Thread: Bloody Poachers!

WTF.... how did that happen

Copy and paste too Dust off Scribe

Originally Posted by Scribe

I have been and am still a farmer myself but I have got to admit that the old cockatoo is a pretty versatile thinker when it comes to game animals...

Way back....When we were culling the cocky would discover a mob of deer on their crop and the telephone would run hot "You bastards are responsible for these deer..."You guys let them go in NZ and you are supposed to be keeping them under control...You should be sacked for not keeping them under control They are eating all my tucker I cant afford to feed all your bloody deer.

A few years later during the deer boom..." Dont you bastards shoot any of my deer they are eating my tucker so they belong to me..You poaching bastards have no respect for another mans property"

The present...For Christ sake start shooting the bloody hinds again and reduce the numbers, there 30 bloody hinds on the crop the other night when I went up to move the sheep. You hunt on the property I expect you to keep the deer numbers down. I can afford to feed all those bloody deer.

I take great delight in teasing my farmer friends about how fast they are on their feet when it comes to looking after there own interests and how I am glad I have been in the game long enough to see such radical changes in position and smart about turns from them.

Wasnt it Barry Crump that described them so well as "those moaners from down on the mudflats".

Some deer farmers are no different. They soon forgot how they were able to have a business in NZ. It was a helicopter pilots vision in the first place. How many pilots and shooters lost their lives, stocking farms with live capture.
As soon as venison started up again in 2004 deer farmers were the largest hurdle. They tried to have it stopped so they could get more for the farmed meat passed off as feral overseas.

Perhaps we could bring in some new rules here.

We could have the Douglas Score X 2 for an animal taken out of a greedy farmers paddock who wants to sell the animal behind the fence to some bigshot.

Then we could have the Douglas Score X 1 1/2 for an animal taken out of the DOC estate that is at risk of being poisoned.

That should liven up the game a bit.

Originally Posted by Scribe

Perhaps we could bring in some new rules here.

We could have the Douglas Score X 2 for an animal taken out of a greedy farmers paddock who wants to sell the animal behind the fence to some bigshot.

Then we could have the Douglas Score X 1 1/2 for an animal taken out of the DOC estate that is at risk of being poisoned.

That should liven up the game a bit.

Should that not be the other way around Scribe? I have been on property's where free range(but on good tucker/fed ect) stags around 300 douglas are culled as they should be and usually are around 350 360 douglas.

I would put way more value on a 260- 300 Douglas public land stag that has avoided the 1080 and WARO and has had some sort of effort put in. As opposed to ride the 4 wheeler walk 500m shoot a bloody big stag have the guide skin and carry it and hand over your 10k

Originally Posted by veitnamcam

Should that not be the other way around Scribe? I have been on property's where free range(but on good tucker/fed ect) stags around 300 douglas are culled as they should be and usually are around 350 360 douglas.

I would put way more value on a 260- 300 Douglas public land stag that has avoided the 1080 and WARO and has had some sort of effort put in. As opposed to ride the 4 wheeler walk 500m shoot a bloody big stag have the guide skin and carry it and hand over your 10k

Yeah you are right man. Just thinking of a way to liven things up a bit...The real test would be getting out again without getting caught and not paying 10 k.

I guess I miss the excitement of the good old days where one could be accused of poaching a couple times a week by some half mad stubble hopper. I just about had the Chopper confiscated on the spot once by a DOC worker once over in Whangamomana for catching stinking old goats. Perish the thought losing your machine chasing stinking old goats. Though I have to admit to making a lot of money out of these goats at the time. We were getting 200 dollars a head for anything with a fanny. When an old bugger of a farmer thought if he could see us working in the distance then we must have been on his land and rang DOC. Wiser heads prevailed in this case in the end though but it was a near run thing.

Then a few days later I got a ring from the local Police...What did I know about the theft of a black cattle beast about three years old from a certain property. This woman had identified her animal under our helicopter as I was flying over her property. Actually it was a rather large wild boar out of the Heao.

When I explained to the Cop That it was a Hughes 300c I was flying and it would have been lucky to have lifted 250 kilos on that day he was quite satisfied then it wasnt a really a clear cut case after all.

Originally Posted by Scribe

When I explained to the Cop That it was a Hughes 300c I was flying and it would have been lucky to have lifted 250 kilos on that day he was quite satisfied then it wasnt a really a clear cut case after all.

I know an old timer that flew a load double that in an old B model from the Pyke valley back to Queenstown. I have no reason to doubt him as I have worked with/for him for yrs. I sometimes would be forced to cringe when I got the one more or hook the rest on signal when I was shooting for him.

