Not far from the spent, multicolored shotgun casings that carpet the cinder base of Coyote Butte, a group of truck-and-jeep-driving teenagers took turns tearing through a collection of mud puddles. Each time, their churning tires shot brown torrents 15 feet into the air.

When Dean Warmack, 18, plowed his white 1997 Ford F-250 pickup through the middle of the bog, his truck — despite its powerful diesel engine — became embedded in the churning pit of chocolate milk-like muck.

“Get the hitch out, boys!” someone hollered.

These mud puddles, located 20 miles southeast of Bend near China Hat Road, are prized by off-road vehicle enthusiasts who love “mudding,” the playful term for off-road driving through wet conditions. The area also pertains to the 114,000-acre East Fort Rock Off-Highway Vehicle Area, a portion of the Deschutes National Forest that is managed by the U.S. Forest Service’s Combined Off Highway Vehicle Operations program. The mud puddles lie in the area’s 100 miles of shared-use paths, which welcome all vehicle classes — from motorized dirt bikes and four-wheelers to the souped-up, street-legal trucks driven by this pack of teens.

Mostly Mountain View High School seniors, the boys know each other from the school’s shop class and its west-side parking lot, where they park their jacked-up and customized trucks. Their go-to spots are here and the Mayfield Pond Recreation Area.

Kyle Rogers, also a Ford devotee, backed his F-250 to the lip of the water to tow Warmack’s. By then, the stranded driver had climbed from the cab to the bed, where he waited for Ty Gelatt to chuck him a hitch and a chord that was attached to Rogers’ truck.

Once the metal rod clattered to the plastic-lined bed, Warmack flipped himself upside down over his tailgate to insert the hitch into the receiver and secure the cord. Everyone scrambled into Rogers’ truck bed to give it leverage. When the roaring truck pulled Warmack’s truck from the brown goo, Gelatt, a Chevy guy, was impressed.

“Kyle, I’m through with the Power Stroke jokes for awhile,” he said, referring to Roger’s Ford engine. “You’ve got a good truck.”

“I know,” Rogers replied.

Passing the torque

Sara Baughman, the Combined Off Highway Vehicle Operations program lead, said the agency doesn’t register and rarely tracks off-highway vehicle use in either Forest Service or BLM land, which it also manages. The organization does, however, release a weekly, free-to-download newsletter that details off-roading opportunities and conditions at places like Cline Butte and Ground Hog Rock Crawl.

“There are routes you can travel on for scenery … all the way to really extreme rock crawling opportunities. We have the whole gamut here,” Baughman said, adding that her primary focus is to direct the OHV community to the right areas.

“If it’s an open route and there happens to be a standing puddle, there’s nothing saying you can’t drive through it,” she said, even if that means doing so over and over again, she said with a chuckle.

Frank Begley, the general manager at Performance Authority, a local custom truck shop, described Central Oregon as an off-road playground.

“When I started playing in the mud 20 years ago, there was a lot of Forest Service land available, and some of that land got tore up,” said Begley, 38. “(Authorities) cracked down, and they definitely made it harder for people to go mudding or recreate off-road.”

These days, Begley said he and his dozen off-road buddies — who began mudding when they were teenagers — prefer venues like a private mud bog in Redmond and DirtyMinds MotorPark in Prineville, which hosts several mud-bogging competitions on private land. Twenty to 35 trucks typically participate and around 200-300 people show up, he said.

As for the truck specifications ideal for mudding, Begley recommends gasoline engines — which can run a much higher RPM than diesel engines — and large, chunky tires.

“Mud is hard on stuff. With the high RPM and the high wheel speed, it’s hard not to break stuff,” Begley said.

The store manager said he’s relatively out of touch with the younger generation of recently licensed drivers who enjoy rolling off-road, yet he knows Warmack, who interns at the shop several times a week. Warmack said he intends to pursue a career in diesel mechanics and welding after high school.

“(Warmack) doesn’t completely think he knows everything. He’s open to direction and guidance. It’s nice,” Begley said with a laugh.

A sometimes dangerous pastime

At Coyote Butte, just as the teens liberated Warmack’s truck, a tow truck arrived. Its driver asked where a Ford Fusion was stuck — the gang snickered and pointed toward a nearby trail.

The teenagers know what they are doing for fun can turn dangerous in an instant. On Nov. 6, along Forest Road 1815, less than a mile from Coyote Butte, four La Pine teenagers were injured, one seriously, when their SUV flipped. All four, who weren’t wearing seat belts, were flung from the vehicle.

Business as usual

A week later, after a few more rainfalls had replenished the puddles, the all-boy crew was at it again. For the occasion, Gelatt secured an American flag into the corner of his truck’s bed using cardboard, duct tape and zip ties.

“It’s the hick way,” he said.

For his part, Rogers decorated his truck with the American and Libertarian flags. His vehicle was spotless; he was here to do the towing, not the mudding. He scoffed at the suggestion of driving it through the mud.

“Hell, no, dude. My dad would kill me,” Rogers said. His father, who’s from a rural town in Pennsylvania by way of Los Angeles, passed down his love of shooting, fishing and off-roading. “Everyone got their hitches in?” Rogers asked rhetorically.

Austin Rosales, 16, took a turn thrusting his vintage Chevy K-10 through the giant cappuccino spill. Halfway through, his truck’s engine made choking noises as it eked out of the bog. On dry ground, its engine promptly died. After popping open the hood, Rosales shook muddy water from his air filter.

“It’s OK. I needed a new one anyway,” he said.

When Gelatt floored his Chevy Silverado through an adjacent mass of brown liquid, it covered his windshield and windows like a drive-through car wash. The truck shook and bumped, and the visual brown-out was as debilitating as the involuntary cackling of everyone inside the truck’s cab. It was sheer muddin’ joy.

Between slugs of Mountain Dew and with a mouthful of chew, Tristan Scott, 17, took several turns through the mud with his Dodge Ram 1500. His performances elicited the strongest cheers when he stood in the bed of his friends’ truck as it took a pass through the mire. When they circled back, Scott’s jeans and flannel shirt were dripping with frothy, cold water.

Of the Confederate flag sticker he fixed to his rear windshield, Scott said it represented his Chickasaw relatives, who live on reservations in the South. It also reflects his nonconformist side, he said.

“We’re rebels. We find (muddy) spots, drive through them, and get out. Sometimes we get in trouble,” he said with a shrug. It wasn’t clear whether he referred to trouble with insufficient torque or with authorities.

Rogers, too, displayed his colors in flag-form. His Libertarian flag sends the message, “Don’t tell me how to live my life,” he said. A senior, Rogers said he intends to relocate to Southern California to continue the charter fishing work he performed the past three summers.

Dusk fell on the group as the boys made plans for the evening. Several mentioned dinner and an early night to bed. Scott, however, said he wasn’t through with the mudding.

“I’m going rallyin’ in La Pine!”

— Reporter: 541-617-7816, pmadsen@bendbulletin.com