Free: Contests & Raffles.
I have friends that hunt it each year and kill deer during rifle season. Like everywhere else, try to find a location that doesn't have a road running through it, and hunting will get better as we get closer to the end of the month.
Your description of your spot is a bit confusing. - SW side is good. The weather there is mild enough that I think they spend the winter in most areas though.- FRESH deer droppings are important. Old droppings mean little. If you never see deer there, that is most likely a spot where they feed at night or travel through after feeding.- In general blacktail head downhill from bedding areas to feed in the evening. Doe and young bucks will often bed down below in the middle of the night in an open spot that allows them to watch for predators (they leave obvious beds there, which confuses many hunters). At some point before dawn, they get up and feed again, (leave poop down there for you to find when you are hunting/scouting there) then head back uphill to their daytime bedding areas, which may be anywhere from 20 yards to 400 plus yards into the timber, and on the side of a hill/ridgeline.If the feeding area is a young clearcut, it is along the edge of the forest/clearcut interface is where you may have an opportunity to see deer coming and going at first light and last light (but don't ignore the rest of the cut. You never know where a deer might be). If the cut is a bit older and has enough brush and trees to provide hiding cover, a deer may stay down there well into the morning, or spend the entire day there. Expanses of Alder provide great feeding areas as well, though even just a few in a small area of big fir can provided enough light to the forest floor to grow deer food. Mixed fir and alder forests can be very productive for deer populations. There is food and cover close by at all times.After reading perhaps thousands of posts trying to understand what is going on in Deerworld, my vision of a perfect spot in the Capitol Forest would be a cut with 4- 6 year old reprod fir trees, (or Alder at least 8 years or older) at the base of a decent to large sized timbered hill; access road only at the bottom. I would be in the timber before first light along the upper edge where I might intercept deer heading uphill to bed after the morning feeding, (or heading down to feed in the evening). Alternatively, in a fir reprod cut, if there was a spot to sit and glass a large area of that edge at morning and evening, I might just take seat and wait for action, staying in the glass as much as my eyes would allow. During these sunny days, as the sun gets higher in the sky during the morning and shadows travel across the cut, a deer that decided to stay in the reprod may stand up and re-bed into a cooler spot when they get too warm in the sun. That is another great opportunity to suddenly find a deer that was previously hidden from view. Upper reaches of drainages that begin in the forest and travel down through a cut can be deer highways. Does often bed above and to the sides of the beginnings of these drainages. Bucks start taking a liking to the does this time of year so they may be close or with the does as they come and go. Perhaps something in there will help you sort it out. Don't get stuck on just one spot. Keep trying new spots and techniques. Some areas have way more deer than others. If you're seeing a lot of doe, you're in good shape. Patience.
When your sneaking through the timber and hear noises like rustling of brush... be aware of the brush pickers lol they're everywhere in there and will appear out of nowhere.
