The next hunter, a return customer, rolled in just as the late season weather came on.  After several days, he finally saw his buck, a nice 4×4, but the shot clipped branches and the hit went awry.  He lost the buck’s trail and went home empty-handed.

The next three hunters came as a group.  I heard earlier this week from Dave that they’d wounded and lost one on Saturday, and then wounded another on Sunday.  Word came later that they’d found the wounded one and put him down.  And here he is… I didn’t get measurements, but from the picture that may be one of the best racks to come off the ranch.

If the weather permits, the rest of these guys will be back at the ranch next week.  We’ll see what happens…

Well Dave is no Ansel Adams, but at least you can see the rack on this nice 3×3.

It’s a pretty, symmetrical 3×3.  I didn’t get the measurements yet, but it looks like a solid buck.  I’m hoping Dave will have some better pictures when he gets back to syphilization civilization.

There are four hunters still to go, and the weather is starting to turn up there.  Bad weather means the deer should start moving, but it also means the roads at the ranch will get sloppy fast.  Hope everyone does well and stays safe.

I’ll provide updates as I get them.

When I rolled out on Friday to help out with some guiding for mule deer at Coon Camp Springs this weekend, I was pretty confident that things would play out like they usually do.  I’d get the client out into one of my honey holes, we’d spot deer, and either find a shooter or at least see enough deer to get excited.  In the past several years, I’ve only had a couple of clients who went more than two days before killing their buck.

I guess I got a little taste of humility.  A huge, heaping helping, to be truthful.  For the better part of two days, the client and I didn’t see so much as a patch of fur.

I had to return to the city and work on Monday, so I showed the hunter around and gave him the lay of the land, including several of my “hot spots”, and then left him to his own devices for the rest of the week.  As of last night (Monday), he had finally spotted a good buck and missed a shot.  No details on that yet, but Dave is still up there to provide updates.

There will be four more hunters coming up in the next two weeks.  Weather is finally moving in, so it’s looking good for those guys… at least until the roads get too nasty.  I’m hoping for pictures as they come available.

As you may remember from the last update, we had three deer down for our first group of hunters, with one hunter, Al, holding out for a trophy buck.  His plan was to return the following weekend and try again. 

Well, it wasn’t a classic hunt.  The deer were simply not cooperating this year.  The warm weather seemed to keep the rut activity to a minimum.  All of the deer taken so far had swollen necks and stinky tarsals, but they were keeping to the thick stuff.  Al hoped that would break loose by the time he came back, but it didn’t happen.  After a couple of fruitless days glassing and hiking, he decided to pack up and head home.  He’d give me a call later in the week to see if my scouting had turned up more activity. 

Before I arrived back in camp, Al had been out driving around the ranch and had spotted an ancient buck with a couple of does.  The antlers looked sort of weird… “like Bullwinkle,” Al told me later. 

As he prepared to drive home, Al said he might ride around a bit more and look for a big, stupid deer.  After driving around, he’d head on out. 

I did some work around camp after he pulled out.  I don’t know how long he was gone, but as the sun started to drop I decided to roll out and glass a couple of spots with the new Nikon Fieldscope (figured I should get some use out of the danged thing).  There were two areas where I’d seen some promising sign, and thought if I glassed from a distance, I could spot movement without disturbing the animals. 

As I was switching positions, I spotted a vehicle coming up the road.  We’d had a tresspasser on the ranch the previous week, and at first I thought he might be coming back.  I tossed the spotting scope and tripod in the truck and started down to intercept him, but as I closed the distance, I realized it was Al’s truck!  I’d assumed he was long gone, and wondered what he had forgotten to make him come back.  I got even closer when I spotted the open tailgate, and then saw the rear-end of a deer.  I’ll be damned!  He got one! 

I reached the road as he was passing, and stopped him.  His smile was unmistakeable, and I hopped out of the truck and ran around to see what he’d shot.  In the back was a huge-bodied deer with the strangest looking rack I’ve seen!  It was an 8×4… almost a cactus buck.  The spread wasn’t all that impressive, 17 or 18 inches, but the conformation of the antlers made this a really unique deer.  I told Al then, “you’ll see a lot of really nice 4×4 mule deer in your life, but you might never see another one like this.” 

We got Al’s deer dressed and caped, and he loaded up to head home.  One more deer to go!

