Thread: Venison meat hunting in NZ in the past

Originally Posted by Maxx

@30late

Is there a story around this you can share? Curious about ground hunters using helicopters to take out shot animals in any number as late as ~ 1990? Used to see it a bit in the earlier days, but not so much that late in the piece?
Cheers

...I think the answer to your question is lying on the ground to the RHS of the carcasses.

By the early 90's the deer had wised up big time to the helis shooting and netting the tops and slips and valley bottoms. Yet up in the thick northern Ruahine forest proper there remained a reasonably healthy population of forest dwelling deer that only came out onto the tussock well after dark. The only way to get onto those sorts of animals was wait till they came and fed right out well clear of the forest edge, then hit them with the Murapara moonbeam. Access to those hallowed high tops around Ruahine corner (.....and a wee bit further north) for this sort of caper was really only by Helo, in and out of valleys etc. Tidy a bunch of redskins up over a couple of days, hump them into groups capable of being lifted by a 500C, and wait for the tail rotor whine to tell you he was on his way back to pick you up.