Thread: Do you know how lucky we are?

Have been in Scotland the past couple of weeks and have enjoyed getting out in the forests and hills, stalking in on lots of roe deer (its the beginning of their rut) and a whole bunch of reds, in the Cairngorms and Galloways.

Not hunting, just easy walking in the woods with the wife and our boys, and a little bit of more adventurous hiking higher up.

Man the Scottish reds are poxy bloody things, way smaller and thinner and just not a patch on ours. Like really scrawny hinds. The stags are in the later stages of shedding their velvet and you can easily spot their rubbing trees. And they're small, body wise. Some good heads, but probably two thirds the weight.

And the hunting of them? What a rigmarole, and expensive. Have learnt a lot, talking to the locals. It takes a fair bit of very careful listening to understand some of the fellas...

We are so lucky in NZ. Its been a stark reminder to me how important it us to fight to protect the NZ rural way of life, and our public land hunting heritage. The UK is a strange country, so much has changed since I was last here in 2004, and since I left permanently in 1989. Just like what's happened in NZ, a lot of metropolitan fuckwits want to change things in rural life they haven't a clue about, for no good reason other than own ignorant misconceptions.

But that's not what I wanted to say, what I wanted to say is that Scottish reds are pisswilly tiddlers compared to ours! Which was a surprise, same species and all, but something I'd forgotten, its 32 years since I last shot a deer in Scotland. Just the quality of the genetics and the feed.