Thread: 2014 - so far - filling the freezer

so far so good - I usually get a few hunts in over the summer months to fill the freezer & suss out where the stags mite be hanging out come the roar, I lucked in with a red yearling that turned up 120 yds away on 2nd jan - made for some good snitzels & bbq pattiesso that was a good start to the year considering it was fairly breezy up the ruahines that day (ruahines & strong wind go hand in glove )
seeing there was a good forecast for the next coupla days up the kawekas I found myself looking over my fav summer spot on a perfect summer morn, 10 mins later the shingle rattled over on the face & 2 sika stags appeared, so it was action time & 2 shots later I set myself up for a self inficted hard carry out
as does happen I found myself checking out a fav spot in the ruahines early morning racing along the ridge to get to spot X before its too the binos picked up 3 good stags feeding just on the bush edge, after some observation via binos & rangefinder I sized up a stag worthy of taking- bit of a long shot (450yds) lined up & released a 155 berger to complete the hunt-which it did in fine style dropping the stag instantly, leaving the 2 other bigger stags to beat a hasty retreat to the safety of the big bush he turned out a nice 8 pointer in hard velvet - hope to catch up with the other 2 stags in the roar-they were good looking stags - a few weeks later found me in the ruahines for a coupla nites with a mate trying to set him up with his first deer, It wasn,t long before I spotted 4-5 deer going through clearings as we parked the bikes up-20 minutes later I had a yearling hind lined up for him 250 yds away, but he didn,t feel confident with the shot so oh well I ups & dropped it giving all a nice feed of prime ruahine venison
anyway since it,s not all about smokin deer etc ill chuck in some scenery pics as its not all about smokin deer it,s about bein out there with your mates & dogs havin fun