Thread: Kaimai hunting areas

Originally Posted by possummatti

cheers Spook
are you a local around there mate or just a frequenter. last time i went up tuahu was just after duck shooting . me and my mate walked up to the hut at the top and stayed the night then headed along that west ridge for about 10km. saw a little bit of old goat sign but nothing pointing us towards any deer. recently i havent been out lately thou managed to get up thompsons a few weekends ago although cannot really venture much further than 5km either side of the track dues to me being only sixteen and prefer no to get too confident and finding myself in a predicament. im currently looking for a riffle as i will soon have my restricted drivers licence therefor i will be able to go up in my time rather than pesting mates to take me up. i have experience with riffles and have my firearms licence. would there be any particular riffle you would recomend to me as i will basically be hunting just the kaimais for now and being a student im a tight arse so dont have as much coin as you more experienced hunters. appreciate any help. thanks

Yeah pretty much local, I live on the lower slopes of Mt Motutapere...I have never hunted north of Tuahu track as I have heard deer numbers are low and where you have goats you wont have deer, pigs yes but deer, no...as for a choice of rifle on the tight budget to shoot the Kaimai's, I say .303. If you have a few dollars, then maybe .308. I used a .270 as my choice of firearm for many years until I had my STW built for me, but then that rifle was for a particular style of hunting. My advice is don't go under 7 mm until you have the confidence of placement of shot and good tracking skills as the Kaimai's are littered with the bones of lost animals. The Kaimai's is a hard place to track woundies and you need something that will put them down on the spot. Many on the forum will cry out in anguish but you asked for my opinion and you got it...opinions are like arseholes, everyone has one.