Thread: Easy goat hunt

Inspired by @Bagheera's recent post, thought I'd write about yesterday's goat hunt.

As you know, we are not blessed with great hunting in Northland. No deer, just pigs and goats. DOC blocks are steep and gnarly and it's difficult to access private land. I'm lucky that I have access to a farm, but it requires a coffee and chat with the farmer before hunting and a beer or two afterwards which is usually nice, but sometimes I just want to get on with it! So in to the bush I went...

I've been working a small DOC block for sometime now and have found a long abandoned track which makes life easier, but this is the usual picture.



I was only about 1km in to the bush when I had a feeling there were some animals about. Didn't see, smell or hear anything, just got that feeling. Weird since I have never seen anything close to that area. Sure enough, there was a white head of a goat bobbing about 25 metres away in a clearing. Used a tree as a rest, got nicely lined up for a head shot and pulled the trigger. Whoosh of a subsonic round and flop. Another white head appeared and I repeated the process to the same effect. At this point, a brown goat spooked which was interesting because I had no idea it was there. I probably wouldn't have shot it anyway, so no drama.

Two goats down. Both head shots with no sign of entry or exit wounds. Just blood from the mouth/nose. I've written before about my disappointment in the Hornady Sub-X subsonic rounds. No good for chest shots and variable on neck shots, but they are good for something it seems.

It turned out that I had shot a young nanny and a female kid. Happy with that as I usually select the kids as they are the best eating. I also kept the heart and will try it for the first time tonight as per @Bagheera. Luckily no balls to tempt me!



Got to work with the knife. Took the back legs and backstraps from the nanny and decided to skin/gut the kid and take it out whole. It folded up quite nicely in to my Pikau!



Home before lunch. I decided to butcher the kid in the same way that I would do a home kill lamb. Got the saw out and utilised everything. Shoulders, back legs, shanks, ribs and cut chops for the first time. Respect the goat! The fridge of dreams was looking happy.



Just a couple of stinky goats from gnarly bush, but it made my day!