be bigger in order to survive, you know. And like you touched on the snow level. Man, we get into those winter months, and guys, you know, they're always asking me, can your system work up there on a high cascade? Yeah, but it's much more suspect to being blown up than say doing a technique like Nathan Endicott. And what I mean by that is that you can spend all summer patterning a buck, figuring him out, get ready to go out there and hunt that buck, and the night before you go in, all of a sudden there's a snowstorm that blew in up there. Say it dropped 12, 15, 18 inches of snow. Now that buck has moved down.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_04And I don't know how far the mountain he's moved down.
SPEAKER_031200 feet.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, uh, you know, it who knows? He could be a mile far farther down for all we know.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, or more.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, and it's like now you're starting over. You're starting blind. You see what I'm saying? Whereas Nathan has spent on those hills, just watching him, you can see that that guy knows those. It's like Steve Isdall. You know, if you've ever read any of his books or watched any of his videos or whatnot, he has spent decades learning that mountain, that mountain range, that that valley where he hunts his black tail.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_04He knows where they go, when they go there, why they're going there. He knows when to go out. He, you know, and I've read both his books as far as on blacktail and whatnot, and it and he's, you know, he's like, Well, I knew that they would be pushed down, and I knew that I had to wait for either the first snow or the first good snow or whatever before he finally
Antlers Genetics And Regional Variance
SPEAKER_04went in and started hunting certain bucks.
SPEAKER_03And then there are certain years that that can get screwed up, like thinking last year, and I was speaking with someone who normally goes in to shed hunt, uh-huh, and he said 3,200 feet. He goes in, that's where they're at. They're at 3,200 feet for these high cascade bucks down in this area, and they were at 5,200 feet this year.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. Because we didn't get the weather.
SPEAKER_03Because there was to come down, yeah. Yeah.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. And see, that's like I was saying with Steve and Nathan, that's years of figuring out their spots.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_04You know what I mean? But it's also really, I mean, it takes a certain degree of intelligence to recognize that well, like Steve Isdall, he says, there's this, he says, I figured out that there are certain spots where these deer like to bed. And when he says certain spots, he's talking about like a two foot by three foot spot. He's not talking like a bedding area. He's talking about a little two foot by three foot spot that when he comes around a ridge or he comes over a bluff or whatever you he comes around, he'll just peek over and start glassing that two foot by three foot spot.
SPEAKER_03Because it's the only flat spot on a 60-degree.
SPEAKER_04He's got bucks right there, and he knows that's where they want to lay because they can see everywhere. The wind is brought right to them.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_04He's figured it out.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_03One of the things, and I just got to thinking about this while I was putting together the script for all of this, because we talk about valley bucks. And when I was kind of doing research, it tried to imply that valley bucks were more ag related bucks. So here I think I can see that.
SPEAKER_04I think I can see that.
SPEAKER_03So that was one of the things I was going to ask about the difference. So, yes, technically we're in a valley. We're because we're in between the Cascades and we're in the coast range. So we're sort of in a valley. But it's different than say the Willamette Valley, which is all very flat. Ag, you know, a lot more ag a lot more ag down there. Yeah. And so I gotta think that there's some differences between our valley bucks and those valley bucks, potentially. What what maybe I say yes and no.
SPEAKER_04I don't know that we have that I would say that we have 100% ag deer in the Pacific Northwest, just because agriculture is it is a business, it is a an industry out here, more on the east side than it is on the west side of the Cascades.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_04And it isn't like I go to Kansas as much as I can to hunt whitetail. I was in North Dakota for four or three years, and you know, I've hunted throughout the Midwest. When they say ag it's miles and miles and miles of ag field. So here it's like, well, no, there's a farm over here, and maybe they do maybe they do corn over here or onions or potatoes or or whatever it is. We're more orchards than we are. Yeah. Which I guess would count as ag in a sense.
SPEAKER_03And I think the ag that are I'm really thinking like that the stuff Willamette Valley, that big wide open valley.
SPEAKER_04It's all flat. It's all flat. Up where we're at, there's not a whole lot of flat areas to do a lot of. And what is flat is typically down in the valleys by the rivers. And once you get out of that basin, it's all hills and mountains.