My last client, Dave Brown, called a day or so before his hunt to see how things had been going.  I told him the hunting had been pretty tough, with the warm weather and storms.  With a front coming in on the day he was scheduled to arrive, I suggested that he come a day earlier.  If we were lucky, we could catch some deer getting active before the storm.  I was concerned that if the storm was bad, it would drive everything back into their beds.

Dave showed up on Saturday afternoon.  I got him settled in, and after weighing the options, I decided we’d try to stalk the fringe between the beds and some feeding areas.  The ground was damp and quiet, and the wind was blowing steadily enough to mask our noise.  It was as close to perfect conditions as we could ask for.

We hadn’t been on the ground more than an hour when I stepped into a clearing under the junipers and a deer blew out of his bed.  He must have been sound asleep to have let us get that close, but regardless, it looked like this game might be over before it started.  As he left the clearing, I caught a good look at one side of his antlers.  There were four well-formed points, but I couldn’t get a good look at the entire rack.  The mass was fairly light, but it looked like they went out to the buck’s ears.  In short, I couldn’t decide if I should call this a shooter or not… especially considering the quality of the buck Dave took here last year.

We got a break when the deer stopped about 50 yards out, but he stopped with his front half behind a tree.  We waited him out, expecting him to step clear.  Instead, he turned and trotted out the opposite direction.  “Get a good look and decide if he’s what you’re looking for,” I whispered to Dave. 

Unfortunately, Dave didn’t have the same angle as I did, and he couldn’t get a look.  The deer stopped again, less than 50 yards away.  Again, his head was in a tangle of branches. Dave was sitting on the ground, trying to steady his rifle.  He twisted his body to get a look.  It looked a little like he was playing Twister or practicing yoga… and it was in this contorted position that he decided to take the shot.

It didn’t go well… but at least the buck was obviously not injured (although at that close range, I bet his ears are still ringing!).

We tried to follow up and get another look, but it wasn’t in the cards.  We made our way back to camp. 

Sunday came on with wind and spitting rain. We covered a lot of ground, both on foot and in the truck as the weather worstened.  When the rain turned to snow and started blowing sideways in a blinding squall, we decided to call it and head back to a warm fire for dinner and a drink or two. 

Monday morning dawned with about an inch or so of crunchy snow on the ground.  The wind had dropped out.  I decided to try a stalk near where we’d jumped the four-pointer on Saturday.  As we moved along the logging road, there was just no way to keep the noise down.  The snow was frozen over the dirt road, and walking on it was like stepping on potato chips.  Maybe we should leave the road and try to stalk the edge of the meadows.

We were creeping along a cut when I caught movement to my left.  I turned in time to see a deer trotting away from us.  I barely caught sight of a forked antler. “Buck!” I hissed.  “But I think it’s just a forkie.”

Dave stepped ahead of me and tried to get a look.  I couldn’t see the deer anymore, but apparently Dave did.  He raised his rifle.  I thought he was just taking a better look at the deer, but then I noticed that he was getting intense.  His shoulder tightened, and the muzzle started making small circles.  Was he going to shoot the forked-horn?  I knew it was a tough hunt, but he still had several days left. 

Then the gun went off.

I couldn’t believe he just shot a forkie!  But hey, it’s his hunt.  I trotted to catch up.  “Did you hit him?” I asked.

“I’m pretty sure I did.”

I thought the deer must have been standing pretty close, but we kept walking and walking.  I was too busy looking for tracks or blood to count our steps, but I’d estimate we walked 150 yards before he stopped and pointed at a place where fresh black dirt was kicked up on top of the snow.  A few steps later and he crouched down.  “Blood!” he whispered triumphantly.

He was holding a clump of pine needles with a drop of blood on it, but what I saw was a solid glob of blood and tissue on a stump behind him.  It was pink, and I felt a wave of relief… lung hit!

The deer had made a death run of about 30 yards and piled up in the snow.  It wasn’t a forked horn at all, but a wide 3×3 buck (22 1/2 inches).  I could see that Dave was happy, and that’s all I needed to know.  We decided to call it the Redemption Buck.

We got the buck dressed and caped, and then it was party time!  Dave was celebrating another great hunt and succcess.  For my part, I was enjoying the relief of filling that last tag after such a tough couple of weeks of hunting.  I have to admit, I was starting to get a little stressed at the lack of activity this season. 

But there it is!  Coon Camp Springs delivers again!

So I actually returned from Coon Camp Springs on Wednesday night.  On Thursday morning, as I prepared to catch up on the Wacky Wild Web, something hiccuped and my Internet connection went bye-bye.  Two hours of rebooting routers, modems, and computers didn’t do anything except get me really, really frustrated. 

