Thread: Close but no sika

Howdy all.

Got out for a day hunt today, first time I’ve managed to get out this rut. I decided to give the sika a nudge, as I thought they may still be roaring.
Got to the road end at 10pm, and camped on the torneau cover of my ute. Heard a couple of stags heehawing through the night, one doing a sequence of 4 calls and the other 5.
Did a big loop in the morning. Came up over a ridge and had an unseen animal come trotting through the bush in front of me from right to left, and stopped behind a big patch of water pepperwood about 8m in front of me. I had a big pepperwood bush in front of me too obscuring my vision. No noise for about a minute, and no wind either. After a minute I slowly tried to peer around the bush, at which point the unseen deer bolted without barking or squealing. I tried a hind call but to no avail. I walked over to where the deer had been, smelt of deer, but not extremely strong as if it was a red. Carried on another 5m where I found a thrashed up totara sapling and a scrape.


My thoughts are that this was a stag, who heard me coming and came to check out if I was a hind or a rival. What could I have done differently here, continued waiting, heehawed?

Found a couple more rubbings through the day, another totara and a pepperwood.



And some interesting fungus.


Anyhow, carried on through my loop, eventually bumping what I think was a hind and yearling. The hind barked and took off immediately, with the yearling going the opposite way. I got the impression that they hadn’t gone far, and after a couple of hind calls detected a bit of movement as the yearling peered around a tree. I scanned back to see where the hind was, no sign of her. Looking back to the yearling, she was now standing front on at about 50m. I was in an awkward offhand position, and she squealed so I took a quick shot at her. She showed no sign of being hit. An inspection of the scene confirmed this, damn.
It was a good day nonetheless, nice to see a few animals, a bit of a shame that I had nothing to show for it.

My observations on these crafty little deer are:
-They can be hunted the same way I hunt reds (spook and shoot).
-They are inquisitive
-Like the Kaimais where I usually hunt, they are unlikely to be found in the nice open bush, and more likely to be in bush with a palatable understory (grasses, astelia, crown fern)
-They don’t feed much near creeks where the sound of running water inhibits their hearing - all the sign I say in these areas was from animals passing through.
I’m not claiming these to be facts, just my insights. Looking forward to learning more about these wee deer, interested in other peoples experiences too. Thanks.

Nice choice of rifle, what calibre?

Originally Posted by Marty Henry

Nice choice of rifle, what calibre?

Thanks, it’s chambered in 44WCF.

Looks like you had a good time chasing the sneaky little bastards. Also looks like you have made a bloody good start to figuring them out.

Good write up. Never chased them myself. I like the old school styles...


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Good stuff mate!

I find that Sika normally aren't far off water sheds where streams/creeks converge into basins. If you sidle these slowly you'll normally bump into them.

If you hunt the kaimais like myself then hunting Sika is easier. Yes you can spook and shoot them like reds. There curiosity to linger at times has allowed me to shoot probably half of my Sika.

Sika will always try and wind you if they not sure what you are as was the case on saturday when my mate spotted a wallow below hehawed waited 20 minutes never got a reply so thought will give 1 single call give it an other 10 then move on he was about to move when he spotted movement in the pepperwood running up the ridge from the wallow waited till he could identify it could see that it had a good head on it in a small gap in the pepperwood yelled HAY it stopped looked at him and got a lead injection from his 222 final result back steak for dinner tonight

Thanks guys, some great feedback here. It certainly is nice to hunt an area that has a good concentration of animals, can’t remember the last time I saw three in a morning in the Kaimais.