SPEAKER_03But thinking about like if they're popping up down there, maybe they're going out into these ag fields and eating it. I do remember somebody telling me that they when they were a kid, which now 50, 60 years ago and looking out west of Reading, out into the and I don't even know if that's ag out there. I know there is some when you get into and I don't know if that's Sacramento Valley up that far north, but just seeing blacktail deer or just deer out in these fields, and they're being hundreds of deer. They just they look like fleas, he said. And so thinking about they're gonna wander, because it's an easy meal, and if there's no hunting pressure or no bear or anything like that, they're gonna wander
Home Range Snowline And Movement
SPEAKER_03out. But I imagine they're not wandering out into the necessarily the middle of it, they're probably still sticking fairly close to those edges.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, that's a tough one. Yeah, that's a tough one. That you know, I don't that's a tough one because I've seen I've gone east side and and come on on over and sat on on alfalfa fields and watched just whitetail and mule deer just flood into them.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_04And they're on every square inch of it. You know what I mean?
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_04We just don't have a lot of egg where I've had the opportunity to sit and observe hunt of what a black tail would do in. Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. And I know like Jimmy, he's close to he's in some farmland. He's in some farmland, but he's also he's found that little thick spot on that property that he's hunting for.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. And I don't even know what it is they grow there, to be honest with you.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, I'm not sure either.
SPEAKER_04I don't know that Jimmy knows what they grow there because I don't know that he's ever, you know, he he hunts it early season and late season, and I've never seen a crop.
SPEAKER_03It might be actually more ranching because that's why he's maybe got access to it.
SPEAKER_04I don't know. I don't know. So it could be cattle. I've never seen cattle out there, but it could be cattle.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, interesting. Just pondering different different situations, but yeah, we don't necessarily have that in western Washington. That's not the agricultural aspect. Right. Yeah, I don't know if really there's because there's nothing really quite like the Willamette Valley or some of those valleys down in we're up here at the very top, just out of it. Yeah.
SPEAKER_04And and yeah, the Willamette Valley is I would count that as egg, it's flat from like, my goodness, from the south side of Portland. Wilsonville all the way down to Eugene. Yeah.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. It's flat, which I will be driving that very soon, a couple of times. So I was also thinking about habitat differences, and another question popped into my head about so we talk about the high cascade bucks or high the higher altitude bucks. Now, would bucks in the coastal range, they're not necessarily like high cascade bucks. Would would they be behaving the same? Because they're and I'm just thinking because there's not necessarily the level of snow potentially.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, they get they I mean, obviously they get more snow than we do in the coastal range, but it's not like it's heavy uh large large amounts where it's like, okay, they get we get eight inches, they get four feet. It isn't like that. You know, we get eight inches, they get maybe they get eight eighteen. Yeah. So it I mean But it melts off almost relatively quick because you gotta think on one side of that is that constant ocean air.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_04And it that offshore air is blowing it, and the Pacific is warmer, you know, than the Atlantic, and and so it just it it's gonna melt that snow relatively quick.
SPEAKER_03So a lot of those, while they might move down t temporarily, but I don't think it may be more than a day or two. Yeah. It doesn't seem like whereas high cascade, I you know, there's a certain point where 4,000 feet, they just can't stay there anymore. They have to drop down lower.
SPEAKER_04Absolutely.
SPEAKER_03But there, the highest altitude, you know, maybe if it goes up to 3,500, I'm not sure where the highest point is, unless you're talking like the Olympic mountains, but it just seems like dropping down, it's gonna melt off fast.
SPEAKER_04Right.
SPEAKER_03So it's not like that they have to make a lot of accommodation.
SPEAKER_04Right. They're not traveling very far for those differences.
SPEAKER_03Okay, northern, southern Oregon, Northern Black Tales, Coastal Valley, High Cascade. I was also thinking the California coast, because we talk a lot about Southern Oregon, California, but from the border down pretty well past even Eureka, there's a lot of, and now it doesn't take long to go inland before you're getting into that manzanita stuff or to go very south. But there's some areas up north of, I would say, Eureka up to the coast. It's thick, it's that you know, it's that coastal thick.
