By Duane Dugannon

Wilderness is supposed to be quiet. I kept telling myself that as I sat on the edge of an alpine meadow in the Sky Lakes Wilderness with thunder rumbling across the crest of the Cascades and hail pelting down on me.

When the downpour stopped, a mist covered the long wilderness meadow I had discovered two years earlier during a scouting trip.

I had hiked into this wilderness area and camped beside a small lake with my buddy Steve Read, hoping to find some solitude and possibly even a buck. Since our High Cascade tags would also be valid for the western Oregon general buck deer season two weeks later, we figured we had nothing to lose.

To this point, I had seen only a couple of does and a few grouse in this meadow, and I had seen more bears than bucks visit the pond at the far end of the clearing. But that was about to change as fast as the wilderness weather.

From the tall firs at the far side of the meadow emerged a buck, still sporting a reddish brown summer coat. My heart leaped into my throat. He had the widest rack of any blacktail I'd seen in the wild, with four symmetrical points on each side. As the crosshairs of my scope danced wildly around the vital area of this handsome buck, I suddenly realized I had plenty to lose.

My rifle broke the silence of the wilderness, and the buck was mine.

The beautiful alpine country and solitude alone were enough to make this hunt a good trip. Packing out a nice buck, of course, made it a great trip - especially because Steve was packing half of it!

Photo by Chuck and Grace Bartlett

Oregon is home to 38 huntable wilderness areas that offer a wide variety of hunting opportunities, and you can escape the crowds, the pickups and the all-terrain vehicles in these hunting havens where motorized or mechanized travel is prohibited. You may encounter a few hikers and horseback riders, but no one is allowed to use anything with wheels in this wilderness.

On the flipside, you also won't find clearcuts, which offer great early successional forage for deer. If you're lucky, you may find some aging burns, or at least alpine meadows that let in the sun and offer a decent chance of finding deer. U.S. Forest Service and BLM offices can tell you about recent burns within wilderness areas on their districts.

Deer typically aren't as numerous in the densely forested wildernesses as they are in lower elevations where there is a greater variety of foraging opportunities, and many deer simply prefer to take the low road and not migrate to the mountain tops.

Due to low hunting pressure, wilderness areas offer the opportunity to perhaps see a greater percentage of mature bucks. Any hunt in which you see more deer than other hunters has to be considered a quality experience.

However, some wilderness areas probably have as many bears as deer, so it's important to know which ones are worth the considerable effort you have to exert to hunt them. Here is a guide to the wilderness areas of Oregon and the hunting opportunities they offer.

Most of the north Cascades wildernesses offer country that is huntable in terms of grade and openness. An exception is Columbia, which is steep, thick and supports few deer.

The Mt. Hood and Salmon-Huckleberry feature some open meadows for hunting. Mt. Hood has some talus slopes above timberline. The east half is in the Hood Unit, a controlled hunt area. The Salmon-Huckleberry has left a portion of the Salmon River and a road paralleling it to a campground open to vehicles - a possible base camp deep "inside" the wilderness.

Badger Creek is on the east slope of the Cascades in the limited-entry White River Unit and has decent deer numbers, especially in the oak transition and grassy areas to the east.

Table Rock is a small wilderness at the lower elevations on the west slope. It tops out at 4,881 feet. Table Rock is largely closed-canopy.

Just to the east, Bull of the Woods is notably larger and has a few more openings and creeks. The new Opal Creek Wilderness Area immediately to the south is steep, rugged and dense, but there are a few old tracks formerly used for mining operations, and eight trails totaling 36 miles.

Middle Santiam and Menagerie are small areas covered with old growth timber and support few deer.

The Mt. Jefferson is a massive wilderness along the crest of the Cascades from the headwaters of the Clackamas south to Santiam Pass. The U.S. Forest Service sells a good map of the area, which hosts both blacktails and mule deer. There are some natural openings, as well as lakes and streams that attract deer.

Leave Only Tracks The idea behind wilderness experiences is that man is a visitor who does not stay. Neither should his garbage. The best rule of thumb: Leave no clues behind to let anyone know you were there.   Wilderness areas come without campground hosts, so you won't see someone driving up with an electric cart to clean up after you. It doesn't take much abuse of small areas along trails before they become the kind of mess that you hiked so far to get away from.   Here are some handy tips for an enjoyable wilderness experience: * Picket horses away from trees so they won't damage the trees; * do not deface trees; * pack out empty food containers and all other garbage; * bury human waste in a shallow hole dug in loose surface soil away from trails and camp areas, and use biodegradable toilet paper. -- Duane Dungannon

Diamond Peak, Boulder Creek and Mt. Thielsen are scattered between Santiam Pass and Crater Lake National Park. Diamond Peak and Boulder Creek are fairly open and feature meadows and glades that trap snow and keep deer around during hot, dry periods. Diamond Peak is rimmed with campgrounds and trailheads.

