Having had a bit of a lean patch when it comes to shooting deer these last three months i was looking forward to Labour Weekend.
Day One
Up at 0530 then around to pick up a mate at 0630 for a morning hunt and to set up my new trail cam purchased off Tim. We headed up Whiskey Gully in the Blue Mountains as i was lucky enough to have the block for the whole three days. We picked our way up the true right of the gully until we made it out on to the low saddle where we were hoping there was a deer feeding on the bush edge. As it turns out were aren't that lucky, i had decided this was where the trail camera would live for the next few days. I found a well used little trail set everything up, secured it from the opportunist thief and left. Our destination the upper saddle that was covered in snow.
picture of the trail camera on the tree, i have covered the lock box with camo tape and painted the chain and padlock two shades of brown. it was quite hard to spot and i knew where i had put it. (this was the last photo i got to take as my camera battery decided that it was too cold and turned the camera off)
http://www.nzhuntingandshooting.co.n...0-pa202751.JPG
After a slog up teh bush edge while the wind danced around us changing direction every 2 seconds it didn't look promising catching anything out of the bush. just as the sun hit the upper saddle so did we, there were deer prints in the snow everywhere but not a deer to be seen. We knew that prints were newish as the snow had only been there for 24 hours and some of them still had nice sharp edges and the displaced snow hadn't frozen to the snow around it. We spied a hind and yearling feeding out on the farm land wished them well for the future and carried on our hunt.
We dropped into the bush and followed the walking track back down to the main creek, then found the ridge we were looking for and headed up the true left aiming for the ridge of pine trees. Now this ridge has been a happy hunting ground for me in the past, but i hadn't been up there for 18 years, so i didn't really know what to expect. As we neared the pines the deer sign got thicker and fresher, surely we would see something soon. We walked the entire length of the pines on edge, expecting a little black rocket to explode from the undergrowth any second. Although it seemed promising and we could smell the deer were there nothing was spotted.
Above the pines is a nice clearing that is quite hard to hunt onto and you have to know where it is to walk onto it. My hunting mate insisted that the clearing was still used by deer so we stalked our way up to it. at one stage he went to the left to get around a dead fall pine and i went to the right, as it turns out the left was the better option and as a result i was a min or two behind him getting to the clearing. As he sneaked out onto the clearing he heard the tell tale sounds of deer moving off into the bush and also sticks breaking off to his left, thinking the noise to his left was me he focused his atttention on the other noises. He was surprised when he turned to his left just in time to see a big black rear dash off into the scrub. About this time i was stalking around the left edge of the clearing and heard the deer crashing through the scrub out to my left. The bush was a bit tight so i could see much and moved off into the clearing. We had a chat about what had happened and decided to carry on up the ridge and see if anything was out on the tops.
the bush above the pines had as much sign if not more that the pines so the deer had been camped in the area for a while. After fighting cramp, snow and regen bush we made it out onto the tops, the wind was blowing a gale from every direction and it was damn cold. Back to the car was the decision via the bush edge and the farmland boundary fence. It was 1200 when we got to the fence that we were to follow and my hunitng mate says "we should be back at the car by 1230". Looking at what we were going to push our way through i was a little sceptical but after forcing our way past blackberry, broom, gorse, pig fern and bush lawyer we made to back to the car at 1245. I was pretty much spent, that had been the most exercise i'd done in many months.
I dropped him off and headed home for a well earnt shower, before the shower i did have a look at where i had placed my trail camera (through my spotting scope) as i had seen a deer in the area 5 out of the last 6 days, but all i could see was sheep. I hope i don't just get pictures of sheep.
Next on the agenda was to sort out Sunday's hunt. With that sorted i lay on the sofa and watched the replay of mighty Otago beating Tasman. So after day one we have spend 6 and a 1/4 hours hunting and have seen 1 deer with nothing hanging in the shed, if we got something every time we went out it would be harvesting not hunting and where is the fun in that.
I can only but hope Sunday is a bit better on the dead deer front.