SPEAKER_04Right, right.
SPEAKER_03Basically, like if you've ever seen a camp spot on the coast where they just cut all the plants back and create a little bowl and put a picnic table in a fire pit, and there's your camp spot. That's what a campground looks like out on the coast. And that's kind of what you have to do. You're just you're cutting the wall back to a certain I laugh because that's the way it was in Forks. Yeah.
SPEAKER_04I mean, it it's a you know, so up north obviously it's a rainforest. And I would say that it's probably a rainforest there too, in the northern portion there, right up against the coast like that. You our climate tends to dry out, say, from July 5th. Well, I'm just I'm thinking i as far down down the coast, you would where you would start seeing a difference in more of a drier climate than you would a wetter climate, like a rainforest type of just south of Eugene is where I've noticed that it really starts changing. Yeah, you start seeing that break and whatnot, but you know, we still get a lot of rain.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, that scrub oak. Yeah, that's when it really starts. Umqua. Yeah, Roseburg, down there.
SPEAKER_04You start seeing a little bit of high desert look to some things. It's still thick though.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. Well, see, and that's thinking about those that thick, it's just because talking to the the guys I know down in Mendocino County, they just talk about their the thick spot is the manzanita, and they're standing in it, and you'll go walking by and a buck will jump out right next to you, and you didn't see them because it's so thick, and it's just a small patch of the manzanita, and that's that that whole kind of area that they're just hiding in those little spots that might be just kind of a few acres or or even less. You know, it might be a few hundred yard patch, but yeah, if they can hide out in there.
SPEAKER_04Oh, absolutely. Yeah, they're the best at it.
SPEAKER_03So thinking about the the way they move throughout their range, and I've seen that sick going up there, like their range can be as little as 20 acres.
SPEAKER_04Really?
SPEAKER_03Because yeah, I read that boy, that was a quite a while ago when I read that. But it was they were talking about how everything's there, and wandering around, I would think you it just increases your likelihood of running into a predator or something. So there's all the food that they need, their water, everything is just right there, and so they'll stay in a real small area. But there are different things where with high cascades. So we talked about the snow that increases their range. But like when you get in Southern Oregon, Northern California, the range can go a little bit bigger. Although, again, talking to those guys down in the Mendocino
Valley Deer And Agriculture Reality
SPEAKER_03County, they always said, if you ever see a buck, you do a circle one mile all the way around him, and you know that's where he's at in that one mile circle, and that's even down there. But thinking about as we've talked to people who've taken the class in California, water becomes a bigger issue. Huge.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_03Because of the heat, shade, different things, which is what's really affected a lot of the deer habitat is they're losing out on their shade and they're letting their like feed too. Because they're letting everything grow up. There's not that replenishment of food. Like the the mosaic burns. I know down there those become a huge factor.
SPEAKER_04And and I know that in our local area that when blogging was at its highest, when it was at its peak, that the blacktail were just flourishing.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_04Because you you always and as ugly as clear cuts may be to a lot of people, and granted, I don't hunt them, but they are a necessity as far as our animals and stuff. That's it's all groceries. Yeah. It's letting the sunlight get back down to the forest floor and letting stuff germinate and grow up. And it I mean, it grows up thick here. And it's like I said, it's all groceries, and if deer, groceries and cover, and if they have that, they're gonna flourish.
SPEAKER_03And now, you know, with the suppression from right.
SPEAKER_04We've seen our deer numbers go down as we have our our elk numbers.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. But the suppression of because they'll spray pesticides and pesticides, but stuff to keep er herb herbicides. To keep plants from growing until they've gone in and are they're able to replant. And so, yeah, it kind of really messes with the whole ecosystem.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, yeah, it really does.
SPEAKER_03But it's that it seems like that ever-changing habitat is really what works best for them wherever they're at. Now, for up here, that that includes a lot of logging because we're we don't necessarily get the forest fires over west of the Cascades to a huge extent.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_04We're getting more and more, but you're right. You get east of the Cascades and fires will burn for weeks, sometimes months.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, and but occasionally, yes, we do, you know, get a nice long dry period out of the coast. I mean, it seems like it's raining all the time, you know, and plus they have that morning fog rolls in and it burns off in the afternoon, so it's always wet.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_03Having going camping on the Northern California coast, it seems like it's always wet in the morning. Everything's just covered in because that fog rolls in. Right. And so you've got that, but thinking about that ever changing, like blacktails thrive when the habitat is something's changing the habitat, whether it's fires burn through.
