Thread: Food For Thought

I pondered a question for a while this roar, wear full camo and try not be seen or trust myself to see others before they see me, or go full blaze and stand out, I went with the fluro option in the end. Have been lucky to not run into any other hunters apart from my own party at camp etc.I Have never been quite as worried/scared this year as previously years hunting. Not a nice feeling walking out to track ends into clearings wondering if someone has a rifle pointed at you .... Have recently purchased a new head lamp a H14.2R and it has a flashing mode so have been activating that before dark to try and stay 'safer'.

Which brings me to the important part of my yarn.
Was in a hut a week back when a NZDA member told me something that I was quite amazed to hear and then it all made sense. In Europe and also in America they have set seasons for hunting where they only shoot the 'bucks' and have a set 'bag' with tags etc for limits. I can't remember the finer details but was surprised to learn that Europe hasnt had a 'mis-sighted for an animal' related hunting incident in decades. Which the guy I spoke to put down to the fact that in these places the hunters hunt for a 'trophy', so therefore identify the sex of the animal and its 'score'. Where as in NZ I hunt for meat first and for-most. Obviously a system like they have in these places is never gonna work in NZ but I just thought it was interesting and something to think about.

So what I was wondering is what do people do in order to stay safe, i.e be seen, do people identify say the age of the animal before pulling a trigger or just identify it as a deer ? And also what do you think we could be doing better as a society ?

Cheers

It would be interesting to see the distance from road ends and heli pads that most shooting deaths occur. I bet not many occur more than a few hours in.

I think they pay for the animals they shoot with the permits. So they want the best head as it makes it more worthwhile.
And most don't hunt without permits as the penalties are high for poaching.
A lot of accidents happen here cause people think its a deer without looking. Just shoot and hope.

I get told what I can shoot so I have to make sure and check. Will get booted off the spot otherwise. So for me checking is first and foremost in my mind

Yes, sex and guess at age. And how many points if its a stag. When the camp boss puts a minimum 12 points at his spot rule on then you better check. I fucked up this year and shot an 11

I believe a check list of demonstrating how to safely use a firearm to a FAL officer in the field would help alot before being issued a FAL. Perhaps even having a target type bush environment where deer and humans are partially obscured or carrying a deer and be told to identify the target and choose to shoot or not. As for high vis, I believe it doesn't work but that's my opinion.

Being from the UK and having hunted in the USA in bush type country, the number of shootings by hunters is so low in the UK to not be worth counting, because we nearly only hunt private land, in Europe they have a lot more due to there habit of having driven hunts, but have reduced the number by using blaze orange on hats or coats, the same goes for the USA on public land.
If I was huntingublic land in NZ I would wear blaze orange, there is no reason not to wear it, as deer pigs etc don,t see in colour as we do, just shades of grey ( real tree was invented for Turkey hunters as turkeys see in colour) a face veil has been proved to be the most useful part of hunting camo, as animals recognise preditors by there faces . Now I have preached to the converted I will shut up.

Does anyone know the percentage of last 10 guys shot in NZ, how many were wearing blaze orange?

Originally Posted by Rusky

I believe a check list of demonstrating how to safely use a firearm to a FAL officer in the field would help alot before being issued a FAL. Perhaps even having a target type bush environment where deer and humans are partially obscured or carrying a deer and be told to identify the target and choose to shoot or not. As for high vis, I believe it doesn't work but that's my opinion.

Remember, not all firearm users are hunters. This is a hunter centric problem rather than a licensing issue or short coming.
As for blaze, it should remain your own individual choice rather than be mandated in my opinion.

Originally Posted by tararua

Does anyone know the percentage of last 10 guys shot in NZ, how many were wearing blaze orange?

I can recall 3 of them wearing high vis. One guy shot in the head wearing a high vis hat or beanie.

If that's the case it very worrying, buck fever on a grand scale

Even more worrying is that this guy can make the same mistake too: Hunter admits negligence in fatal shooting | NZNews | 3 News

I'm going to stick to camo and being sneaky. Is working quite well for me so far.

Dunno about everyone else but I see far more people in the bush than animals I can shoot. My goat culls are balanced out by walks in south west Ruahines where each carpark has 10 cars.