Road Trip to Malta

 

It's wet and there's a river in the background. I think you get the picture...

I took my last guide trip on November 5th, which was actually a great time way to end the season. The weather was pretty warm but super windy. McKenna kicked some serious butt catching multiple, 20+ inch browns and a bunch more cookie-cutter, 18-to-20-inch Missouri River bows. Her grandpa modestly expressed how the trip was all about her and he was happy that she was doing so well even though his rod was bent only a fraction of the time...but we know what he was really thinking...Now that the fishing season is officially over for MDFO, it's time to get back to filling the freezer and since the elk aren't coming down from the high country anytime soon, I decided to take a road trip to Malta for deer and birds.

The plan was to get up at 3:30 am on Thursday morning, throw the rest of my gear in the truck, grab Cutter and hit the road. Unfortunately, I couldn't turn my brain off, so I only got a couple hours of sleep before the alarm rudely woke me up. I chose to grab a couple more hours of dream scaping and didn't get moving until six. 

If you're not familiar with Malta, MT, it's nothing like the Malta that's located in the Mediterranean. In fact, the two destination spots couldn't be any different and while searching Google for hotels in the area, I was wondering where all the palm trees were coming from on the hotel sites. Having not been that far north and east in Montana, I was pretty sure palm trees weren't indigenous but couldn't be 100% certain. Turns out, palm trees are not indigenous to Malta, MT and in fact, once you get out of the river bottoms, finding any trees of substance is problematic at best. 

So why Malta, you ask? It's 4 1/2 hours from Helena, can be incredibly windy, no trees, and not a town bigger than a couple hundred people for hours. That's why. No people and the deer haven't been getting chased into inaccessible, private plots where they don't move until midnight. At least that was the theory. And there are birds that haven't been ass-pounded for the last month but again, that's only theory. In fact, those wild birds are a lot more educated than what I had hoped and for the most part, way smarter than I am. 

Upon getting up to the High Line, which is what the area along highway 2 is called because it runs along the Canadian border with a rail line connecting it to the rest of the world, I was greeted with the openness of Eastern Montana broken up by muddy creeks and deep coulees that would most definitely hold both deer and birds. I was getting antsy to get out and find some pheasants so once past Havre, I found the first BMA (Block Management Area,) grabbed the 20 gauge and Cutter and headed into the CRP. The only thing I saw on that quick hunt was a dead mule deer buck a few other hunters were dragging out. 

Cutter and I headed further East, thinking the further down the Milk River, the better the hunting would be. The next chunk of public land we tested out was the Dodson Dam Wildlife Management Area. Cutter and jumped out of the truck to see a couple roosters on the railroad tracks. As luck would have it, a train passed by while we were getting the gear out and pushed those birds back into the WMA. Perfect timing and as Cutter and I made our way through the gate, birds exploded out of wheat grass and glided into a group of trees just a hundred yards away. I couldn't tell you how many birds initially got up but enough to where I thought this was going to be too easy. I remember thinking to myself that I had forgotten my bird vest with a game pouch and how difficult it was going to be to carry all these birds...turns out, that wouldn't be a problem. 

As Cutter and I approached the small aspen grove decorated with a mix of alder and red twig dogwood, roosters scattered in all directions and Cutter couldn't contain himself. All the whistling in the world couldn't keep him at bay and just added to the chaos. As I saw white flashes of the multiple rooster's ring necks darting through the brush, I brought Remington 870 up thinking I should just ground swat a few of them but I kept thinking that one, it wouldn't be very sporty, and two, you never know if there's a hen in the bunch that might get caught in the pattern of the shot. Plus, the dog is on the ground and the last thing I would want to do is put some pellets in my pup. 

I brought the gun down and sprinted around the corner of the grove. Birds flew everywhere. One even passed by in front of me, which at first, I thought was a miracle but then, objectively, realized it was just the law of averages that one of these dozen or so birds would have had to pass my direction and this fellow was the unlucky one. I pulled up and dumped him, and Cutter settled down just long enough to retrieve the bird, drop him at my feet, and then continue along on his manic pursuit of more birds. I found myself blowing the whistle so hard I literally lost my voice and within a few minutes, all the birds were gone with the exception of the one bird I easily carried in my left hand while holding the shotgun, safely pointing over might right shoulder in my other. Crisis averted.

We circled the WMA, jumped a few hens, and then headed back to the truck. I had heard FWP had released some pen raised birds in the area as a pheasant hunting "recruitment" effort, but nobody really ever really knows where or when it happens. On the way back to the truck, I realized I had found them. Pen raised birds are dumb and they tend to want to gather back up where they were released. As I approached the gate to open it up, birds started taking off from all around me again and again, one unlucky rooster met his demise. This rooster was missing his tail feathers and again, not very smart and I am not too proud to not take advantage. By the way, the next day, Cutter and I would find a bunch of wild birds, which resulted in a much different outcome. 