SPEAKER_04It's like rotating crops.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_04You know what I mean?
SPEAKER_03Uh or or the logging and replanting 'cause it lets them move around, it gives them fresh feed. Yep. Yeah. So You know, we were talking about the differences in bucks, but knowing that in your area, so up here, logging creates some really good habitat. So there you go. Timberland is really good habitat for what we would call valley bucks. Absolutely. Or coastal bucks.
SPEAKER_04Yep.
SPEAKER_03Now, when you get into high cascade or I would say California, Northern California, into those drier areas, southern Oregon, those mosaic burns. You know, and hopefully they get do c some controlled burns, but those are great for feed. Creating feed.
SPEAKER_04Feed and cover, yeah. Because stuff comes back and it comes back thick, lush, and yeah, and deer love that. Deer and elk both love that. Now I'm not saying go out and start fires, but there's something to be said. I mean, whether it's a controlled burn or whether it's logging, you know, there's a way to keep that going that is beneficial not just for the timber industry or or wood industry, it's also beneficial for our ecosystem.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_04You know, and and the wildlife and that habitat. And we hear, you know, a lot of people coming against that because it it isn't necessarily aesthetically pleasing, you know, the first three, four years after it's been cut.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_04And I get that. But we have more deer and elk now than when Lewis and Clark came out here. And the reason is is because we have logged the timber, we have allowed the sunlight to get to the forest floor. It has generated countless acres of food, habitat, cover for the animals that that live here in the Pacific Northwest, and they have flourished because of it.
SPEAKER_03Old growth, from what I study, old growth timber is actually the worst for fawn to dough ratios.
SPEAKER_04There's no food. Because there's no food.
SPEAKER_03And there, yeah, there's no cover. So thinking again, that food safety, opportunity to breed. Well, there's no food and there's no safety.
SPEAKER_04Right.
SPEAKER_03So the deer aren't hanging out there in the in that old growth necessarily.
SPEAKER_04Right.
SPEAKER_03Okay, so we were talking about feed differences. Now, got thinking
Drier Country Water Shade And Burns
SPEAKER_03about this. So coastal valley and whether it's our valley versus Willamette Valley, more that 30 inches, 30 to 40 inches of rain per year or more. What are they typically eating, those those particular bucks?
SPEAKER_04So, you know, our deer, blackberries are huge here. And deer love blackberry bushes. If you you know, you go through and you're walking by the blackberries or whatnot, and you look over and you see the the leaves have been nipped off, or little viny maple bushes, you know, high sugar content in those leaves. And deer and elk love those. And you'll see a bush that's just been picked clean. Yeah. Because they eat just the leaf and leave the stem, you know. And so that is huge for deer and elk, is and fresh green shoots, fresh green grasses and whatnot that grow here. We go through winters, and our deer down here, you know, if we have a hard winter, you know, they may get relegated to trail vines, which aren't high in nutrition, but they'll sustain the deer throughout the winter. And we have a lot of trail vines.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_04But mostly they're eating the fresh, fresh green shoots off of the grasses and the leaves as as spring comes on and throughout the summer. Yeah, we've got a lot of greenery that they're gonna survive on. We have more briars up here than say down in in southern Oregon, Northern California.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_04But it's still gonna be the same as far as but they'll have a lot of acorns down there. All the scrub oak that's down there, they're gonna have acorns and whatnot. And there are some things that are both up here and down there, you know, sword ferns and that kind of stuff. But mostly the the fresh green shoots, especially during the the spring and summer months.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_04Which is really critical for a lot of the does and and fawns at that age. They want them to grow as fast as they can, so there's there's a lot of lot of availability for that stuff.
