Thread: Stags Shot 2018

Knocked off work at 3 today, drove up the road a bit to some public land I know well and put the head down aiming for a high basin I know holds stags in the roar. While the area is heavy hunted, many hunters, even locals look past this basin. I stumbled across stags going bananas in there a couple years back and make the effort to get in at least for a day hunt during the roar. It’s a good grunt though.

Got up high and perched myself under some bluffs out of the wind. Had only been sitting 5 minutes and heard the first stag going, one turned into at least 4 or 5. Perfect! They were all in the bush, but I knew they’d come out for a stroll once their hinds came out to feed. An hour ticked by and then as if on que the hinds came out, eventually followed by a stag or two.

Less than an hour before dark and I’d seen four out of the five that were roaring, all within 1500m of me. All bar one old 8, were young 10’s and 12’s, awesome to see on public land. I got some awesome roaring and scrapping footage. I knew there was another stag holding up below me in the bush as his roars drifted up occasionally, and sure enough I finally spotted him make his way cautiously into the scrub belt behind a hind.

He looked good, and I immediately decided to get a closer look, but literally had minutes of daylight left! He was 1400m in a straight line, so I pretty much ran to get around the basin and above him. Then I walked on in on his last known location, but he was gone! By now it was pretty dark. Then a hind barked out the way I had come and then I saw her and him making it for the bush! He looked good, I wasn’t sure of age or points etc, but I made the call to shoot him.

For some unknown reason this morning I’d decided to take my recently acquired 308 bushpig, which i zeroed at 100m last week but not checked trajectory at longer ranges. I didn’t have time to pull binos out and range him, he was moving, guessed him at about 200-250, so aimed top of shoulder and just got the shot away on time as he went out of sight.

I didn’t know if I had hit him, no bullet impact sound, so clambered through the monkey scrub before it got dark. Found where he’d disappeared, then smelt him so knew he’d be lying somewhere. Sure enough, found him with a perfect shot through behind the shoulder.

While he’s a nice public land stag, to be honest I was a little disappointed in myself for shooting him, I’ve shot better. My gut feeling tells me another year or two would have best for him, but I made a split decision and realise his offspring will be in the valley to take over. I proceeded to bone him out and skin the head out. It was a massive load from horse of an animal.

A solid three hour uphill slog to the truck, couple hour drive out and I’ve just got home and am eating my warm bacon and egg pie and chocolate cake the wife had sitting waiting for me

Roar trip isn’t happening till next week now so pressure is off I suppose.



Happy and safe hunting fellas.

Cheers
Josh


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Originally Posted by JoshC

A solid three hour uphill slog to the truck, couple hour drive out and I’ve just got home and am eating my warm bacon and egg pie and chocolate cake the wife had sitting waiting for me

Happy and safe hunting fellas.
Cheers
Josh
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Some people get all the luck, I'd have come home to a cold shoulder and 'what did you wake me up for'

Originally Posted by 223nut

Some people get all the luck, I'd have come home to a cold shoulder and 'what did you wake me up for'

Yeah I'm pretty fortunate in that regard