As the sun traveled further west and time was running out for this first day, I shifted my focus to whitetails. A BMA just down the road looked promising, so I took a hike along the Milk and found a spot to hunker down and watch for a while. I didn't see a single deer. I did see some racoons foraging for either clams or crayfish in the silt of a pond I was posted next to but no deer. I started worrying that my assumption that these deer were unpressured and nearly tame, was not even close to being true. The few wild birds Cutter and I kicked up also rebuked that theory of finding unpressured game and the unrealistic expectations that often screw up these hunting expeditions started weighing heavily on me. 

I woke up in the Maltana Hotel well before sun-up that next morning and headed out to check on some public land. I wanted to get out there before the whities headed back into the brush to bed down for the day. The vantage point I picked for that early morning scout was the set of railroad tracks that ran along the Milk just outside of town. From there I could watch a section of BLM land on my side of the river as well as glassing some private land on the other side. I did see one whitetail doe on my side of the river. I also saw about a half dozen whitetail does, another six or eight mule deer and a nice whitetail buck on the private grain field on the wrong side of the river. Seeing the buck, however, gave me some hope as he chased one of the does off the field, which meant the rut was starting and these bucks could be chasing does all over the country soon. When this happens, deer don't recognize property boundaries and often cross over into accessible plots. 

I spent the next five hours driving the countryside, looking for promising public lands or Block Managment Areas. I found some more incredibly skittish birds that flushed a good hundred yards out and nothing I wanted to put a lot of effort into for deer. My mind kept going back to the deer from that morning on the private land. I thought about going back and asking for access. What's the worst that could happen? The landowner says no?

I do remember a few interactions with landowners in the past, which is why I'm so hesitant to ask. My buddy and I walked up to this guy's house in Wisconsin once on a Friday evening while the Packers were playing a pre-season game. We knocked on the door and the property owner gets up off the couch in his tinged, white grundies to ramble across the uneven, creaking floor of this early 1900's farmhouse. Beer cans littered the carpet in the house and the yard outside, as well as the makeshift can holder on the Montgomery Wards riding lawnmower that obviously hadn't had gas in it for months. The volume on the TV was so loud, we got the play-by-play through the storm door and the Pack was not doing so hot. He was obviously perturbed by us disrupting this important game and lectured me for about 15 minutes about just walking up to someone's house and asking for permission without even bringing a bottle of whiskey! The nerve of some people...

I had to make the best of the next couple hours, so I headed into what I thought was a driveway to the private land I was hoping to access. White flags bounded throughout the property immediately after pulling off the county road. These white flags weren't surrendering anything. They were deer waving their goodbyes as dozens fled into the brushy river bottom. I drove on until I found myself in what appeared to be a century old settlement of dilapidated houses and out-buildings; some still showing yellow paint, others sporting the rich texture of authentic barnwood, now void of any living inhabitants, minus the racoons and squirrels. Pieces of newer farming machinery sporadically intermingled with straw bales cut from the active wheat fields carved out of the cottonwoods and alders. This place was deer heaven. 

I pulled up my OnX app on my phone to find where the landowner's house was located. I was about a mile off so I turned my truck around and headed back to the county road and to the rancher's house. Seeing these deer and how prime this land was, I strategized how to approach the landowner and how I might start the conversation. Damn, I wish I had a bottle of whiskey. 

Two houses, one complete and well kempt, the other still being worked on with house wrap showing and then another double-wide trailer behind the two houses told me I was on the right track. Idling diesel motors competed with cattle for audible supremacy. I couldn't help but empathize with these people's busy lives as it was obvious there were multiple balls in the air, they must be frantically keeping off the ground, as they juggled what obviously was a chaotic time of the year with calves being weaned and property being winterized and the hundreds of other tasks having to be completed before heavy snow made life even that much harder in northeastern Montana.  

I looked for signs of human life. The house under construction didn't have a vehicle parked in front of it. The trailer had two vehicles, both late nineties Toyotas and the more well-established house: a newer full-sized Chevy. I chose the Chevy. 

I knocked on the door and nothing. I walked from the front door to the garage and noticed a light flicker. The man door to the garage opened and out peered a perfectly made-up white-haired woman dressed in perfectly pressed slacks and a blouse, sparkling jewelry, glasses, and just the right amount of make-up that might suggest she is the matriarch of the compound. She smiled and asked if she could help me. 

"Hello," I said and held out my hand feeling a little vulnerable sporting my sweaty camos. "I'm sure you guys are crazy busy, and I don't mean to bother you, but I noticed you have a ton of deer on your property..." 

She was a sweet woman. Every time she spoke, she smiled and ended each sentence with a wink, and I found myself smiling along with her. Somehow, she drew me in with her kindness. Unfortunately, she was the mother of the rancher and not the one to make the decisions to let me hunt. She also conveyed to me they had just moved the cattle to the property to wean the calves and they were a bit riled up so hunting that piece, so close to these agitated mothers was probably not going to happen, but there was a piece of state land just on the other side of their land that was accessible. 

