We started 2022 heading into our third year of the COVID-19 pandemic and got introduced to Omicron and all its siblings and children. 2022 also seemed to be the year where the effects of climate change really hit home in the PNW. For all the weirdness though we actually did quite a bit this year and spent a lot of time outdoors truffling, hiking, camping, hunting and fishing.
This year I decided to do a second turkey camp in Southern Oregon to get some more turkey meat in the freezer, to get a few more Rios and to check out the Rogue Valley. I had kind of wanted to do the West Coast Turkey Tour and fit in California but didn’t pull it off this year, maybe next year I’ll go for all three. I had debated on wether or not to tow the trailer or tent camp but decided the trailer would be way more comfy so did the long tow down on Monday and set up camp in Gold Hill, very close to some of the turkey spots we were going to hit.
This year I headed back over to the Spokane area for turkey hunting. I had originally planned a trip to Winthrop a few weeks ago but the weather (don’t get me started) was horrible so that got canceled and I was placing all my bets on Spokane/Cheney area which also happened to have an extended three bird limit this year. I towed the trailer over on Tuesday and set up camp at Riverside State Park, wandered around finding a few false morels and then tried to get some sleep.
2020 totally sucked between the Coronavirus pandemic, lockdowns, wildfires and finally Lira injuring her knees so I had hopes 2021 would be a huge improvement. As I write this we are pretty much back in the same place we were in winter of 2020 with the new omicron variant raging in Seattle and the rest of the world and the obvious impacts of climate change hammering us with snow and, for Seattle, extreme cold. The year has been full of pandemic canceled plans but has some bright spots with Lira making a full recovery by summer time and taking on new challenges this fall.
Lira is back to bird hunting after last year’s injury and subsequent stem cell treatment to try and get her back. She’s been out after birds a few days a week only, not wanting to push her daily like I used to so we tend to hunt Mondays or Tuesdays and Thursdays or Fridays. I do have her drag a check cord to help slow her down a bit but she’s been doing great and finding birds every single time we get out, whether or not I get a shot is another thing but this week I’ve hit every bird that we found and the freezer is getting some pheasants again.
To give her something to do on her off days we enrolled her in truffle dog school through the Truffle Dog Company in Seattle. We started the Foundations I class a week ago and have her booked up with classes through the end of the year. She seems to really enjoy “hunting” truffle scent under cones in the house, is getting used to clicker training and loves all the extra treats. This should be a good activity for the off season for her since truffle season here picks up about the time bird season is slowing down.
After last year’s short and hardly huntable turkey season I had hopes for this year. Everyone was confident cases would be dropping like a rock in April and May so things would be safe this year. Of course Washington and Oregon are still on the increase having fourth waves but at least I’m fully vaccinated as of last Saturday so I went ahead and had my trip that I had booked with Joe for last season. Even with the vaccine I had trepidation about the trip. The counties over here are the fifth worst in the nation for new COVID cases at the moment, I hadn’t shot anything in six months and I hadn’t been out using my shotgun since last fall when Lira got hurt. I did manage to get to the range and zero in my Fastfire red dot but still felt a lot of concern that I’d end up missing or wounding a bird. The whole thing tied me up in knots to the point where I was debating just stopping hunting altogether so I sort of needed today.
2020 was by far the worst year for pretty much everyone. In my case maybe 2014 was worse since I was sick the entire year but 2020 has been one thing after another mostly hijacked by the Coronavirus pandemic. I had such big plans starting the year, I had stopped working (again) and was looking forward to several big hunting trips, camping and travel to the LA sunshine. All that lasted about eight weeks.
They re-opened the outdoors in Washington on May 5th and after a week of letting the crowds thin out I decided to start getting back out there. Lira and I have been hitting the lakes early in the morning to avoid the crowds and the boat ramp backups. It has been fun getting out on the water but our freezer isn’t filling up too fast, I’m in a streak of losing fish and bringing home one per day out when I hook two or three more. I need about 8-10 trout to get the trout supply in decent shape for the rest of the year so I’ll keep at it while I can over the next few weeks.
Yesterday I went turkey hunting for the day over in the Teanaway. Tough to do in a day trip with no scouting but it was great getting out into the woods for a full day. I covered a range of spots in the DNR land over there and put in about 8 miles of walking with a lot of calling and sitting in good looking spots. The highlight of the day was when a mule deer walked out into one of my spots. The deer knew something was up but wasn’t quite sure what to make of me and it finally just walked off after looking in my direction a few times but not really spooking. Of course the only turkey I saw was walking across Red Bridge Road as I was driving back home. I may try to get in one more day before the season ends just because it was so nice being outside all day and not having to deal with running into other people at all.
I have no idea what this is all going to mean for fall so I’m hoping to take advantage of as many local opportunities as possible to get a deer in the freezer and do a bunch of bird hunting. All I know is that I’m glad we have a fairly well stocked freezer at the moment from last year and between that, our garden and CSA we don’t even need to go to the grocery store too often.
Another year gone by already and what a year it was. I spent a lot of this year dealing with a relapse of SIBO and some other health issues but still managed to get outside every single day, got in a lot of hunting and fishing and had quite a few good trips locally, to the LA area and to British Columbia. So much, in fact, I couldn’t even really get it all in the picture grid.
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After last season being a bust in the big-game department I decided that I would try and get out of state for a hunt at least once a year to better insure a freezer full of meat. I knew if we rationed I would get to October so we cut back on venison consumption and ate more fish and birds. I started looking for a trip and contacted Backcountry Montana Adventures who were listed as a RMEF supporter and began discussing options. Originally this trip was going to be Catherine and I doing a bit of whitetail doe hunting and looking in the mountains outside of Dillon for a mule deer buck. After planning the rest of our year Catherine decided against leaving Lira for a week so I switched the trip to be a whitetail only hunt and invited Christian along since he now had an empty freezer and had never been on a big game hunt before.