SPEAKER_03But come season, once season hits, which is probably different when you're talking September versus December. September is still plenty to eat out there, but it's once it's hitting.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, and that's what that's why I say they'll get rel relegated, you know, January, February, March, back down to those trail vines and whatnot. But uh, you know, being valley bucks, though sometimes they have the opportunity to usually go into it to a yard here and there, maybe at night or whatnot. Yeah. You know, October, November, there's late season apples. I know in our area, when this place was this area was was settled, that a lot of the people that that that settled this area had orchards.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_04And those those orchards have been grown over. That property has been lost it throughout time.
SPEAKER_03Random apple trees, it's kind of everywhere.
SPEAKER_04You'll be up in the woods, and here we got six plum trees.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_04You know, or oh my gosh, here's a little apple orchard right here. Well, you're on, you know, they were homesteaders that came out, and for some reason they left that and the land never got claimed, and now and I'm talking state land. We'll go up on state land and find that, you know.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_04So some of those are late season apples, some of those are late season pears. And and typically the deer and the bear will find those and really go to town, especially the bear.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_04I don't I don't catch a lot of elk. I'm not saying they don't, I just don't catch a lot of them in comparison to to deer and bear on the apples and and pears and whatnot. But we have a lot of that stuff around here that that they'll that they'll hit.
SPEAKER_03And there's still like again, thinking about the coast, a lot more, a lot of berries out there, a lot of different types of berries.
SPEAKER_04Milder temperatures, so it stuff will last longer.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. And but thinking Southern Oregon, Northern California, I know acorns. I just remember hearing bumper crop of acorns this last year. They were just shoveling them in. But yeah, there's not a lot, and that's one of the big problems with California, from what I understand, that Paul Trouette from Mendocino County Blacktail Association was telling me that they haven't managed the forest lands. And so it's all this old stuff. They don't want to eat old stuff, they want to eat young, fresh growth. Yep. Which is why those burns are so great. But it's it's figuring out your area, I guess, for each of these and what do they like. And but that's also different from buck to buck.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. There's stuff that's kind of universal that every deer likes, you know, and uh and and we look at we look at black tail buzzers, whereas whitetail are grazers.
SPEAKER_03And see, to me that sounds like the same word.
SPEAKER_04So a browser is is is something that likes a mixed bag.
unknownOkay.
SPEAKER_04And that's blacktail, they'll come in and guys that have bait and stuff, and they say, Well, you know, I put this out and nothing came in, or nothing like that. So blacktail like a mixed bag, and that they like multiple stuff. They don't want to they'll come in for just one thing, but they won't stay consistent on that one thing, you know. They're kind of opportunists in that sense. Whereas like whitale, you can and you see it on TV, they're gonna come into that same food plot over and over and over and over and over.
SPEAKER_03So grazing like a cow where they'll just eat everything down so it's nothing.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. So it's like you can bring them in. Let's say it's oh, what do they got out there? Let's say it's uh it's turnips. They could be on those turnips all season.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_04All late season rather, all winter long. They're on turnips. Or soybeans, you know, they come in and there's a soybean patch, and that soybean, they'll stay on that they won't every breakfast, lunch, dinner kind of thing. So that's a grazer. It comes into one food source continually all the time. Whereas a blacktail, you know, they're kind of like a they're kind of like the picky child, the picky eater.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, which is so I guess if you had if you were able to do a food plot somewhere, yeah, you want to have a mixed bag.
SPEAKER_04Absolutely.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. Because they'll be as as you have two bucks, we they've been named
Logging Clearcuts And Habitat Renewal
SPEAKER_03Dale and Brennan, who a couple of stepbrothers walking through the yard there, they eat a little bit of this, because they'll start off down by the apple trees and eat there aren't really there's sort of apples there, but now they're just eating leaves, the low-hanging leaves. Then they'll go over to the burn pile and eat some alder leaves.
SPEAKER_04And then in the middle of the yard, we got a whole mess of clover. They'll stop in there for a few minutes and and then they'll but they never spend a lot of time in any one particular spot.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, they don't eat it down to nothing.
SPEAKER_04Right, right. And that's the difference. You know, if you did clover for whitetail, you know, that the trick is to let it get above eight inches so that it reseeds itself. Uh-huh. Because before that, the whitetail, those deer will eat it down to the dirt.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_04Well, then it'll n it doesn't reseed itself. Is it it because they can come in and they will just focus on one particular until it's all gone.
