Newbie to SCH but not hunting forums as I have been on numerous forums with some form of the name “Blacktail Slayer” for many years. I started going out with my dad rifle hunting when I was around 5 or 6. My family would only rifle hunt blacktail deer in western Oregon. After high school I went into the Army for 3 years and then returned to Oregon for college.
My plan at first was to work at Gold’s Gym, teach exercise classes and work on becoming a certified trainer while getting a business degree to one day own a gym. While going through college I decided to switch my degree path to physical therapy. That all changed one last final time after I decided to go through Oregon Dept. Fish & Wildlife’s (ODFW) Master Hunter program which required something like 25+ hours of volunteer work towards wildlife and/or habitat work. My volunteer work was with the local wildlife biologist and on the local wildlife refuge. After seeing what they got to do for work each year I knew becoming a wildlife biologist was for me.
While going through the wildlife science program at OSU I took several temporary positions as a wildlife tech with ODFW. This work experience made me think that I would easily get a permanent job with ODFW if I was willing to move and work any position but it never worked out. The wildlife career field was not easy. It took several years working temp positions, at tech pay, and moving all over the state of Oregon with BLM and the Forest Service. One year was spent on Camp Pendleton here in CA in a wildlife position but I was not getting the work experience I was hoping for so I left a permanent position there to take another temp (sometime year-round) position with the Forest Service in Oregon.
The Umpqua National Forest Diamond Lake Ranger District is where I was at. This was an amazing three years as we worked with several hunting organizations and ODFW on big-game habitat projects. I was even able to work a skid-steer and tractor on projects like creating new meadows for game.
Then finally after several years I landed a wildlife biologist position on March ARB. Not an easy road but it happened with hard work and the willingness to move all over, have no work some months and little pay. Working for all these agencies has helped me learn/scout while out in the woods and talk with other employees out in the woods working on their projects. I feel very fortunate because of this as I loved every minute. Going from working on a forest that is 1 million acres in size and surrounding by other National Forests just as large to a military base surrounded by pavement and buildings is a little different but a good move for the family as a whole. We are in Temecula and the schools, family events, and opportunities for our daughter are amazing compared to the small town in the middle of nowhere back in Oregon.
Back to hunting. After the Army I hunted another year for blacktails with a rifle then decided to put in for a cow elk tag. I harvested a cow elk that year and the next before deciding to switch over to archery and have loved every minute of it. I feel learning to archery hunt turned me into a better hunter as I started to examine everything there was about hunting deer and elk under a microscope. This had me reading several books and going on hunting forums for half the year and then scouting or hunting June-Jan. Scouting and using tcams is just as fun to me as the hunting is.
Well that is a pretty good start to who I am and you all will probably get to know me more here over time. Looking forward to some good threads.