A cold, wet day in Deer Camp is still better than a day at work.
Training. Preparedness. What do these words mean to you? Are they a lifestyle, or just terms you use to pigeonhole your attempt at sounding “ready” for the calamity that many believe is coming? Have you lived in the woods for more than just an overnight camping trip? Have you used ALL THE GEAR you’ve collected for your survival if that calamity occurs. What about that dutch oven you bought on sale, but have never actually used?
Some of the best “Survivalist” oriented training I’ve ever done was during my weeks in “Deer Camp”. I hear from many people who tell me they don’t have an area to train in, and that they can’t carry a firearm in their State parks unless it’s hunting season. Then they ask how they should go about getting the experience needed for bad times. If they’ve mentioned the “hunting season” comment, I tell them they’ve answered their own question to a large degree. If they haven’t mentioned it, I advise them that they should go do the “Deer Camp” thing for 4-8 days every year.
“Why Deer Camp?” you ask. It’s simple really. First, Deer season in most States is during the colder part of the year, hence, harsher living conditions. Second, You get to go out and use you wilderness living gear in conditions that usually aren’t stellar in terms of comfort or convenience. Third, You get to actually experience carrying a weapon through the woods with support gear, all while trying to maintain a low profile. The low profile is necessary if you plan on actually seeing and killing a deer.
A very wet day, but the gear did as advertised and we bagged a few.
Yeah, if you’re rifle hunting for deer, you probably have to wear blaze orange. So what? You’re not hiding from people in this instance. You’re hiding from something that is infinitely harder to pic out and hide from in certain aspects. Adding a blaze orange vest, a hat or both over your gear is not a big deal, and honestly, a vest that covers up you ammo vest from prying eyes is not a bad thing in this era of PC BS. I had to download my semi auto mag to the allowable round count, but even that wasn’t a big deal. The main thing was getting out with your gear and using it.
It used to be an annual event with a number of my preparedness Buddies that we would go to a State forest an hour away and set up “Deer Camp” for anywhere from 4-8 days. Some guys would filter in or out during that week, due to work schedules. Even that had a commo schedule and SOP to let us know they were nearby and coming in to base camp. Everybody loaded their vehicles with the gear they would bug out with. Everybody had a list of what that consisted of, and brought it along for practice, even if they knew it wasn’t gonna be used that particular week.
Sleet and snow for 2 days straight will help you figure out how well your tent and waterproof storage gear works.
Takeaways from those many years of activity showed us what worked and what didn’t. Tents were a big thing. If your tent couldn’t survive a week of cold, crappy weather in “Deer Camp”, you could not plan on it surviving weeks in the woods after the apocalypse. Heat for the tents all the way from Propane IR and ceramic heaters, up to packable “Outfitter” or Army “potbelly” tent stoves were used. Some worked great, some were a pain till we figured out the sequence needed to make them run efficiently.
Deer camp doesn’t need to be elaborate. A tarp and sleeping gear is good to practice with to figure out what works and what doesn’t.
Sleeping gear was put through it’s paces. Some failed, some thrived. Cooking gear durability and techniques of use were experimented with, with plenty of success. Clothing, especially cold weather clothing was tried and shown to be “Good to go” or complete crap and not brought back the next year. Finding gear and food storage methods that were weather and water proof, especially in extremely cold weather was an eye opener.
You had better practice with that cooking gear before relying on it. or your abilities with it.
Hunting in and of itself is good training. Combining that with living in the woods for a bit just increases the training value. If you ever have to Bug Out of your home, your best bet is to act as if you are hunting, but the difference is EVERYBODY out there is the quarry that you need to see first to be successful (staying hidden from). Success in this case is surviving. Whether it’s turkey hunting, predator hunting or deer hunting, seeing your quarry first is prerequisite to being successful.
If you don’t hunt, you are missing some good training opportunities. If you do, but have never done the “Deer Camp” thing, you are also missing on some good training opportunities. I’ve been hunting for over 40 years, and I still learn things in the woods every year. Besides being able to add to the larder in my freezer, being in the woods hunting is one of the most relaxing activities I can do. Communing with nature is it’s own reward, regardless of whether I get what I’m going for that particular day.
At the end of the day, learning to enjoy the little things and those around you that make life enjoyable is what it’s all about. Training doesn’t have to be hard or miserable to be valuable.
JCD
"Parata Vivere"-Live Prepared.
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This is straight out of Red Dawn haha.
Me, Jed Eckert and the boys are having deer camp in late September except we’re staying in a motel and probably blasting Bambi near the road.
Your wife actually looks happy to be camping.
She was. It was around 15 degrees in that pic.
Looking forward to November!
An excellent article. Hits home on many subjects.
To start the art ,a quality 4×4.In this case a full size Bronco,hopefully a 351 but a 302 acceptable.The best camp vehicle(in my not so humble opinion!)a E100 van dropped on a mid 70’s F250 4×4 frame with lift/33′ tires ect.Can haul a lot of gear and can still sleep in it as only 2 captains chairs in the front/plenty of room for deer to if necc. tagging station transport,now,to just get them deer!
