Thread: How far away was the last deer you shot???

Micky is a professional, he will be like an all black waiting on the sideline with a yellow card.

His ban must be almost up and he will be bursting back onto the field full of energy and plenty of go forward.

About 90km from my place.

It is the measure of a person to take criticism on board and move on.
Plenty on here probably regret what they have posted at times.
It is everybody's responsibility to consider what they post and this media is difficult to get right at times.
Not like face to face with other cues indicating where you are coming from.
It has been disappointing to see some contributors drop off of over something I showed no interest in and wasn't following.
Everybody can and does contribute and the gems they produce are priceless.
Some were better than Bunji in that they were genuine and it is a pity they have been banned or pulled the pin
The mods have a shit of a job, a bit like speaker of the house.
They have to moderate as well as contribute which is a tough act.
Any way everybody have a good festive break and tell us what you got up to in the New Year.

The last one I shot was at 30 metres, but it was only because it was obscuring my view of the one 600 metres away that I wanted to shoot with my expensive gear.

This comment made in honour of Mr Duck.

This poll interesting because it shows me shooting distance has NOT changed alot since 60s-70s. 50% of animals in this poll were shot between 0-100m, about 73% shot 0-200m, and 85% shot within 300m. Approx. That's not really different to 40-50 years ago - even though quality of most rifles and certainly optics has improved. Shooting usually governed by conditions and not necessarily longer range capability of modern arms.

Tends to confirm my own view that LR arms/optics setups not necessary for NZ field shooting. They are for one segment of our shooting fraternity - ideal choice of course for 400-1000m competition shooting, or perhaps southern mountain chamois/thar etc. But .. also true to say we shot those thar etc comfortably with the 270s/308s of the day with a Pecar Berlin 4x sitting on them. My view - LR gear no neccessity, but if its your hobby interest then my all means go for it!

Be interesting to see a north/south island breakdown from the figures above. Most of our deer in the past in the north were well under 100m. Bush shots. That will still hold - average distance still likely well under 100m. South more open so more frequent longer shots, and one would expect higher average distance.

The last one I shot was 60 meters, normal average would be 200 meters.

Originally Posted by mudgripz

This poll interesting because it shows me shooting distance has NOT changed alot since 60s-70s. 50% of animals in this poll were shot between 0-100m, about 73% shot 0-200m, and 85% shot within 300m. Approx. That's not really different to 40-50 years ago - even though quality of most rifles and certainly optics has improved. Shooting usually governed by conditions and not necessarily longer range capability of modern arms.

Tends to confirm my own view that LR arms/optics setups not necessary for NZ field shooting. They are for one segment of our shooting fraternity - ideal choice of course for 400-1000m competition shooting, or perhaps southern mountain chamois/thar etc. But .. also true to say we shot those thar etc comfortably with the 270s/308s of the day with a Pecar Berlin 4x sitting on them. My view - LR gear no neccessity, but if its your hobby interest then my all means go for it!

Be interesting to see a north/south island breakdown from the figures above. Most of our deer in the past in the north were well under 100m. Bush shots. That will still hold - average distance still likely well under 100m. South more open so more frequent longer shots, and one would expect higher average distance.

Well I've lived in the deep south for 10 years and most of the deer I shoot are sub 300 with the vast majority being sub 150.

It also depends on what part of the south island you're talking about. Fiordland, Westcoast, Rakiura can be both bush hunting but both equally clearings and open country. But I do agree it would be very interesting to see how it breaks down in terms of SI vs NI and into that what regions people are shooting.

Originally Posted by mudgripz

This poll interesting because it shows me shooting distance has NOT changed alot since 60s-70s. 50% of animals in this poll were shot between 0-100m, about 73% shot 0-200m, and 85% shot within 300m. Approx. That's not really different to 40-50 years ago - even though quality of most rifles and certainly optics has improved. Shooting usually governed by conditions and not necessarily longer range capability of modern arms.

Tends to confirm my own view that LR arms/optics setups not necessary for NZ field shooting. They are for one segment of our shooting fraternity - ideal choice of course for 400-1000m competition shooting, or perhaps southern mountain chamois/thar etc. But .. also true to say we shot those thar etc comfortably with the 270s/308s of the day with a Pecar Berlin 4x sitting on them. My view - LR gear no neccessity, but if its your hobby interest then my all means go for it!

