Thread: Rookie mistakes!

Originally Posted by Aly

I thought since being a newbie to hunting I would live to hear some "wise" ol' stories from anyone and everyone, or advice, about any mistakes rookies out there often make?
Would be nice to learn from the mistakes of others to make sure I don't follow suit

Share your rookie mistakes from when you started out, or any from anyone you took out with ya - or any general tips!

One thing I've learned from just tramping is that when you're out there - a big, black trash bag can really save someone!
This coming from a trip a bunch of mates and I made up to Nina Hut in the Lewis. Pretty easy track to the hunters hut - but we went on a weekend in torrential rain and in a storm (fully equipped for the weather!) last winter, as we were a party of 9 and expected to have the hut to ourselves with the bad forecast for our little "hut party". Got there and the 10 bunk hut ended up with 22 people in this storm, as a bunch of rookie tourists showed up!
Heck, you should have seen the state of them - dressed in trousers and all that as if they were taking a stroll along the Abel Tasman.
One lady didn't even have a raincoat - or any jacket of any sort, so on top of graciously giving up our bunks to them and putting up with their complaints and refusal to share space within the hut (acting like they were more justified to be there with all the comforts as they were more "inexperienced"), we also had a fashion her a make-shift jacket from black trash bags so she could continue their crazy trip, not back out, but actually stubbornly further into the valley.

Not much, but knowing how easy it is to get caught out there, I never take the basics for outdoor kit for granted! Or you know... just wear the weather-appropriate gear in the first place....

Stay Cool... but that's not always easy.

First day on the job with the Forest Service and hoping even then to score the only vacancy as the bonus Hunter for the following season. Two of us both rookie's climbed up out of the Kawhatau River and on to the Hikurangi Tops. We were heading for Mckinnon Hut and the route would take us over the highest point in the Ruahine's. by afternoon were up in the beautiful red tussock basins near the top of the range when we spied a couple of deer down in one of the lowe basins. Sliding down into the basin on our bellies we closed the range for a fairly easy kill. The shot was mine because I spotted them first. I took my time and Derek had his cross hairs lined up on that big old hind as well.

At my shot the hind reeled away obviously wounded followed by a hail of fire until she went down. Nobody was prouder than I as I ran my hands over her admiringly then I took her tails ears and back steaks. Then we remembered there had been two deer and the other one could not have made it out of the basin without us seeing surely. I was a beautiful sunny early autumn afternoon with unlimited visibility so it was a mystery as to where it had got to.

So as we slowly zig zaged our way up the steep slope through the tussock to where our packs were, I nearly fell over a dead yearling. I touched it and it was very warm so obviously it was us that had shot it alright. Rolling it over I found a large hole in its head where a bullet had exited.

Looking round the basin and back to where we had fired from we figured that the dead yearling was close to where I had fired the first shot at the hind. The small entry wound and large exit meant that the bullet had passed through the yearlings head before hitting the hind. This meant that the whole time we were looking at the hind through our scopes both of us had failed to see the yearling standing in full view in front of her.

This is the sort of tunnel vision that I believe is partly or at times fully responsible for hunting accidents. I guess we were both so excited and our brains were processing information so quickly that whole chunks of the information was being left out. Our brains were showing us a big fat hind that was just dying to be shot and leaving out the bit that there was another deer in full view in front of the target.

No one was prouder than I whilst carefully threading the two sets of tails and ears on my belt. If I was a dog with two tails they would have both been wagging furiously.