They surprise us and make us proud.

We don’t get out as much as we used to, life just seems busy the last couple of years. It used to be rugby in the winter but with a new found love for cricket weekends in summer are lost now to. These last school holidays the stars seemed to align cricket finished and rugby not starting for a couple of weeks combined with the public holidays it seemed like the perfect opportunity to get away. A plan was made to head south and shoot goats I figured it would give him the most opportunity to spend time behind the rifle also knowing there might be a chance for a deer.
The first morning was very wet a heavy drizzle had come in with not a lot of wind to push it away. It was very slow going with not a lot seen until mid morning when I spied a goat about 800 metres away 1 became 2 then 3, 4 and 5. We hatched a plan to head up and hopefully cut them off from where they were heading. My boy is 12 and never shot my 308 so I decided to buy some of the reduced recoil ammo for him to use. We snuck up a small gut into some rocks and peered over and to my surprise they were a lot closer than we thought about 50 metres away. We got the rifle ready and he settled in behind it. I quietly chambered a round he had picked out one that was standing broadside I told him when he was ready to settle on it chest a squeeze of, he obliged the sound of a good whack came back to us. Being 12 and thinking he was Rambo he wanted another one I insisted not to shoot anything running, being one of the silliest game animals they ran up past us about 100m and stopped allowing him to drop another one.
We carried on hunting for the rest of the day and got another 14 dad even got to shoot a couple.

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Jack’s first goat

Day 2
Was fine a big relief after getting quite soaked on day one. It started a bit better spooking some goats early and dispatching a few more. This is when I realised Jack’s not a bad shot distances started getting further, I was shooting the longer ones with the 150g superperformance ammo and changing to his when it was his turn. Then he had a shot with my ammo at one that was 180m and dropped it stone dead no need for the low recoil ammo anymore he was away

The afternoon took a turn when we were walking along and heard a croak come from a large scrubby gut he got very excited maybe a bit loud and we watched a buck and 2 does exiting the gut about 400m away he was keen to have a crack as he told me but I said sorry they are to far away and moving. We carried on around the hill up and over into the next gut then the next only to hear a croak again. This time we lay low in the rocks and got the binoculars to work, I managed to pick up a doe and yearling then a buck and another younger buck following behind. They were 350m away and jack was keen to get lead in the air but I had to tell him we needed to get closer. We back tracked a bit and got to some rocks we could see the gut they had gone into. We waited about 20 minutes It was starting to get dark and they hadn’t showed themselves again but we also hadn’t seen them come out. Then the doe and yearling appeared on the opposite face I said keep watching the buck will follow. The doe must have heard us and started starring right at us this is going to go bad I thought. She moved of up the hill taking the yearling with her. Then the buck appeared out of the gut they climbed up through the rocks the whole time Jack behind the rifle saying I’m on him and me saying wait till he stops. He got the the top of the rocks walked about 5 metres into a small clearing and stood broadside starring at us, Jack said I’m on him I said front shoulder pull the trigger. It was a perfect shot the buck leapt in the air went 10m and fell over the shot was 220m

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Jack with his buck it was dark when we got there the photo came out very good for how dark it was

Just goes to show what they can achieve with a little bit of confidence