Story By: Joshua Faughn
In 2025, I didn’t draw a single tag throughout the West and ended up hunting my home state again—California. I had recently relocated to a new town in Northern California for work and found myself looking at units I knew very little about. Of course, I didn’t draw anything in California either, so I bought an over-the-counter tag and committed to spending the spring and summer figuring it out.
From car camping to long day trips to overnight backpacking missions, I spent twenty-two days scouting that year—and I’m glad I did. During the first handful of trips, I looked over a lot of empty country across multiple areas in the unit before I finally turned up some deer. Pretty embarrassing to admit, honestly. But not long after, I found a buck worth hunting.
Over the next few scouting trips, I focused on learning access routes into the area—limited roads made that tricky—and dialing in the best glassing points. By late summer, with September creeping closer, I noticed more and more headlamps and pickup trucks in the hills. Other hunters were out scouting too. That’s the reality of public-land hunting: everyone has the same right to be there. All you can do is be courteous, respect others, and trust the time you put in.
The day before opener, I set up camp and planned for two friends—one with a tag—to join me for the weekend. Opening morning came fast. Excited and anxious, I crawled out of my sleeping bag around 4 a.m., drove to the spot I wanted to park, and . . . someone was already there. Not just parked—camped. Another set of headlights was rolling down the road behind me, likely headed to the same area. I had to make a decision fast. I grabbed my pack, put on my headlamp, and took off on foot.
Oddly enough, I never crossed paths with those hunters. Across the canyon, my two friends were glassing back toward me, and I could see clusters of headlamps scattered across the mountain. I’d assumed an area with lower deer densities would mean lower hunting pressure. I was wrong. Still, I stayed confident. I had put in the time.
As the sun rose, the gray light faded, and golden beams broke through the clouds. I was already tucked into a rock pile, glassing the country below. My visibility grew from 100 yards to 200 to full clarity across the basin. Not long after, I caught movement—a small group of deer about 1,000 yards out, silhouettes slipping through the brush. I needed to cut the distance and wait for good light to see what they were.
I shouldered my pack and worked my way through the canyon to the next vantage point. Once there, I found the deer again and immediately recognized one of them—the buck I’d been scouting all summer. I settled in, controlled my breathing, and made one well-placed shot. The buck dropped in his tracks.
I sat there for ten to fifteen minutes, quiet, taking in the moment. All the miles. All the empty canyons. All the glassing. It all came together on opening day.
When I finally hiked down to the buck, I realized just how important that scouting had been. Every ridgeline and every outcropping around me held hunters, all glassing into the same basin where the buck now lay. I quartered and processed the deer, and my friends met up with me to celebrate and help pack him out.
I was the lucky hunter on the mountain that day—but it wasn’t only luck. The twenty-two days of scouting are what made the difference.