Thread: 2 for 3

Another good weekend stroll. Weather was SHITE, 20-30knt NW that brought in a glaggy wet mist, then it swithced to a freezing cold drizzly Souhterly half way through the day.

Rob and I started off in what we thrrught was the general direction of the forest. We could only see about 40m, we found the rangefinders were pretty much useless in fog... just refused to work. Good to know.

Gearing up and trying to figure out where we were..... pretty disorientating.


Ok over this ridge?

We hit the forest and started to stalk maybe 150m apart heading into the wind... very spooky but very cool in the pines with fog.

Rob down the hill from me

spooky

Being super quiet was pretty easy on the damp needles. After about 30mins of quiet creeping I spotted movement. A bedded young billy. I froze as it got up turned around and faced quater off from me.... "shit this is too easy". then it took a step further and sat down. damn.

Ok now the proper ninja stalk was on, keeping out of view behind logs or trees, couching or on hands and knees I managed to clse the distance to about 16ish meters without them seeing me. I ranged. Too mich misty fog so no reading, and the bugger was still sitting. I went to move for a better angle then I saw his mate next to him. Ok Now I was pinned.... slowly inched my way back to the tree and reevaluated. I could have had a go but the shot was an iffy angle and there was a bunch of branches in the way.
The i saw Rob to my right crawling in about 30m from them. He had a good lane through the trees, so I gave him the thumbs up. He waited a few minutes until the closest one stood an thwack a clean through and through.

It was super cool to watch from a side angle and the stalk in made it even better.

Both the goats bolted and we began the track. After about 20mins we managed to circle round and cut them off, I waited in ambush as Rob pushed them towards me and I finished it off at 10m as it ran past me.... no idea I was there. A good team effort on the hunt and the butchering.

We found a nice grassy patch to cut it up with no pine needles messing things up.

After that Robs coldy-flu thing kicked in another notch so he pulled the pin.

I still had no meat so I headed over to the old faithful spot. Within a few minutes I'd spotted 3 big billies on the opposite ridge... doable but the weather was closing in and I was getting tired. Billy taste like burnt tyre anyway...... so I passed.

Went a bit further and spotted a couple about 100m below the ridge I was on. One looked like a good eater so I went for it. Wind was good again and I stalked in... more like crawled in along the animal paths under the gorse and scubby stuff. I'd lost sight of the taget for a bit so I slowly had a peak about. Shit, it was on the other side of the bush I was behind only 3-4m away. FAIL!!! There was no way could get a shot from there, if I moved to get a shot I'd be up wind, if I went back down wind he'd be looking right at me.hmmmmm....
I drew back and stepped sidways slowly to get around the bush, I could see fur but not what I needed to aim for. then bam, it saw me and bolted taking another 3 with it straight down the valley and up the otherside about 500m away before I could do anyhting. Damn they can cover some ground. Ok that was blown.

Next spot down by the coast on the cliffs. I hadn't been there since my very first hunt and I was surprised how good it was. I also had a Navy ship anchored 300m offshore watching me no doubt.

I spotted a mob below me on a small flat, stalked in, belly crawled behind a low berm to get to a bush and kneeled. range was 32m on a slight down hill. None of them had spotted me yet so I picked the best looking eater, a 1-2 year old in mid mob. Wind was now howling across left to right. I sighted my broadheads (waaaaaay different to my feild tips) so i knew I was straight. I aimed a wee bit left for wind drift and let loose. The wind down lower was ALOT more than I thought and the shot visibly difted right as it clsed in but still hit the vitals and went clean through. The animal just stood there not knowing what had happened. I initally thought I'd missed then I saw the blood start gushing.... a few steps and it was down. The other goats still hadn't seen me and it wasn't until I stood up that the ran...... all with the Navy watching (probably on paua poaching patrol)

Dressed on the spot and carried back, then skinned. Now have a whole animal in the hanging fridge, next is to make a charcoal BBQ Argentinean stays.