Thread: first fawns

yip thats right folks Bambi has blown to bits....Ive seen two in two days (on farms)
guess its stag or yearling for me untill january-febuary

Aye, that puts a smile on ya dial

Agree, I'm hoppers and Tahr for the next while.

Yes it's that time of year again, yearlings getting the boot from mum, easy picking.

Hi all
farmed deer are mated 3 weeks earlier than the wild ones, stags on farms go out on March 15th normally, and the wild boys get into their work from about the 7th of April so should start to see wild fawns from the first week of Dec. It is about the abundance of food, nature has a way of timing it just right for the mums and their high nutritional needs for feeding a fawn. There will be some silly spikers out there now as they would have been ejected from the family unit, and they will be turning up in the most unexpected places due to not having mum to guide them, I had one follow me along a track for about 5 minutes in the Ruahines once without being scared of my scent , needless to say he made the remainder of the trip in a back pack. The yearling hinds will generally stay with the hind but at distance around fawning, but teaming up when the fawn is able to keep up, hence those family groups of three that are often encountered.

7mm

Yep saw hoof prints on the beach the other evening so must have been out during the day with the tides. Also plenty of prints round the middle of the village... very small hooves the whitetail yearling (tasty though)

Friday sawheavy rain,thunder and lightning all night into the early hours of Saturday morning...good time for a hunt I thinks to self...chucked Meg in terrano and off we set,nice late start dayhunt should be just the ticket...Rangitata river was rather high as we crossed it Saturday morning ......oh how a little hind sight wouldve been good here....
we arrived up at bush edge just as sun came out and set off. nice day for a wander although the wind was fair howling,
thought to self at least its fairly consistant in direction,even if it was completely diferent direction to ten minutes earlier!!!!
went up through jelly fern clearings where we have shot 4 deer before...nothing doing there,little sign either...full stalk mode out other side,we have spooked deer in this 200 yard stretch of bush at least 10 times over the years,normally they beat us to the draw and are long gone...Meg my faithful big black bitch has upped the odds in my favour.shot 2 earlings here a couple of years back after she let me know they were close...some of her first deer.
a month ago in pouring rain again she let me know before deer broke...and I missed.
saturday looked promising the wind was fair howling over top of us but Meg winding VERY strongly down hill...so down hill we stalked full on ninga mode,eyes on stalks and dog in close...down fifty yards,then another 50 she still winding like mad...then sound of movement down below us,winding so hard its a wonder the ferns werent sucked up her nose,turned to look at me and let out tiny whine...then movement below..... deers head TICK upright neck TICK a fawn TICK fawns are good TICK
BOOM goes the 308 quick reload but hind wasnt seen..then brain kicks in...fawns are only weeks if not days old...if Ive connected with 50 yard standing neck shot it wont be a very big animal.......Meg leads me down hyper excited as she can smell what happened before I can see it...yip a fawn,yip its tiny...feet were firm so going by bobby calf standards more than four days old......
oh well its a deer,bush stalked and at least I didnt shoot the Mum and leave fawn to starve. removed poohs n wees,legs at joints and the head via the smashed neck....hornady 180grn RN did rather a lot of damage even with little resistance met.
into daybag and nice quiet walk back to wagon...only to find out via txt message from folks the river had continue going up and bridge was shut......no gas cookers were to be had in either store on way home so spent night in terrano at camp ground before a nice chap who Ive met from work offered me a bed for night...and dinner. so that took care of Sunday night,got to bridge at 07:30 this morning and crossed at noon.
so much for a quick outing. fawn tastes good,contemplating using it instead of chicken in dishes and doing a boilup type thing with the bones.
stoked for the dog,happy with the shot....not quite so much with age of Bambi....VERY pleased to be home.

Originally Posted by Ruger7mm

Hi all
farmed deer are mated 3 weeks earlier than the wild ones, stags on farms go out on March 15th normally, and the wild boys get into their work from about the 7th of April so should start to see wild fawns from the first week of Dec. It is about the abundance of food, nature has a way of timing it just right for the mums and their high nutritional needs for feeding a fawn. There will be some silly spikers out there now as they would have been ejected from the family unit, and they will be turning up in the most unexpected places due to not having mum to guide them, I had one follow me along a track for about 5 minutes in the Ruahines once without being scared of my scent , needless to say he made the remainder of the trip in a back pack. The yearling hinds will generally stay with the hind but at distance around fawning, but teaming up when the fawn is able to keep up, hence those family groups of three that are often encountered.

7mm

I went for a shot yesterday evening timing couldn't have been more perfect it had been pissing down & rite on que when I parked the truck it stopped , had a young stag trot off infront of me in the ''no shooting" zone , after walking around 300m from the truck walking over a rise I spotted a yearling hind 8 paces away facing away from me and walking down into a hollow in the scrub , never to be seen again I continued on to a long clearing that's produced the goods previously however nothing was on it so I figured for a change id watch it for a while , a couple of minutes latter out walks a little spiker he just kept walking directly towards me so when he got to within 80 yards I started making odd gruntal piggy noises on hearing this he stopped mid stride , he didn't go far after the shot the 22-250 hit him square in the chest 30m tops , he was one of the smallest reds I recall shooting , hed be the size of a fallow with 2 little bumps of velvet an inch long , must have been a late fawn , well conditioned though so will be good eating , managed a xmas tree on the way home too so I was a happy chappie.

Big mob of fallow down here now have a hawk in tow, I'm guessing mum protects the fawns but the hawk knows its afterbirth season!

Yup I came across two lots of afterbirth in thick scrub last week while looking for a downed red spiker. Beat the pigs to it by minutes I reckon.

Dad was in ruhnies 3weeks a log & the dog pointed to a fawn in the fern & we took some photos of it