Kat’s call later to AT&T only served to reheat that stew, and get her pretty riled up as well.  The best they could offer was to have someone out on the 16th… TUESDAY!  Boy, I’m sure glad they broke up the Bell monopoly and made life better for us customers. 

Anyway, enough venting on that topic.  Can’t change it.

I’m online now from a Holiday Inn Express in Lebec, CA.  Tomorrow morning at 10:00, I plan to be on a ferry heading for Catalina Island, where I’ll be deer hunting with a new friend, Charlie de la Rosa, thanks to another friend, Hank Shaw.  How this whole thing came about is sort of an extended tale for another day, but for now I’ll just say I’m tickled to have this opportunity… even if it does mean I’m out of the house almost before my laundry is dry from the last trip.

A full write-up of the Coon Camp hunts is in the offing, so if you’re curious it’ll be here before you know it.  Patience is a virtue.

I hope that by the time you read this, I’ll be kicking back, cutting firewood and prepping the camp to be shut down for the winter.  When I last made a live post, I still had two clients left to tag out.  By this point, I expect that’s been done… or at least we gave it one heck of a try! 

 Here’s another look at the father-and-son buck from last season, just in case you forgot what kind of mule deer we have up here.  I’m sincerely hoping to have some new pictures when I get home that’ll top even this one!

The next post you read from me should be live, from the comfort of my own living room!

I’m also hoping I can slip off sometime during that period to make a run at some waterfowl.  There’s a small refuge down in the valley that looks promising, and maybe we’ll have some birds using the ponds on the property.  Who knows?

In the meantime, my posts will be sporadic.  I won’t have direct access to the Internet, of course, so I’ll have to pre-load some stuff for ya’ll to gnaw on while I’m gone.  Don’t get all crazy and stuff while I’m out. 

So, see ya’ll in two weeks (or so)!

Our first four hunters of the 2010 season packed up and went home yesterday evening.  In two and a half days of hunting, they were able to fill three tags (see yesterday’s story).  Al is still looking for that big 4×4, and will return this coming Sunday to see if we can find it for him. 

The rut is just now starting to take off, the moon is waning, and the weather has turned cold.  There’s snow on the ground this morning, and it looks like more coming this weekend.  Cold weather can make for some hot action up there, and I’m looking forward to putting Al right in the midst of it. 

The following weekend, Dave Brown, our last hunter, will pull into camp to see if he can do a repeat of his big buck from last year. 

This should be good!

This season at Coon Camp is going to be a little different.  We received one extra PLM tag this year, meaning we’ll be hosting five hunters instead of our usual four.  While we’ve certainly had our success filling out four tags, it’s never wise to get overconfident.  Wild animals are notoriously unpredictable, as is the weather.  Between the two, and the always fickle nature of hunters’ abilities, the only sure thing is that you never know how things will turn out.

One big difference this year is that I wasn’t able to get up prior to the hunts and do my scouting.  Fortunately, Dave was able to go up a couple of days early to check things out.  Unfortunately, he didn’t see any sign of the impending rut… and very little sign of deer activity.  That didn’t sound good.  

But two things I know.  One is that there are deer, plenty of deer, on that property.  The other is that sometimes you have to hunt for them.  They won’t just walk out and ask to be shot.

Another really big difference this year is that our first group of four hunters all arrived together.  Typically, I’ll take two hunters at a time, a manageable ratio for a single guide.  The normal hunt is a week long, and that’s usually more than enough time to get everyone on animals.  This year, the first group is scheduled for two weeks, although as I learned when they arrived on Friday, they’ll actually be leaving after four days.  Those who can will try to come back this coming weekend.

I drove up to Coon Camp on Friday evening, arriving at around 0330.  The clients had chosen to stay in cabins over at Eagle Lake, and were scheduled to be in camp by 0500 to start the hunt.  I set up my bunk in the guide cabin and tried to get a little nap.  Unfortunately, just as I got comfortable, Dave came into the kitchen to start coffee and breakfast.  Oh well, sleep is for wimps.

It was spitting snow and rain when the folks showed up.  Al, Larry, Denton, and Jim would be our guests for the next few days.  In camp to help, we had Dave and another Coon Camp Springs board member, Bob.  We decided I would take Al, and Dave would pair up with Larry.  A few days earlier, Dave had set up a blind for Denton who would hunt solo.  Because Jim has serious mobility issues, Bob would hunt with him from the truck.  The plan was on… even if the weather was going to work against us.