Mt. Thielsen is choked with lodgepole pine and offers little forage for deer, but a few good mulie bucks are taken occasionally.

The Rogue-Umpqua Divide Wilderness is all within the general Cascade buck season but is also included in the hunt area for the High Cascade season. This area is lower in elevation than most Cascade wilderness areas and offers more diverse habitat. The road along Fish Creek has been left open, allowing hunters to travel deep within the wilderness by vehicle and bail off either side into the wilderness.

The Sky Lakes Wilderness, which is included in the High Cascade Hunt area, is a vast expanse that covers the summit of the Cascades along the Pacific Crest Trail from the southern park boundary south to Highway 140. The area is interspersed with small lakes and meadows that offer good hunting. Numerous campgrounds provide base camps and trailheads. Mule deer and blacktails share habitat here.

Mountain Lakes Wilderness sits just south of Highway 140 on the east slope of the Cascades near Upper Klamath Lake. It's in the Keno Unit and offers controlled rifle hunting for mule deer. Small lakes and meadows offer good hunting in this volcanic area. These deer migrate south to winter.

The Kalmiopsis is a massive wilderness in Curry County. Elevations are all under 5,000 feet. Last year's sweeping Biscuit Fire may produce a long-term benefit for big game here.

Grassy Knob is a steep, densely forested wilderness area just east of Port Orford in the Sixes Unit. Even the trails are not well maintained, and deer numbers are poor.

The Wild Rogue Wilderness surrounds the wild and scenic section of the Rogue River. Cover is mixed with conifers and oak stands. Access is gained by road or by floating the river, which is highly traveled. Permits are required part of the year. Also, they don't call it the wild Rogue for nothing; boaters face Class III rapids and a long float.

Red Buttes is a huge wilderness, but only about 4,000 acres are north of the California border. The area is rugged, but more open than areas closer to the coast.

The Ochoco National Forest is home to three wilderness areas - Mill Creek, Bridge Creek and Black Canyon. All are reasonably accessible and huntable.

Mule deer can be found in these areas throughout the controlled buck season, and in some cases the number of deer using the areas actually increases as hunting pressure from outside the boundaries pushes deer into wilderness where they encounter fewer hunters.

The country here is a mix of conifers, mainly pine. Bridge Creek is somewhat thicker than the other two, which have seen fires in recent years. Black Canyon is literally that in some places. A fire burned there last year. Mill Creek has a pair of burned areas from fires about three years ago. Black Canyon is the most rugged and steep of the three.

The Strawberry Mountains and Monument Rock wildernesses, both mid-level areas near John Day, have had burns in recent years that should improve forage for deer. The Strawberry Mountains has burns of varying ages up to 10 years, while Monument Rock had a major burn last year.

The North Fork John Day is in four sections that offer different terrain worth checking out. There are good trails in forgiving terrain, and there are some aging burns that produce good bucks.

The Umatilla Wilderness in the Mt. Emily Unit is a diverse area in terms of elevation (2,000-6,000 feet) and terrain. About 27 miles of trails wind through this thickly wooded wilderness.

The Wenaha-Tucannon, Eagle Cap and Hells Canyon wildernesses all have relatively low deer numbers, but there are some unique hunting opportunities and a few wallhangers to be had. The Wenaha-Tucannon, in the Wenaha Unit on the Washington border, has whitetails in its lower ranges and mulies in the higher country.

The Eagle Cap is a massive area at very high elevations approaching 10,000 feet. Early in the season good deer hunting can be found above timberline.

Hells Canyon stretches seemingly forever along the Snake River. This country is generally open and there are some recent burns, but it is extremely steep and deer numbers are not high. Some hunters reach the area by boat, camping by the river's edge, hunting uphill and - hopefully - dragging deer downhill.

Steens Mountain Wilderness is one of Oregon's newest. Drawing a mule deer rifle tag for Steens may take up to four years. The area offers country from low sage and juniper at the lower elevations up to mahogany, aspen and rugged mountain peaks at elevations topping 9,000 feet. Some areas within the wilderness received controlled burns just prior to wilderness designation. Prospective base camps are plentiful, and a few traditional roads have been left open.

From sage flats to snow-covered peaks, you can find any kind of country you want to hunt in Oregon's wilderness areas, where about the only sounds that break the silence are the rumble of thunder and the roar of your rifle.