It’s been a hard year of hunting so far. It’s been unseasonably warm, except for one snow storm that only stuck around for a day. There are hardly any deer in the area – our camp usually has two or three bucks hanging by the second weekend, and this year it took until three and a half weeks in before the first one was killed.

And the bear feed is non-existant this year. Usually one source of feed produces well. One year it was acorns, last year it was choke cherries. There’s usually something to draw them in and hold them in the area while they stuff their faces to fatten up for winter. This year though, it’s lean. There are hardly any cherries or acorns, and even the manzanita berries are thin. There aren’t as many deer gut piles for the bears to supplement their diets with. The few bears we’ve killed haven’t had any significant fat at all.

They’re still here, the bears, but they’re not staying put. We catch them travelling through looking for more feed, and we’re catching far fewer than in years past. This weekend was the first one I remember that we got absolutely skunked on. We didn’t even tree a sow and cubs to let go, like we did last weekend. No, this one was spent entirely looking for tracks, putting dogs out on marginal strikes, and then spending hours rounding up dogs.

We did have one bit of adventure. Senior had taken the three kids up to our camp while we bullshitted down at bear camp. On his way up, he came across some hunters that had run their Toyota off the road. Nothing they had could pull it out, his hooptie sure wouldn’t do it, and they were having a language problem with AAA.

So he called us on the radio to come lend a hand in the big Dodge. Now, if it were snowing or on a dirt road, we’d have thought twice about it, not being willing to risk having our truck go off the edge too, like happened to my friend Jeff a few years back in a storm. He’s still known as the guy who was hanging off the side of the mountain. Everyone who hunts up there has heard of him, and it’s not a flattering story.

But it was on dry pavement, and I carry a nice assortment of tow straps and chains, so Junior and Senior hooked one around the guy’s frame and chained it to my hitch. A few minutes later and he was out up on the road again, and very grateful. We didn’t even do any more damage to his truck getting it out; a different pull-point would have had the nose end swinging down into the trees. His front panel was wedged into his tire, so again we hooked a chain to it and gave it a little pressure with the Dodge, and it popped right out. He had only damaged his windshield washer reservoir, so he was even free to roll again.

The ladies with them were so grateful. It was very cute. They didn’t speak much English but were trying to push money at us. We didn’t accept; sometime it might be us needing help. It was nice for the help to be appreciated though, and it was also nice to have something to take photos of for the weekend at least.

There’s a storm rolling in tonight that should have both the deer and the bear milling around nicely. Junior’s going up Wednesday night and I wish I could too. But I’ve got a new hire working backup for me starting this weekend and I don’t get to leave early any more. But hey, at least I get to go. I’ll take two days over nothing any time.