And it did… 

We spent the first hours of daylight huddled in our respective blinds, glassing fruitlessly over the empty ground.  With the wind and the snowy mix of precipitation, it was an uncomfortable morning.  At one point, I thought I heard a gunshot, and hoped that when we returned later, we’d find someone in camp with a deer hanging from the gambrel. 

After about four hours of freezing on the rock outcropping, I asked Al if he’d be interested in taking a walk.  I figured if the deer were moving at all in this weather, they’d be sticking close to cover.  I knew a few sheltered areas we could take a look at, and maybe get a little lucky.  Besides, a walk would warm us up.

As we stalked along the ridgelines, I was disappointed not to see the amount of sign I’m used to seeing.  Of course the rain had likely washed out most of the tracks.  Finally, we rounded a rock outcropping where I used to see a lot of activity, and then we started spotting tracks and scat… some of it very fresh.  I turned to Al to give him a couple of options which way to go when he stopped me and pointed.  “Deer!” he hissed. 

I turned and spotted the white backside of a deer about 300 yards away.  I hit it with the glasses and saw that it was a really nice 3×3, about 19 0r 20 inches wide and probably just as tall.  I wouldn’t call it a trophy, but it was a respectable buck.  Al considered it through his own glasses as another buck stepped out.  This was a smaller forked horn.  A few seconds later they were joined by a third, small buck. 

I gave Al time to decide if this was a buck he wanted.  From our position, we would easily be able to close the range to around 150 yards for a shot.  All he needed to do was make the call.

He didn’t.  After watching the deer for a few minutes, we decided to head around to another area.  Al told me he was hoping for a big, traditional-looking 4×4… preferably over 22″ wide.  He’d seen the pictures from the last couple of seasons, and knew what the property holds. 

The plan was for everyone to gather back at camp for lunch.  We hiked one more ridge and checked the time.  I saw an area that I really wanted to check, but it was already noon.  We headed back to the truck and to camp.  I noticed the empty meat pole when we pulled up, and sure enough, no one else had pulled a trigger or even had a shot.

After lunch, no one was eager to sit around and waste daylight. 

Al and I headed back to check the ridge I’d been looking at earlier.  There were several steep rock outcrops on the lee side of the ridge, providing a beautiful set up for bedding bucks.  Mountain mahogany, juniper, and bitterbrush covered the slopes below the rocks.  It was just a beautiful area, begging to be hunted.  So we did.

For the first hour, we slipped through brush, peered over ledges, and glassed hillsides.  Nothing.  Then there were a few tracks that looked pretty fresh.  I clambered out onto a particularly steep outcropping and looked over.  As my toes cleared the edge, the brush directly below exploded and a 4-point blew out!  I frantically waved at Al, but he was already trying to get his scope on the fleeing animal.

I got my wits together and made a quick judgement.  It wasn’t a bad buck, but he wasn’t what Al told me he wanted.  Maybe 20″ wide, and tall, but not a giant or a particularly old deer.  I passed my estimate on to Al who kept the deer in the scope until it topped a distant rise and disappeared. 

Once the deer had gone, we looked at each other grinning.  That was fun!  I asked Al if he wanted to trail the deer and try to get another look.  I figured it would slow down once it was out of sight, but the tracks kept going in a beeline toward a distant ridgeline.  After a while, we decided to let him be and get back to the blind for the last couple of hours before dark.

Just as we reached the blind, the rain and wind started coming back on.   Before long we were sitting in a storm, and I realized we wouldn’t be seeing anything out in the open sage with this kind of weather.  About an hour before the end of legal shooting time, I raised Dave on the radio.  He and Larry were driving down the hill, so I had him swing by and give us a lift back up the hill to Petunia. 

During the night, the storm set in with a vengeance, and when the guys showed up at 0500 Sunday, the wind was kicking occasional gusts that must have exceeded 40 knots.  The rain was frigid and stinging.  We all knew the odds of catching deer out in the open with this weather were slim to none.  We’d hunt some bedding areas, and hope we could maybe get lucky.  I told Al as we headed out, it would be nothing short of pure luck if someone got a deer in this storm.

He and I covered a lot of thick territory, but the best we encountered was a set of fresh tracks.  Obviously, despite the wind and wet ground to silence our approach, something had spotted us first and boogied out of the brush.  We rounded the ridgeline and took a shortcut back down to the camp. 

