I'm looking for some help with general locations for opening day. We recently moved to the Rainier, Wa area about 10 minutes outside the Vail gate. Last year I took my nephew over around winthrop for his first deer(a nice two-point). This year tho he can't take the time to get away. I was planning on going into the vail area but I'm now hearing rumors that they may not open it up due to the dry conditions. I've been "researching" and thought about trying goat rocks area. Has anyone been around that area and any others I might look more into?
Washington Opening Weekend
- Thread starter Wanderer
- Start date
W
wake1
Guest
According to the Olympian yesterday. They are going to open it. You can go to Weyerhaueser's web site and get the phone numbers to check on a daily basis. I do not hunt there but live in Olympia. I usually go out by Elma or down around Mossyrock. You can always try to get registered on FT. Lewis. It should be coming up soon. They usually do the registration at the golf course off of I-5. There are some great blackies around there. Good luck.
Hey Wanderer
I live on Vail Cut Off Road on the Rainier side. Where is you? Vail is a scary place on opening weekend. If I rmember right, last opener there were close to 1600 rigs driving the roads up there. They take a lot of does and little bucks out of there but you have to fight the hordes. Vail usually only produces less than 4-8 decent bucks every year. Pretty sad for the amount of area. I use to work with one of the old timers that run the Eyes In The Woods check station up there tells me that the only way to get the bigger bucks is to hike to the bottom of some of the timbered canyons before daylight and hold tight. Those animals get chased from all directions and eventually wind up in the bottoms, out of sight and reach. There are spots around here where you can get into really nice bucks, but youve got to be willing to go x-country and away from the roads.
As far as Goat Rocks, there arent as many deer there, but the bucks that you do run into are usually pretty nice. There are some big ones up there. Those bucks have blacktail and mulie in them.
Shoot me an e-mail and I'll help you as much as I can.
Eric
I live on Vail Cut Off Road on the Rainier side. Where is you? Vail is a scary place on opening weekend. If I rmember right, last opener there were close to 1600 rigs driving the roads up there. They take a lot of does and little bucks out of there but you have to fight the hordes. Vail usually only produces less than 4-8 decent bucks every year. Pretty sad for the amount of area. I use to work with one of the old timers that run the Eyes In The Woods check station up there tells me that the only way to get the bigger bucks is to hike to the bottom of some of the timbered canyons before daylight and hold tight. Those animals get chased from all directions and eventually wind up in the bottoms, out of sight and reach. There are spots around here where you can get into really nice bucks, but youve got to be willing to go x-country and away from the roads.
As far as Goat Rocks, there arent as many deer there, but the bucks that you do run into are usually pretty nice. There are some big ones up there. Those bucks have blacktail and mulie in them.
Shoot me an e-mail and I'll help you as much as I can.
Eric
