Thread: Help me shoot a big goat?

I think that big heads grow where there are few goats.

Its because they need to be old to grow long. So you need a okace where people dont hunt goats ie not enough to be worth spending a day out for and prefrably not many deer either.

If there are a lot of goats around, people will tend to shoot the biggest ones first, before they get really big.

Originally Posted by norsk

Thats where I shot mine.

Must go back for the head,its only been 14 years.

Should be pretty clean by now, mate.

Originally Posted by Micky Duck

interesting the NZDA record was shot in hunterhills.......very interesting as goats are VERY few and far between there and have been for the 30plus years Ive been down here. the place gets hunted hard on regular basis for wallabies and goats stick out like dogs danglies by comparison.....

Really? I used to shoot roos on a few farms along the east side of the Hunters and would usually shoot a few goats at the same time. Or are you just meaning public land in the hunters?

@clem my 2c would be to start by driving the forgotten highway... did the drive from New Plymouth last year and the number of goats from Whangamomona through to Taumarunui/Te Kuiti was staggering. As others have stated with the current value of live goats being what they are, many farmers are now deliberately keeping numbers high and mustering but a little door knocking will do you no harm and a few public access open hunting permit areas not far off the road, you will only know if an area contains any big boys by getting out there by checking them out.

My two cents.

Like any trophy hunting bloodline is number one.
High angora will often produce long wide horns but usually at the expense of girth and gnarlyness. Angora will however produce an earlier trophy for you. Where to find them? White goat country. White goat country is also usually less shot country as these are the first down for newby shooters as they're usually first seen. Of course this isn't a hard and fast rule as you get a few Saanen lines and these produce rubbish heads generally speaking.

Then you have the classic multi coloured and black billys. I took a few good black billys and some good 'blues'. The classic brown colour with the stripe rarely gave out great horns(34+). Most of this sort of billy would be quite old before they went over 32"(which was my length of keeper). I was just looking through old pics but most were saved to photobucket which I found out last lockdown, they eventually delete.
Here's a blue that shows that nice gnarlyness. I think I kept this pic as he had really bad brushing on the end of the horns.


Really like any trophy hunting the trick is to find an area that would have the correct blood line. It also needs bluffy ground that is well back from the average hunter ground to lower pressure. You then need to spend the time in there not pulling the trigger. Sometimes some of the little doc blocks that are overlooked can be the best. In fact the most heads over the shortest time for me came from the bush that overlooks Whangarei(we killed every goat in there in the end, sorry it was our job).

The TeKuiti area holds very large numbers of goats and is also blessed with huge amounts of food under the pines in many areas. On a friends farm down there there is usually 70+ goats in view from his house at any time. Few are of trophy quality as the bloodline is average and it is heavily pig hunted meaning they get smoked over just prior to real trophy size. when numbers are that high it's too expensive to cull for the cocky usually and these are hard to round up with out a huge effort.
But if you spend the time in there you are guaranteed to pull out a 30+ at some point if you cover ground and glass when you can. When they chop the pines it becomes a lot easier.

I had little interest in the value of the goats when I was shooting as a contractor, until I met a new mate of the old forum who had a shed full of deer trophys and who was shocked to see the pics of what I was leaving to rot. It inspired me to keep some however with days of 9 to 11 hrs on the hill I was only ever to keep one s that were close to the end of day or close to the car. Last lockdown I pulled all the trophys out of the rafters and gave some to him to boil out which we still haven't done. I'll have to try and get a pic of some. My biggest was 112cm(44") which I put in a tree to rot only to have it chewed up but one of my dogs. I'd seen him a few time with two other large ones which I'd shot but took a year to find him somewhere that I could shoot.

Some of the guys on the old forum had some seriously big ones. I believe a 45" goat is a trophy equal to a 190+ sika stag. Certainly it's pretty rare and takes a lot of ground and time to secure if you're attempting to reach that milestone. Of course some folk are lucky and just have them at the back of their farm. My 44 had been mustered a couple of times as they sliced a strip on the front of the horns each time.

Here's some goat porn for you I found while looking through an old youtube acc.



https://youtu.be/vGxs6f4Mr9s

Nice,

I could probably put you on to a big goat in Australia,
Goats are mustered here for sale but the big ones are back in the hills.