Just as we reached the camp, I caught movement out near the main road.  I was shocked to realize that several deer were trotting right along the road.   The last two deer in the group slowed and I could see that they were does.  However, I told Al to come on and follow to see if we could get a look at the rest.  The deer slowed down about 200 yards from where I’d first seen them.  I spotted the grey shape through the misting rain and hit it with the binos. 

I gasped and tried to get Al’s attention.  This deer was easily 24 inches wide, with tall, thick antlers.  From the angle, I couldn’t count the points, but it would be an impressive animal regardless.  Al was trying his best to get it in his scope, but the rain and wind had flooded the bell of his Leupold, and he couldn’t see a thing.  My heart was pounding as my attention kept going from the oblivious buck to Al’s frantic effort to clear his scope. 

Finally, the deer turned his head and I could see that he was only a forked horn.  I couldn’t believe it!  I passed the word along to Al, but a sidelong glance showed me that he was locked onto it.  Would he shoot it anyway?  I returned my focus to the deer and waited for Al’s .300 WinMag to go off.  It never did, and at last I heard Al sigh and stand up.  

As I watched the deer, I saw that two of the others were smaller bucks as well, and there were also two does.  We watched them for a moment, and then started back to camp.  The deer were headed in the general direction of where Jim and Bob should be, so I radioed to see if they were still there.  They were, so I told them to stay put and stay alert, and then we turned to go back to the cabin.  Just as we did, Dave and Larry pulled up. 

I ran ahead and told them about the deer.  Larry wasn’t necessarily looking for a trophy, and he also had a limited time to hunt.  That huge forky would be a great deer.  They jumped in the truck and took off up the road.  Al and I gave them a few minutes and then followed.  We’d barely turned onto the main road when we heard the rifle report.  

When we caught up to Dave, he was pulling his field dressing gear out of the truck.  Buck down! 

It turns out that Larry had taken one of the other bucks, a nice 3×3.  The big forky had disappeared.  Still, this was a good deer, and Larry seemed happy enough.  As we got the deer field dressed and loaded, the other hunters all pulled up.  There was hand-shaking and picture taking (Excuse the quality of the accompanying pic… it was taken on my cell phone.  The good pictures will be available later.), and then we all headed back to camp. 

While I was skinning the buck, the weather turned even nastier.  The hunters decided to head back to their cabins for the day.  Hunting in the storm would be a miserable exercise in frustration.  They’d be back on Monday morning.

Unfortunately, I had to get back to my real job on Monday, so I bade them good luck and got my gear packed up for the drive home.  Dave and Bob would take care of things for the remainder of their stay, and I’ll be back up there on Sunday to help anyone who’s still not done, and to get ready for our last hunter in two weeks.

This is Coon Camp board member, Bob Olds with Jim's 4x3.

Overnight, the weather finally lifted out.  After three days of being bedded, I knew the deer would be out and about in this lull.  I expected to hear some success stories, and I wasn’t disappointed.  At about 0930, I got a text message and photo from Dave.  Jim got his shot on a really nice, old 4×3.  After they got it back to camp, the whole crew jumped in Al’s truck and did some driving around. 

Here's Denton's buck... another cell phone picture, I'm afraid.

A little before lunch, I got another text message.  They encountered a decent 4×4 above a canyon, and Denton  made a good shot on it.  Suddenly the group was three quarters done!  As of my last message from Dave, Al “slammed down a sandwich and disappeared.”  I wouldn’t be at all surprised if he brings in deer number four before dark tonight.

Anyway, I am home, and it was hot.  

The plan for this weekend was to get out with Holly and a friend she met at the Women’s Hunting Camp.  Her new friend wanted to get a taste of deer hunting, so Holly must have figured the sadistic thing to do would be take her out on a mid-season, public land hunt.  One thing I can say with some certainty… if you come back for more after one of these trips, you’ve definitely got hunting in your blood.

Also along on the trip was my friend Dave Allen.  Dave spends most of his weekends working on the habitat projects up at Coon Camp Springs, and this would be his only weekend to actually use his B-zone deer tag.  In a couple of weeks we’ll have paying clients up at Coon Camp, which is sort of like hunting… only not quite.  It’s as close as we’ve been to actually getting to hunt the property since we started the habitat projects up there, though. 

The final member of the planned party was Payton, the 16 year-old son of another friend.  This would be Payton’s first time hunting big game.  He’s followed along with me a time or two, but on this trip he’d be toting a .270 and a valid tag.  It would be quite the hunting party.

