La Buela - Rancho Viejo Dec. 6, 1979 George Caldwell left today so I can invite the hunt with the Rhodos and the Bootes. We set out on an "exploring hunt", which I have been led to believe is heavy on the exploring and a bit casual about the hunting. We drove down the Santa Ynez River to within 5 km of the ocean, then turned south and climbed to the top ridges seeking an unnamed valley that Peg and Carol had seen and admired last spring. We found a pretty valley but they insisted it was the wrong one. As we explored further we had a flat tire that changed the game plan considerably. After changing the tire we found a nice live oak with good shade, pitched camp and cooked quail (brought from home) in the coals. After lunch, about 2 PM, we heard quail chittering in the brush nearby and with guns geared up we flushed the covey of at least 80 birds. Followed the bulk of the bunch and had a nice little shoot until about 4 PM. We ended up with 17 birds, of which 3 or 4 were adults, the rest young. I shot better than yesterday (8 birds with 15 shells) but again lost three birds down hard and supposedly dead. Two runners I spotted at shot on the ground. Again I say how much I pay for a dog. On the way out this morning we saw quail in air glasses, mostly undentable. Come home in the evening we again saw cover out feeding - one very good bunch on an open hill where the cover was largely royal dense clumps. I would rather not be dropping dead birds (or worse yet cripples) in that stuff. Again today I saw two Cooper hawks, several hootches, one marsh hawk, but no falcons.