SPEAKER_03It's knowing what coastal, just what's in your area that they like.
SPEAKER_04Yep.
SPEAKER_03And being aware of that. But so thinking about weather differences, because thinking coastal, probably a lot of wind, a lot of rain, but a lot of drizzly rain, not necessarily well, that's that's pretty common though for our side of the Cascades.
SPEAKER_04You know, we talk, and it's funny because I I said I went to Kansas or I go to Kansas a lot, and they were like, Man, you're up there from the Pacific Northwest, it rains all the time.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_04And I started saying to them, Well, how much rain do you guys get here? And they looked it up on Google and everything, and it came up 41 inches. And they said, Well, how much I said, How much rain do you think we get? Of course, they started throwing out double, sometimes triple that, and everything. I pulled it up online and it was like 42 inches.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_04And the difference is that we get rain spread out throughout six months where they get rain. Six months. Yeah.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_04Where they get rain and it's like buckets.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, it's two inch rainstorms.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. And so it's it we get the same amount. It's just ours is spread out over months and everything.
SPEAKER_03But you think of like forks, so coastal range, uh-huh. 80 inches a year.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_03So coast, they're getting more rain and more wind. Because it's just a constant wind blowing. And I mean, if you drive the coast, and this is from Washington all the way down into California, you'll see those trees that are growing in a weird shape because the wind is constantly blowing at them from one direction. So it's there's a certain way that I would think that they're being coastal bucks are becoming desensitized to wind and just constant rain. To or they're they've adapted to the so each of these bucks are adapting to a certain type of weather that they get more. High cascade, it might be snow. Southern Oregon, Northern California, heat.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, it's gonna be water. You're gonna they're gonna be more center centralized around the water. Whereas you come up here, maybe in August, a little bit in September, but that's it.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, water and shade down there, but the weather's going to change their their daily routine, their their and how maybe how there's the safety factor. So food, safety, opportunity to breed. Yep. Breaking it down to those coastal bucks, it's that okay, it's uh it's raining again. And the I would say our rain is probably pretty close to coast, only theirs they can get more drizzle.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, theirs is like a constant drizzle. I don't think it ever stops.
SPEAKER_03And then like last year, they were probably getting deluged with the atmospheric rivers like we were as well. Although once they hit the cascades, they dump even more water, you know, as they pass through the coastal range or through certain areas there. But like different bucks when we talk about valley bucks versus high cascade bucks versus coastal bucks, there's different extreme weather and typical weather, and so they've got to adapt to those a certain way.
SPEAKER_04And and I will I would say that the bigger, the tougher deer are definitely the high cascades.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_04Because the weather, if we're talking about weather, the the weather alone is so much more extreme. It is mild. Yes, it is mild here in the valley and on the coastal range in comparison to the high cascade.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_04And I mean, it to me it's not even close. So our deer here, and I'll say that about myself. I'm soft. If I was a deer, I would be in the valley. I I couldn't make it up in the high cascades because it is a harsher climate, both summer and winter. The amount of food, the amount of cover, it's all gonna be less up there. The amount of protection, you know, say as far as as cover provides and all that stuff, it's gonna be less up there. The the winds are gonna be more severe. Yeah, the temperature ranges are gonna be more severe, the storms are gonna be more severe. Everything about it is a harsher life.
SPEAKER_01Yeah.
SPEAKER_04So to me, when you get when you get a big buck up there, you've in my personal opinion, you've accomplished something. That's incredible. Hats off to Nathan Endicott, hats off to him and all his buddies that go up there and do that. Those guys in my they're all of our listeners who do that, yeah. Yeah, to me, they're good hunters. That's the standard that that I would put in my life to say that's what I want to achieve. Now I'm 50, I've got Lyme's disease, I don't have the opportunity, I can't do that anymore. But if I could work, but that would be the person that I would be, those would be the guys I would be striving to be like myself.
SPEAKER_03That is the mark that you want your son to achieve.
SPEAKER_04There you go.
SPEAKER_03There you go.
SPEAKER_04There you go.
