Hard to believe that I could not spot a single deer from this lofty perch on the last day of the hunt. I could see a couple buck antelope in the distance and a little further out approximately 30 wild horses, but no mule deer.
The buck in the above photo was the second largest buck I saw during the six days I hunted. The photo was taken with my Cannon Powershot digital camera through my spotting scope. It’s not great, but it is a photo. This buck bedded under an alder bush where I could have got close, but I chose to wait for another opportunity, hoping something bigger would show up.
One of the factors impacting the deer herd in Nevada is the fire cycle. Several recent burns have reduced habitat in the area I hunted. This is a typical picture of what the desert habitat looks like about a year or two after a fire.
This family of burrowing owls seemed to be happy with the results of last years fires.
This is the site of a lighting caused fire that took place last month. The rancher who lives only about a mile from this fire site attempted to put the fire out before it spread, but he was unsuccessful. He told me that he feared his entire ranch would burn, but quick response from neighbors and aerial drops on the fire put it out before it exceeded about 100 acres.
An interesting development was that (apparently) aerial seeding of bitter brush has been at least somewhat successful. The burn I surveyed had many bitterbrush seedlings like the one above.
I’ll be back again. I’m sure exactly when, but the hunt is not over.
Well, glad you have resolved that you’ll be back again! That means you must have found something that brought you joy out there in the lonely desert!
We have terrible wildfires all the time over here and I wish they’d reseed with bitterbrush like that…that’s a great idea! Here it gets reseeded with grass, so all the sage that burns is gone forever. It’s sad.
[...] Nevada Archery Mule Deer Hunt Wrap « Rich Fletcher’s Blog Posted in Archery hunting, Big game hunting, Hunting, Wildlife habitat, outdoors, wildlife conservation | Tagged mule deer habitat in Nevada | 1 Comment One Response to Nevada Archery Mule Deer Hunt Wrap on August 11, 2008 at 7:17 pm1 Tom Sorenson Well, glad you have resolved that you ll be back again. Home About Rich Fletcher Thoughts on Managing a Ranch for Native Wildlife, Hunting and Value Rich… [...]
Sounds interesting..I’ll have to look into this a bit further.
You should. It’s a good way to guarantee a tag, but not necessarily a big buck. R Rich Fletcher Real Estate Broker 1568 Catalina Ct. Livermore, CA 94550 (925)373-6601 fax(925)605-3527 c(925)989-4372 http://www.hunterlandowner.com Latest blog posts: Jan 17: Pass Shooting Can be Messy.