Be interesting to see a north/south island breakdown from the figures above. Most of our deer in the past in the north were well under 100m. Bush shots. That will still hold - average distance still likely well under 100m. South more open so more frequent longer shots, and one would expect higher average distance.

The poll itself doesn't really mean dick squat, it only asked for the distance of the LAST animal you shot, the last 2 i have shot have been about 50 meters which is the distance i put in the poll, the 6-10 before that were 200meters plus, The poll would have been better off, if it asked for an average of range that deer were shot in last 12 months.

Originally Posted by HUNTY

The poll itself doesn't really mean dick squat, it only asked for the distance of the LAST animal you shot, the last 2 i have shot have been about 50 meters which is the distance i put in the poll, the 6-10 before that were 200meters plus, The poll would have been better off, if it asked for an average of range that deer were shot in last 12 months.

Its all relative tho i wouldnt been looking at it like a survey to take numbers from.
The season is ripe for easier hunting too, fresh grass kicking around and silly spikers out trying to find there feet.

Last one i shot was in a stag group, shot a spiker, stags too off but 3 spikers hung around for another few minutes before taking too the bush.

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Not really. That’s not how statistics work.
If you sample a big enough group you get good data. It’s just as likely a long range hunter shot 9 of her last 10 deer at distances over 600M But the last one was at 25M.
As you say if you take a 10 shot average you get a very different result. But so long as the overall sample size is big enough you get a good representation.

I would guess a bigger issue is exaggeration.
Plenty of blowhards in the world, and while Bunji maybe gone, there’s bound to be the odd one like him here.

Bring back Mick

Yup. Maybe a poll that shows up a more usefull result (but unlikely to do so due to the blowhard bullshit LH mentions) would be "how far away was the last deer you missed" Now that would be interesting.

Originally Posted by Tentman

Yup. Maybe a poll that shows up a more usefull result (but unlikely to do so due to the blowhard bullshit LH mentions) would be "how far away was the last deer you missed" Now that would be interesting.

Reading that I straight away thought of two awesome miss story's......it could have potential

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Ive often said "Icant hit a cows arse with a shovel "does that count

" Like my duck /goose shooting if i do get birds my standing explanation is "nup didnt shoot em -they were laughing so much at the idiot on the ground they had a heart attack and well dropped dead!" in saying that though manys the feral goose whose peaceful slumber was terminated by my well placed texas heart shot sometimes as close as3m (living in dead flax bushes.) or suprise suprise"oh shit oh dear not himagain time to fly" ..BOOM.

great fun and excellent practise for close quarter snap shooting.possums -get as close as i can to the bloody snarling moosh spitting&cackling then deliver the terminal blow job.5-10m typical.

Originally Posted by Tentman

Yup. Maybe a poll that shows up a more usefull result (but unlikely to do so due to the blowhard bullshit LH mentions) would be "how far away was the last deer you missed" Now that would be interesting.

Yep not sure how much info would be gleaned, but I think it would be entertaining if nothing else.

My last miss was 5 shots at animals ago. A fallow doe and I really needed meat as had just moved and wed emptied our freezers before moving. She was quartering towards me at 100 meters. After the shot I saw her ghosting through the scrub and I have no idea what I did wrong. In fact I was so sure I had done nothing wrong that I spent the rest of the morning with the dog searching the area. Dogs dont lie.
So I will make a presumption of likely cause. I hurried because meat was important and if I miss its generally a tendency to shoot over top of something and maybe it was 150 instead of 100 and she wasn't standing where I thought she was. Often in case like that is is a lot of small things that add up too one big miss.

Here’s another curveball:
I head shot a reasonable (for me) 10 pointer 2 roars ago at a tad over 400M, steeply down hill.
I didn’t have a great shooting position, and wasn’t as steady as I would have liked, but I had cleanly dropped a couple of fallow at that range just a few weeks earlier, and hadn’t missed or needed 2 shots for years.
First shot seemed to be a complete miss, he just looked around, hardly moved. Lined up again, boom; he disappeared. He was standing on a tiny clearing, and was mostly behind a tree.
Big climb down, across a river and up, not really expecting to find him, only to find a head shot stag.
Thing is I was aiming for centre chest…..
Total fluke.