SPEAKER_03So let's
What Blacktail Eat And Why
SPEAKER_03wrap up here thinking about like ways to hunt. So high cascade, is it pretty much spot in stock?
SPEAKER_04Is your yeah, so I would say it's probably 90%, 95% spot in stock. One of Nathan Endicott's buddies last was it last year or the year before killed an absolute giant out of the street.
SPEAKER_03From a tree stand, yeah.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, but you don't get the activity up there that you do down here.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_04You know what I mean? Because the numbers are different.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, and they're they're potentially traveling further during the day.
SPEAKER_04The range is a lot bigger and stuff. So, like I said, he man, what an accomplishment.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_04But yeah, probably 90 to 95% spot in stock.
SPEAKER_03Now, I would think Southern Oregon, Northern California, and uh glassing is kind of a everywhere. Yeah, I'd say yeah, but maybe not out the out at the coast.
SPEAKER_04I mean I would say that that that that particular area has a little bit of everything.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_04You know what I mean?
SPEAKER_03For your valley bucks.
SPEAKER_04Yeah, as far as being able to do the spotting stock, being able to do the glassing from an advantage point, being able to do hunting thick cover, that kind of thing. I think you have that advantage.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, the ambush hunting or the set hunting.
SPEAKER_04You have that opportunity to do that, all that stuff down there.
SPEAKER_03Because they're probably again, Eugene up to up into Canada, smaller ranges. So you you've got a fairly good idea of where they could be going. Now the coast, I gotta think that's gotta be tough.
SPEAKER_04I I would think spot and stock would be so difficult there with all the sal that's there, and and man, everything that's blown down throughout the years is on that forest floor, and it's crunchy, and you're climbing over it or under it or whatnot. It's just so thick.
SPEAKER_03The only thing I could think of as an advantage is the noise from the rain and the wind.
SPEAKER_04Yeah.
SPEAKER_03Covering for you.
SPEAKER_04But I still don't think it's easy to get through that stuff, though.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, that's gotta be the hunting coastal bucks.
SPEAKER_04That's gotta be a challenge.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_04That's gotta be a challenge.
SPEAKER_03Because I don't know if I'd want to approach anything but just set hunting. It's just, you know, you gotta come to me. We let just work out a deal. You come to me and I'll kill you.
SPEAKER_04There you go.
SPEAKER_03I'll make it quick.
SPEAKER_04I'll make it quick.
SPEAKER_03I'll put you out of your misery quick. I'll enjoy your backstraps. Okay. So hopefully a lot of that made sense as far as because just I've been curious about really wanting to understand the difference between again, they're not subspecies, they're all blacktail, but the habitat, the weather, all of those things, food, it's that that safety food and opportunities to breed, it affects and their habitat. It really affects their the I don't know, idiosyncrasies, the the behavior of these different deer in these different parts of these states.
SPEAKER_04So and it what's funny is that they're all in different spots, but the everybody says the same thing about them. They're hard to find.
SPEAKER_03They're hard to find.
SPEAKER_04Yeah. As far as a record book book. And uh I would agree with that a hundred percent.
SPEAKER_03But it's that it's that finding what's true free for all of them. They all have a range, the food safety, opportunity to breed, they all like edges, they all are gonna go looking for that thick stuff for cover. Yeah, there are gonna be there's things that are true. You just have to figure out how to work what's true in that your particular area in your favor
Weather Tactics And Closing Requests
SPEAKER_03come season. Yeah. Okay. Well, thanks for joining us this week. If you could go on, like, subscribe, share, especially share. Make it your goal to share this podcast with one person this week who either doesn't hunt and who's been really wanting to, or that just needs to listen to this podcast that you know that this will make him Dave will make them a better hunter by listening to him. Okay, as he's made us all better hunters. Again, trophy tactics for Turkey, trophy tactics for blacktail classes are open, deposits. You can go on the website, the blacktailcoach.com, you can go on the huntersgathering.com, get signed up. That's going to be a great weekend. Get signed up early. We have it set up actually this year where you can make your deposit and you can set it up where you can do monthly, equal monthly payments up until the hunters gathering, or you can just pay it all the balance at a later date. So, anyway, thanks for joining us, and we will talk to you next week.
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