It had an Edelbrock 400 made from a 351M. I now use a 4WD Chevy Suburban 1500 with a 5.7Vortec
Yes, I remember with fondness the days that were too warm(shirt sleeve) and the nights that got cold enough to freeze the beer on the ground next to the tent wall. The food that tasted so great up in the mountains, didn’t taste nearly as good in town…but that’s OK. The pleasure of warming up next to a wood stove when it was snowing and blowing outside and nothing with any sense was moving around, including the deer and elk. The stories that we told about previous camps. The drop in visitors that had a couple of miles to go to their camp and warmed themselves in our roost. Enjoy it while you can; between age and more restrictions on available hunting ground there are fewer people doing it.
9 glorious days of training in it’s purity IF it’s done correctly. Staying a hotel, driving out to 1/4 mile then driving your ATV up to the heated deer “stand” (sitting on a chair) on a timed feeder set at 0900 is NOT what we are talking about.
Actually hunting is however the greatest opportunity in which you get to use the comms, carry all day every day, camo, staying alert, building critical team skills using hand signals and watching body language, moving and not flagging one another, performing bounding overwatch and timed sniper skills. You get to match your skills against those that hear, see and smell better. You get to test your physical fitness dragging or carrying one out across terrain with a pack and rifle. All that tacticool gear you’ve bought the last year gets to be tested. For me it’s also a test of did I really need it or did I just load more good idea crap in my pack LOL.
Now we can use full capacity mags in our ARs and suppressors are all good too for those that have them in my state.
Take the opportunity to get the kill from the field to the freezer. Don’t use butcher services because that defeats the purpose of preparedness.
This is the best opportunity to pass on skills ever to everyone regardless of the age or gender. Watching my daughter smoke her first doe at 215yds with her 243 will forever be one of my best memories. She did it all right from using a pack to brace to squeezing the shot off and immediately reloading to putting in the humane follow up. I can’t wait for all my grandkids to get old enough. All them hours at the range of misses and not wanting to listen and aggravation melted away. I taught the kids how to sew with the fishing kits, build shelters, start fires, read tracks and all kinds of stuff not to mention foraging things like cattails, cactus and sumac. We made cordage of yucca too. So many things I can’t even remember them all but it seems they do. Best days ever
I don’t stay in when the weather is bad. In fact being 12 degrees with a 40mph wind blowing sleet in my face has just become the norm. Embrace the suck and get used to it because it’s gonna be there.
Just loading up and going is in fact part of the bugout plan. It tells you how much time it takes, how much help you might need, what’s really important and how to actually load everything to fit and balance.
Man this has got me all fired up and missing November even more.
Timely and spot on post…While i don’t deer camp, i do Trout Stalk Camp several times a year here in the Southeast, mainly WNC/ETN region.
In fact just a couple weeks ago i headed up to Maggie Valley, camped near Balsam Mt, at 5500′ + elevation.
I set up my mobile commo/sigint suv w shelter systems, cooking platforms and all the comms gear i wanted to test in live field conditions for a 3 day weekend of just listening on various bands from CB, to vhf/uhf, some hf, various SW bands, to .civ/.mil air bands and anything else my various antennas and gear could discern.
I learned a lot that weekend about my kit, various solar systems and battery systems for charging devices, etc.
I did not speak to a soul the entire time, ‘cept the voices in my head.
I also got to enjoy the cool 65 degree day temps and hi 40’s at night while sleeping in my hooch…
All in all, a great weekend of doing/learning/unlearning and redoing testing and verifying…
No trout were stalked this trip, that’s the fall adventure, though i did have some young Elk wander thru my site and entertain me..
Good post and thoughts. Deer camp for me is pretty much a three day even (Friday night – Sunday afternoon) event. When I was younger and unattached with MUCH less responsibilities, Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays were the bomb. A solid week of camping.
You could feel your senses get sharper as the days went by, layers of ‘civilization thoughts’ melting off. Sun time rather than wrist watch. Early morning wake-ups and walking to stands in the dark, wait for some hours and come back for lunch. Head off again in early afternoon until dark and come back, cooking supper afterward. Knock off at 10 p.m.. And then the next and then the next. Incredible sunrises and sunsets, I’m closer to God in the woods than church. When you can appreciate miracles.
Hunting for me as evolved. When I was young, I wanted larger trophy deer. Now that I’ve taken a few, I’ve realized that it is the meat that is more important than the horns. I begin season looking for horns and after the rut, then go after ‘tamale meat’, a young doe being favored for tender meat. I guess I’m getting more mature, the company and the experieces are more important than the contents of the cooler when I leave. I’m in my mid 50’s and hope I can continue hunting into my 70’s. The work to get and keep the property maintained is getting harder and harder. Just me and my brother who is easily my best friend.