Except for the party pooper… Holly.

As the weekend got closer, Holly emailed to tell me that, due to some things going on in her professional life she’d have to bail on the hunt.  With her out, her friend would also be pulling out of the trip (and who could blame her for not wanting to go out alone into the wilderness with three strange, armed men?).   That certainly put a bit of a damper on the plans, but Dave and Payton were set to go and of course I was chomping at the bit for any opportunity to get into the field.

We set up camp at the trailhead and proceeded to spend two and a half days swatting flies and sweating.  We saw a few deer, but no legal bucks.  By Sunday, as Payton and I sat on a high ridgetop overlooking a dense field of chemise and scrub oak, the temperatures were tapping the 106 degree mark.  My brain was boiling inside my skull when I finally decided to call it a day.  By the time Payton and I staggered back to the truck, my eyes were rolling and my head felt like someone was pounding from the inside out with an 8-pound sledge.  It didn’t help to find that we’d somehow gone through an entire case of water in less than two days. 

Dave had taken the “scenic route” back to camp (he’s a bit of a madman) and finally came stumbling in around 4:00.  We briefly debated heading out for the evening hunt, but without water, I didn’t want to chance it.  I’ve had a couple of real close calls with dehydration and heat exhaustion… no need to reinforce the lessons.

We relaxed in the little bit of shade that was left in camp until the shadows were starting to fill the canyon.  I decided we’d break camp and drive up to a lookout to do some glassing.  While I doubt anyone was up for a 500 yard sprint if we actually spotted a buck, it was a nice way to finish out the day.  Besides, I had the new 25-75x82mm Field Scope from Nikon that I wanted to try out. 

Of course, we were glassing the area that I would have hunted that evening, if we’d had the energy (and the water).  With about 45 minutes of shooting light left in the day, I spotted movement at about 900 yards.  Sure enough, a deer stepped out into the clearing.  Another followed, and then I made out the shape of one more in the bushes.  I put the spotting scope on them, and cranked up the magnification.  At about 40-power, I could clearly see that at least two of the deer were does.  The third wouldn’t show me a good look.  I cranked the scope up higher, but at about 60x, the tripod was too unstable to get a clear picture. 

I backed off the power and waited for the third deer to step into the open.  Just then, the largest doe looked back over her shoulder, into the dense chaparral.  Her ears pricked forward and her tail flicked.  Suddenly all three deer bolted across the clearing and into a draw.  I kept the glasses trained on the clearing, hoping to see that they were running from a randy buck, but nothing ever stepped out.  The shadows got deeper until it was nearly impossible to see anything at all. 

As we got back into the truck, I wondered aloud which of us would have been willing to make the dive into the canyon and across the meadows to attempt a shot if a buck had, indeed, appeared.  I got blank looks and then Dave, one of the most hardcore guys I know, shook his head.  “You guys could have him,” he said with a snort. 

I still wonder what he’d have said if a buck had shown up.  I enjoyed the mental picture of a breakneck race between him and Payton as they jockeyed to get into range and take the shot.  Me?  I’d have been there to shoot the whole thing on video… right from the truck.

On this hunt, I got my first real opportunity to try out some optics from Nikon.  In addition to the Field Scope, they also sent me the Monarch X, 10.5×45 binocular.  I used the binocular in NC, during my bowhunt there, but in that thick country you can’t really see more than 75 or 100 yards so it wasn’t much of a trial.  Out in Kokopelli Valley, on the other hand, there are sweeping vistas where quality optics are your best friend.

In short, I was pretty impressed with the Monarch X.  It’s probably unfair to compare them to my Leica Geovids, but they did actually compare somewhat favorably (and consider that they’re about one-fifth of the cost of the Leica).  The glass is clear and bright under all light conditions from pre-dawn to dusk.  I was able to pick out the subtle shades of a doe feeding in chemise at well over 700 yards, which I think is a good test of any hunting optic. 

The Monarch X is also fairly lightweight (don’t recall the actual weight, but you can find the specs on the Nikon website), and felt good in my hands during extended glassing.  I expect that with a tripod mount, these would be an excellent choice for most western hunting situations… especially when backed up with the Field Scope. 

I’ll be putting these glasses through their paces a lot over the coming months, both on my own hunts and while guiding.  I especially looking forward to using the Field Scope while guiding at Coon Camp Springs this season.  I expect it’s going to be a really useful addition to my gear.