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EJ65 · Joined: 09 Feb 2004 Posts: 21 Location: Northern California

Ahh... the @#$%ing blacktail. I've been trying to tell people for years that BT's are the hardest (and most satisfying) deer to hunt. I sat next to a guy in an airport from a state I will not tarnish (but he had a large hat). This gentleman and I talked rifles, calibers, techniqe and deer for a good hour. Then he mentions that he's shot over 50 WT's in his life. I said, "wow, that's a lot of animals." He asked what my number was and I said, "oh, well let's see here. Well there was, the one on top of Highway 50, the forken horn and.. Yep, that's it. I shot three Black Tailed Deer. I shot a couple of Mulies too." He said, "but you just told me how much you love to go hunting every year..." I said, "yeah I do. It's just that black tails always win." I told him about the time my cousin lost a tooth because he walked over a blacktail when we were bushwacking for a fishing hole - the deer waited for him to literally walk over him, then popped up and caught my cousin with an antler sending him into the rocks below - The time I went three years without seeing one except for tons of sign. He looked incredulously at me as I told him I shot my first one by clinging to a cliff 50 feet above a possible bedding area. I had been watching deer in that area for two weeks and had decided that the only way to get in was to sneak down the cliff. So California blacktail hunting = lot's of hunting and very little shooting.

hunter_jere · Joined: 20 Mar 2004 Posts: 17 Location: Vancover Island B.C

if you want to know where to hunt black tailes for the ultmite challenge try vancover island b.c and i have lived and hunted there all my life and i have tooked 2 deef from here and i also went to the queen chrooltts but i think the ones on my home area of vancover are the hardest because i spenp so much time hunting with my dad and i have learned that there are nothing like mule deer who travle their own trails where you can put up a tree stand and just wait to get a blacktail deer you must do lots of bush hunting and cover lots of ground with a truck and even then the most deer i saw during hunting in one day is 20 and we were amazed normally being lucy in seeing one a week.

hunter_jere · Joined: 20 Mar 2004 Posts: 17 Location: Vancover Island B.C

so black tailed are the hardest espiclly the vancoverisland blacktailed deer

chrisout · Joined: 14 Apr 2004 Posts: 2 Location: California

EJ65 wrote: Ahh... the @#$%ing blacktail. I've been trying to tell people for years that BT's are the hardest (and most satisfying) deer to hunt. I sat next to a guy in an airport from a state I will not tarnish (but he had a large hat). This gentleman and I talked rifles, calibers, techniqe and deer for a good hour. Then he mentions that he's shot over 50 WT's in his life. I said, "wow, that's a lot of animals." He asked what my number was and I said, "oh, well let's see here. Well there was, the one on top of Highway 50, the forken horn and.. Yep, that's it. I shot three Black Tailed Deer. I shot a couple of Mulies too." He said, "but you just told me how much you love to go hunting every year..." I said, "yeah I do. It's just that black tails always win." I told him about the time my cousin lost a tooth because he walked over a blacktail when we were bushwacking for a fishing hole - the deer waited for him to literally walk over him, then popped up and caught my cousin with an antler sending him into the rocks below - The time I went three years without seeing one except for tons of sign. He looked incredulously at me as I told him I shot my first one by clinging to a cliff 50 feet above a possible bedding area. I had been watching deer in that area for two weeks and had decided that the only way to get in was to sneak down the cliff. So California blacktail hunting = lot's of hunting and very little shooting.
Yep, I totally agree.
I have been going into the sierra's for 20 years. I have seen allot of them.
Only 25 or so that were huge. I mean 200 pound ten to twelve+ pointers. All of them when I was not hunting. I mostly have been fishing when I have seen them, it seems like they know the difference.
I have had the oportunity to harvest one deer, the first time I actually went hunting in the the D3 zone. It was an 11 pointer and it was pure luck. It was around 3 oclock in the the afternoon and I believe he was being chased by a mountain lion or was spooked by one. he came down two hundred feet almost straigt down a pure rock wall and stopped 30 feet on front of me looked back up the wall then at me. I dropped him where he stood. like I said it was pure luck or a gift from god. I actually have walked up on a mountain lion in this area as he was killing a snow goose. this area has a large population of lions according to the local forest ranger.

blacktailer · Joined: 10 Sep 2004 Posts: 10

I've been lucky enough to bag four "Phantoms" in jsut a few years and recently trying to get my third consecutive in three years. Knowing that they are a challenge and the willingness to work hard to find a good buck is what makes it so much fun!!!

sacramentojoe · Joined: 09 Dec 2004 Posts: 3 Location: Sacramento,CA

blacktailer wrote: I've been lucky enough to bag four "Phantoms" in jsut a few years and recently trying to get my third consecutive in three years. Knowing that they are a challenge and the willingness to work hard to find a good buck is what makes it so much fun!!!

You from Cali? Where do you go ?
I cant seem to find a good spot unless you want to pay $500 bucks for one.

Thanks.