Greetings all, I am an Albertan transplant living north of Seattle now. I was wondering if anyone could share their hard earned experience hunting Blacktail on the rainy side of the mountains. Any advice, stories, words of wisdom etc. are appreciated. Hope everyones holidays were full of good cheer and thanks in advance.

Welcome to the forum lostapiarist. Rules are simple, be nice and join in.

I lived over in the Anacortes area and Seattle area for a while and found that a quick handling close range gun works well. Any of the levers, semi-auto's or bolts with good peep sights gets you on quick for that fast departing blacktail. I used a Ruger 44 mag carbine and it worked very well for shots out to a hundred yards. In that dense brushy country that did in several deer for me.

Thanks for the welcome faucettb. I am glad to hear your advice as I recently purchased Marlin 336c 30-30. So did you head up in the foothills or stay lowland?

I have taken a Blacktail in Western Washington every year since 1968. Their habitat varies a great deal. Sometimes the shot is in brush at 50 yards, other times it might be in a clear cut, across a canyon and nearly 300 yards. This year it was at 150 yards. Last year about 250 yards.

I think they are harder to hunt than the other deer species. Their food is everywhere and water is in nearly every draw so you don't see them traveling any great distance for necessities. I hunt in the southwest part of the state just because that is where I live. I am sure that the Olympic Pennisula is just as good.

Some areas that you might want to try:

Brooklyn, WA area. This is a small communtiy in the hills midway between Raymond and Oakville.

Ryderwood area. An old logging town west of I-5 and North of Longview.

That area south of Pe Ell, Wa and the Columbia river.

I don't believe in secret hunting areas so I am willing to share the better places that I hunt. Email me if you have any specific questions

Dean

Thanks for the response Dean and being generous with the info, much appreciated, I may shoot you an email or two. Hope your New Years was enjoyable.

There are some big bucks in the farm country east of Bellingham in the Sumas area and in the Skagit River country. I use to hunt out there on the BC side and took some nice bucks,

Real close to me!! excellent, ill be heading out and up some logging roads to get a feel for the area.

Out here on the north face of the Olympics, they are where you find them, although, two of the last 3 were within spitting distance of water.
The country here is blackberry and devils club and trees so close together you'd think it was a fence; I use a 75 year old Model 99 in .250 Savage with a WW2 Lyman Alaskan scope on it. Best deer rifle I ever owned and it has 3 one shot kills since I found it. Used to hunt the Snoqualmie pass area back in the 80's and 90's, but had little luck; have more deer nibbleing on my roses than I ever saw off of Interstate 90!:D
bob