This story was originally published in December 2024.
Another week at deer camp. In Maine, and anywhere in the country where there are deer hunters, there are the fabled deer camps. A poet, whose name escapes me, likened these remote, sometimes tar-papered shacks, to “palaces in the popple.”
For the 55th time, a deer hunting crew calling itself “The Skulkers of Seboeis” made an annual pilgrimage to deer camp a few weeks ago.
These camps are each unique, with their own primitive architecture and history. What they all have in common is deer hunting, outhouses, lots of food and drink, card games and a fellowship that enriches itself with each passing deer season.
A few have women members, but deer camps, despite this era of gender enlightenment, are still populated only by bearded bipeds.
The Skulkers of Seboeis deer camp was born one autumn in the late 1960s. Most founders of this eclectic mix of characters have either moved on to the Ultimate Hunting Camp or are too old to make the trip or tromp through the deer woods.
Again this year, I was the sole founder at deer camp, feeling like the last of the Mohicans, thankfully able to make it to camp and take part in the annual hunt.
Despite a week of serious hunting by our crew, the game pole remained deerless by week’s end. Oh, we saw deer and plenty of signs, scrapes and rubs, but not a shot was taken.
The combination of extremely dry, noisy conditions and a full week of unrelenting high winds, often gusting to 25 mph, made for difficult stalking conditions.
Typically, we saw the south ends of deer escaping into the north wind, or spotted them crossing the logging road repeatedly in front of our pickup trucks as we headed back to camp at dusk.
No matter. A week with wonderful friends and relatives at our deer camp is always the highlight of the year for most of us, deer or no deer.
Where we hunt is Big Woods with unfettered access: no “No Hunting” signs, not many hunters and a chance to encounter moose, coyotes and other wild critters.
If you hunt, as I have, the same wilderness haunt over a period that exceeds a half a century, you witness the cycles that typify Maine woodlands, most of which are dictated by logging practices.
In the late 1960s and early 1970s, the area we hunted was loaded with deer. In the late 1970s and early 1980s, the loggers came and just about leveled the hardwood ridges with expansive clear cuts.
Most appalling were massive cuts of old-growth cedar that wound up in rotting piles in logging yards, when the cedar market and prices suddenly went south.
With no forage base or wintering area left, the deer numbers diminished markedly. A quarter of a century later, the deer are making a discernible comeback in this country. This is no doubt attributable to milder winters and outright protection; or at least restrictive, responsible logging practices on large tracts of woodlands owned and managed by the Maine Bureau of Public Lands. The public lands tracts are adjacent to larger areas of privately owned woodlands and were acquired about a decade ago.
What does the future hold for the deer populations in the lands where we hunt?
It is hard to say. Where we hunt, the cutting cycle is obviously swinging into high gear again. In one year’s time, our area has seen renewed cuts in the regrowth of what were clear cuts of the early 1970s, as well as a new network of major logging roads, where the tree stands and boot prints of the Skulkers of Seboeis once appeared.
The beat goes on.
An afterthought: A national survey of American deer-hunting camps revealed that the average lifespan of a deer camp is about 20 years, or one generation. The Skulkers of Seboeis, celebrating 55 years of existence, are welcoming third generation members.
May this group continue to beat the odds, and keep the Maine deer-hunting legacy alive for decades to come.
V. Paul Reynolds is editor of the Northwoods Sporting Journal. He is also a Maine Guide and host of a weekly radio program “Maine Outdoors” heard Sundays at 7 p.m. on The Voice of Maine News-Talk Network.
