Thread: Where Deer show up.

Originally Posted by Ned

Early Sept this year I think driving back from Turangi to home along SH41 and just after Kuratau and turn off to Western Lake road, about 12.30pm, what's that up ahead? It looks like, yep, arse end of a deer between some road side scrub. Took my foot off the gas and this stag reverses out just onto the edge of the road and looks at us. No ear tags (I know there's deer farms around there), scrubby short antlers, eyes widen then he clears the low fence just up the bank and bolts. Pretty steady traffic along the road so no idea how he'd managed to get onto the road there. It was a small bodied animal too. I'd swear it was a Sika.

It may well have been. I've seen Sika on Pihanga, not that far as the crow flies really?

I've seen them in quite a few odd places, its surprising where they turn up and what they can tolerate..

Was driving to Queenstown from Cromwell one morning and I saw a cracker red stag cross the road in the Kawarau gorge mid afternoon not far from the Roaring Meg area. I'm not sure what he was doing but he sure was hoofing it.

Have seen multiple animals on the edge of the old golf course at the Chateau Tongariro..not to mention on the flat scrubby plain 100 m from the National Park petrol station.

The weirdest place I saw one though was in the Ngaruroro river bed between Maraekakaho and Omahu a few months ago, closer to the Omahu end. I was taking my dog for a walk in the riverbed and looking into the odd pool for trout. and I had approached the true left bank of the river at a point where it cut into the willows when the dog locked up. I followed his point to spy a red hind feeding her way into the willow trees. She had no eartag either..

A couple of years ago I was up at one of my regular goat spots close to town. By all accounts this block only holds goats and the odd pig. One particular afternoon we'd just put the rifles back into the boot and jumped into the front seats to head home after the hunt when all of a sudden 3 reds emerged from the edge of the block, ran across the road in front of us and disappeared into the private property across the road. Never seen any deer sign in there before or since, and the other guys I know who regularly hunt the same block were all in disbelief.

Not deer this time, but I was fly fishing an undisclosed Otago river in November 2015 with a buddy of mine. We were just walking and chatting our way back down the riverbank the few kilometers to the car at the end of the day when my buddy suddenly stopped and goes "dude, there's a ####### tahr right there!". Without looking up I simply replied "ah it'll just be a goat man"... but when I did look up, sure enough there was a bull tahr standing on the opposite bank about 30-40m downstream of us. He was watching us, but wasn't spooked. Had time to slip my backpack off, get the camera out and take a couple of snaps before he sauntered off up the hill and out of sight. The spot in question is only about 30-40km from the Otago east coast, and a couple hundred metres above sea level.

I was driving the Moonie Highway back to St George in Qld where I worked during the week on a early Monday morning 5am ish I passed this particular spot. Just off to the side of the road were a group of Chital. All had jumped the fence bar one and he jumped as I passed. So graceful and elegant with those spots and a decent rack. The herd although small numbered eight. All the times I passed the spot after that I never saw them again.

Less than a km up the Hacket just past Te Rata road,someone got an easy Red this morning, big animal, shot on the track/road,paunch and ribs over the edge.Loopies are gunna grizzle about the smell.
I have been running the dog up there for a while but have not seen any sign.