After hunting for many years all over the Island, I can say that you'll have more success if you hunt nearer rather than further from a rural area.....just make sure it's safe and legal to discharge a firearm there. You can drive and hike the back 40 all you like, and you'll find alot of bears, cougar scat and wolf scat, but not many blacktails! The smart [and living] deer are right in your own back yard. I once read a land management report that singled out the extensive logging-road access combined with lack of old growth forests as a main cause for the steady deer population decline on the Island. The animals that prey on deer also use the roads to hunt their prey [ black bears catching fawns in the spring ] and consequently, the deer no longer have an inaccessable sanctuary in which to escape their predators. The cougars, bears and wolves can get to any part of the deer's range with ease. Our blacktails have a very small home range, and their hapy to live their whole lives with in a very small area provided they have what they need to subsist. It' doesn't take much to wipe them out......just ask any oldtimer who hunted in the 40's and 50's, they be able to recount stories of seeing herds of deer around. Gone gone gone. There's no where left for them to subsist but in your back yard.
Like I said, study the regs, get a topo map and start scouting for sign. When you find a good area you'll know. Find the does and the bucks will be close by come November. You might consider a tree stand. Climb up pre-dawn and cover those travel routes. You'll find em.
The back 40 is great if you're looking to fill a bear tag.