I thanked her for the info and headed towards my truck. 

Another woman was parking a huge truck in one of the out-buildings. She came out of the building and again, asked if she could help me. I told her what I was there for, and she reiterated what the kind older woman had told me. She also suggested that I park my truck near one of the uninhabited houses on their property and access the state land from there. That was incredibly helpful information, and I took her up on the suggestion. 

It was only a few steps from my truck when I started seeing deer. They were across the river and does, but it was a good sign and as soon as I went from stubble field to undergrowth, a buck jumped up in front of me. As I watched him bound out of sight along the Milk, I slowly pursued. 

Standing up on the bank of the river, I peered up and down the riverbed. The buck hadn't gone far. In fact, he was only about 80 yards downstream, sneaking right along the river's edge. I was standing up on the bank about 20 feet above the river looking down. He wasn't huge but a decent buck and given the lack of action to that point, a sense of urgency over-took me. I pulled up my .270, dropped the crosshairs on him and squeezed. The buck dropped, ass-end first and then tipping over. 

"Sweet," I thought. "I've got a couple birds, this buck...Life in Malta is pretty good."

I worked my way down the high bank to find an easier path to the deer. He dropped in some waste-high grass so I couldn't see him, but I knew he was down and wasn't going anywhere. As I approached, his head popped up and he tried to gain his feet. He fell back down but now in a spot where I had a clear view of him. I needed to get a shot at his neck to finish him off quickly but every time I pulled the rifle up, he would shift and any shot through the neck would also rip through his shoulder, or his back straps and I didn't want to waste a bunch of meat. I needed to get closer, so I climbed down the bank. 

The deer struggled even harder to get up. I don't like seeing deer suffer so that was creating some stress. I also was well aware of the river only being a couple feet downhill from where he was thrashing. That was also weighing heavily on me. As a slipped down the snotty clay-lined bank, struggling to keep my feet, the buck rolled and splashed into the river. With his front legs still functioning, he started swimming out to the middle.

At this point, his neck was clearly exposed, so I was able to re-gain my footing and finished him off but now he was floating downstream, a good 30 feet off the bank. 

The Milk was named after a very distinct characteristic; it's Milk colored. It meanders through clay bluffs and is always silt stained to where you can never see the bottom. It has high banks and although it moves slowly, it does have a deceptive current. It's also surprisingly deep, which became clear to me after pulling a stick out of a pile of logs and testing the bottom for depth and integrity. Yes, I was thinking about wading in after the deer but water that color, in the high 30's and chest deep was not going to be in the cards. 

This is true. My initial thought was that I was going to get wet and literally seconds before taking the plunge, after setting my rifle and pack down in a safe place, I caught myself and thought, "Wait, at least take your clothes off so you have something dry to put on." 

"Fuck that," I said out loud as I wondered how far the next bridge was.

"Hold on," I thought. "Think for a minute." 

The deer was floating and slowly making its way downstream. I was on the outside bank of a bend with a pile of logs 50 yards downstream. Maybe this thing will get caught up in the logs. 

I hoofed it to the pile but given how steep and unpredictable the bank was, that meant crawling up the bank and running downstream, and then back down to the river's edge. I wasn't sure I was going to have time.

I beat the deer down to the pile and calculated the line it was taking towards me. It was getting closer to the bank, but it wasn't going to meet the pile of logs. I needed to do something. 

Grabbing the longest log I could pull from the pile of driftwood, I just hoped I could reach the deer as it floated by. I couldn't even take one step into the river however, because of the shear drop-off right along the bank. The length of the log was all I would get and as the deer got closer, I reached out and barely snagged the flanks of the buck and pulled it towards me and into the eddy just upstream of the pile. Spinning the deer around, I was able to grab his horns and pull him onto the bank. 

There was no way I was getting him out whole. With only a foot or two of bank to work on, I quartered him up, constantly aware of sliding into the river and piece by piece, hosted him up to the top of the bluff. From there, I loaded it up in my pack frame and hiked the quartered deer back to the truck in one trip. 

I drove back to the complex to thank either lady for their help but unfortunately, neither could be found as I'm sure they went on with their busy day. I kept thinking of the noise that was coming from the cattle and the machinery and wow, how could anyone take this for more than a minute and then to think, at some point, these folks would have to sleep, right?

That evening I sat down for dinner at the Great Northern Hotel Lounge. I'm still recovering. A burger with fries and soup and enough Cold Smoke from the Kettle House Brewery out of Missoula to nearly get me hit by a truck while walking the block and a half back to my room only cost me $34. What this means is either I'm a super lightweight or the beer was really cheap. Or, in fact, the folks sitting at the bar I was engaged with in having conversations about hunting, fishing, and solving world problems were insanely generous. My head still hurts. 

I do want to give a shout-out to all the folks I came in contact with, while visiting Malta. I had such a great time and believe me; I'll be back if you'll have me. 

Keep 'em where they live...