Thread: Hunter shot in Kaimanawa ranges

Originally Posted by Flyblown

What I want to know about both these incidents recently is what were the guys wearing? I guess this will come out in the inquest for the poor bugger in the Kaimais. Hope like hell the bloke today pulls through.

I read again recently the research regarding deer sight, the colour spectrums they see, UV reflection etc. Debated again with the wife tonight about her reservations about hunting public land, especially bush. She’s not happy about going into public land anymore - flatly refuses the Kaimais despite the fact we look right at them out the bloody kitchen window.

Problem is its hard to get a definitive position from the science, someone that will say “Deer see X, Y and Z and that’s it”. Its more like well maybe its XYZ but could be ABC and more besides. Luckily we hunt mostly private but I think we take it for granted sometimes and should still wear some kind of hiviz. Whilst we hunt as a couple or with our kids, we only ever take one rifle... its the other bugger that we don’t know is there thats our concern.

Does it matter what you are wearing. Identify your target.

Originally Posted by TeRei

Does it matter what you are wearing. Identify your target.

Does it matter? Seems that in thick bush, where for whatever reason a lot of guys (like me) don’t wear hiviz, it does matter. Because every year we have the same small but disastrous hunter-shoots-hunter nightmares. The id your target mantra isn’t working for a tiny percentage of hunters, with the same consequences over and over. Never has worked 100%, seems like it never will. So the next step is legislation like many of the US states, thou shalt wear blaze orange to a certain level of coverage. Which no one really wants to see happen, because many of us balk at it.

Ask your wife / girlfriend / mother, whoever, how would you like me as a hunter to be dressed in thick bush? I make my kids wear blue hats and blaze orange singlets matter of course, why the fuck don’t I wear it myself???

Anyway, as pointed out above, the Taupo team pulled off an amazing rescue today and that’s worth recognising big time.

It's the other fecker that needs to identify their target that I worry about. I usually wear blaze orange on public land, and when I come on places like this I see clowns making excuses like 'in certain light blaze looks like deer', well it aint a bloody deer so that's a dickhead excuse. I'm sad to say I am considering switching to blue, I don't care if a deer can see it, I'd rather miss the odd chance of a deer than be shot by some wanker.

I read somewhere that in 1 state in USA, something like 62% of hunters shot were wearing blaze. Goes to show that no matter how much we try and educate folk, it will never work 100%.