I'll never forget when I shot an animal in a shitty gut way up high in the Turnbull when we were on the way back home from a good run. I thought we were going to B line it home and forgot to wrap a couple strops around myself after we dropped the last load at the truck.
Without thinking I stepped off the skid onto a boulder and made my way cautiously down to the animal. I stuck it and reached for a strop....bugger, no good to me lying on the floor of the machine, eh.
Having to run back up the gut to get one out of the machine would surely anger my employer due to the time and wasted fuel. He is lets say, well known for doing his nut for lesser indiscretions.
I held with my back to the annoying down draft that all impatient pilots seem too bestow on their shooters by hovering mere inches above your head thinking it will hurry you up. Hunched over the carcass I was contemplating my next move. Most of all, I was dreading the abuse that was sure to come when I had to reveal my mistake.
I was just plucking up the courage when I seen a huge white flash and felt like I was sucker punched by Mike Tyson in the back of the scone.
Old grizzle guts knew I had no strop and took great pleasure in beaming me from 30-40 feet in the head while hovering with a tied up strop. What made it worse, was we bought a heap of new candium coated steel carabiners that replaced our alloy ones. I reckon I just about wore a strop everywhere I went after that. I never forgot one again.

You chopper boys are having to easy a ride in this thread So... Farmers changing their minds about deer because of their value? maybe. Generations from my area took care of there own place though and where ok with the bounty and selling the tusks .Yes the approach changed with the value of venison and so did the approach of the choppers,just makes good commercial sense. For those that did as you say well when you own the land and need to get a living from it you use what you have. But don't lump all farmers in together,as I'm sure you wouldn't like all chopper operates to be labeled the same. Which ever way you want to look at it a boundary is a boundary and poaching is poaching. You might look back on it with a wry smile but having been on the other side of it for many years from land and air I don't see much to smile about when the subject is bought up. The local cop here is taking it seriously these days.

Chopper boys have been lumped together with bad reps from ignorant hunters for as long as I can remember. I am not condoning poaching in any form. Sorry if it come across that way.

No worries mate, wasnt aiming at anyone just putting a point of view. Had a plenty of trouble over the years, on one occasion had bullets bouncing off the road 30yds infront of the car with the whole familly in it.

Whilst on the other foot I have had to appear twice before the courts in Taupo to do with poaching charges. Both cases never made the grade. In one case DOC withdrew the charges because of hostile witnesses but not until we appeared before the judge and in the other case a fellow Pilot admitted to the judge that he had laid a false charges.

In both cases I was grounded because DOC took my Wild Animal Recovery Licence from me.

DOC knew that none of the cases were ever going to make the grade.... No compensation, no sorry, no nothing.

Its a great way to do the opposition over as some outfits quickly found out.

What about the guy we had down at the pub that was boasting about pissing in our jerry cans that we had left behind on the hill to fuel up on the way home. Reckoned we were probably poachers, then a few weeks later this snivelling creature wanted us to back load him into the hills when we flew out some hunters, all for nothing.

They were incredible these 'me toos' cockys worse than the rest I used to be so ashamed of them. If they wanted a job done or a bit of search and rescue or they thought there was a spare seat in the machine it was always 'me too' "me too'

They were worse still when there was any money involved. We used to catch a lot of deer on a 50/50 basis then on farms. Always on a one for you one for me basis. But when you went round to get the animals later you would find that the farmer had substituted a couple of spikers worth $200 for your couple of beautiful hinds worth $2500.

And they would lie to you right in your face. They used to get a rude reception from us as we had risked our lives to catch those animals while the cockatoo sat on his ass in the shade. A shooter never forgot what animals he had caught and tied up

We had Less Mars (sp) here mostly till he craked himself on the head. He always came back and he recieved the respect he gave. Worked very well and I never heard a bad word about him or from him regarding the local area. Have had deer taken and padocks buzzed by another operator trying to push them through or over the fence and a couple of face offs with the old man with plenty of threats as to what would be happening when noone was around. Good and bad on both sides like all walks of life.

Of all the operators I have never known not one would have ever been silly enough to try and steal a deer out from behind a deer fence or similarly try to push deer over a deer fence. Why would you.... you would only be able to grab one before they split in every direction. And look at the risks involved in plucking a deer out of a deer farm, robbing a bank would carry less risk

Its was always far more sensible to put an hour in up in the hills and catch one that didnt belong to anyone

In this case Scribe it was spite, he'd been refused permission to the property but had been tumbled taking deer off the hill anyway, was after a little confrontation.

Originally Posted by sneeze

In this case Scribe it was spite, he'd been refused permission to the property but had been tumbled taking deer off the hill anyway, was after a little confrontation.

Less sense than robbing the corner dairy when you had 2 mill in the bank.

I reserve the right to defend anyone against paranoia and false accusations of poaching . Have a read through this thread and you will see that there is absolutley no proof that any poaching at all has occurred and yet people want the owner of this vehicle Trespassed. Worse still others want his vehicle damaged or destroyed.

This is the same mindless paranoia that caused stupid young men to piss in our jerrycans full of fuel.