Thread: Thank god for mountain toot

In my last post my mate Shaun and I ticked through a lot of country around Aranga a bit early for spring. However we both like the Northern Ruahines so…

A month or so later I was a guest on his Big Hill ballot that he was lucky enough to win. The goal was to fill the freezer and see what happened. The first snafu happened at the gate with the new smart lock not working for us! So we waited for someone to let us through while calling the DOC office right on closing time (they were ultimately quite helpful but couldn’t fix the issue), zipped up the road and headed out on foot towards Shutes for a couple of days. I’ve hunted this area occasionally over the last five or six years but with a two year gap between trips I was very keen to get back and hit the scrub.

Getting to a suitable camp in the dark was fun with the wind howling but it sure beat the couch. Camp was set and we were hopeful of a morning hunt. However we both somehow forgot cutlery so we whittled some chopsticks out of pepperwood sticks. Snafu number two.

The wind increased that night so we flagged the morning hunt and elected to glass once the wind eased off, assuming that most deer would avoid being too exposed.

Shaun had even downloaded a couple of movies to his phone as a treat so after watching one we rolled out of camp and set to searching the scrubby rocky faces. The wind had eased a fraction and it had only been about 5 minutes when Shaun mumbled “I’ve spotted one”.

A hind stood in a tutu bed about 300 yards from camp, in a slight hollow. The wind raged all around her but where she was appeared sheltered. Shaun got set up and correcting for the wind, fired. The hind just disappeared.

We crossed the gut to where she had gone just in case and after 4 hrs of looking around in incredibly tight scrub we figured Shaun must have missed.

Scraped to bits, and exhausted we trundled back to camp. An inauspicious start. Snafu number 3. Our luck had to change now!

By the time we got back to camp we had time to eat a muesli bar each and drink some water before changing tack and hunting another big creek head that was riddled with yet more tutu beds.

On our way there I raised my binoculars on a piece of tutu a long way off and immediately spied a deer which looked unusual. I did a double take. Hang on a minute..

I hissed at Shaun that he’d better have a look. He looked at me curiously and said “That’s a sika I reckon”.

I had come to the same conclusion that we were looking at a sika hind. Dark grey coat, bright white rump patch and not very big. I’ve shot hybrids in the broader area before but this was definitely the first full blood sika I’d seen. As we watched, three red hinds emerged below her, dwarfing the little deer in size. She looked down at them and drifted off over the ridge away from the group, showing some caution.

Well that was it, and we decided to close the gap. By the time we got over there those 3 had disappeared, but over the next ridge a stag had appeared on, yep you guessed it, a toot bed.

It was still quite windy and I only had my 7mm08. 270 yards, about as far as I dared.. Watching the wind for a bit, I elected to aim at his head as he stretched out to snaffle some food. I was rewarded with the stag pitching down the face with a bullet bang on the shoulder.

Getting over there was simple and we had our first deer down for the trip! Luck had changed after all.





Shaun had walked in a feed of sausages and mash and it sure made a change from the freeze dried stuff we both begrudgingly eat on a usual walk. As we ate we searched the camp face and spied a hind out on her own for a few minutes before she escaped the wind. Nice to see.

The next morning we were up in the dark and heading to a gully system about a km from camp where there was some good grassy faces. As soon as we broke into the open we immediately spotted 6 deer in various spots but far too far away for a stalk without exposing ourselves in the open. As we sat and watched them, a yearling emerged from the bush edge only 100 yards away. Shaun made a good shot and the yearling ran hard for the bush, where we found her piled up inside the bush edge.
Deer number 2!


After gutting that one, the wind got up once again and so we headed for camp. Rounding a bend on a rocky slope we heard rocks rolling down. Shaun spotted a spiker only about 50 yards away trotting to the safety of the bush. I whistled at him, stopping him for a moment before he continued into full gallop and leading him, fired and dropped him on the spot. Deer on the tops at 50 yards, this was living.



Back to camp it was with heavy packs and grins on our faces

We slumbered through a chunk of the day, broke camp to Taruarau Bivi and then left a couple of hours before dark for another gully system. This one was the best I knew of in the area and as we got ourselves positioned we immediately started spotting deer, mostly hinds and yearlings.
A total of 7, all within range, but feeding in and out of scrubby patches. We’d see a head , or a back end, or half a deer ghosting through the scrub feeding as they went.

It wasn’t enough for us to shoot on, so after some thought we decided to change our angle by backtracking over a spur out of sight for a few hundred m hoping to pop out on the gully head.

The plan worked but the group of deer had vanished properly. However as I looked down I spied another deer on yet another tutu bed 100 yards away. A very bony yearling, which Shaun promptly dropped.



Another one down, and a good one to shoot being skin and bone. We couldn’t believe it. Once we got to the deer we had a look over it. It was balding from a life of shouldering through scrub and had all ribs visible. We gave up any semblance of hunting at that point and started shit talking loudly to each other as we boned the deer out.

I turned to look at the view down the gully as the sun was setting, enjoying a classic Ruahine scene and I couldn’t believe what I was seeing. Another hind and yearling crossing a slip below us, looking back but not too worried.

“Shaun theres two more deer over there”
He raised his binos and said “It’d be good if you shot the yearling, it’s pretty skinny” in a very serious tone.

I promptly ranged the deer at 170 yards. The hind moved off, but the yearling stayed looking back over its shoulder at me. I rested the rifle on my knees and aimed between her shoulder blades. At the shot the deer rolled down the hill cleanly.
Another yearling hind, in poor condition but slightly better than the previous deer. I left Shaun to his deer and snuck through the scrub to retrieve the other. I could see why they were there in numbers as the scrub held a lot of tutu and grass beneath.



Unbelievable. 5 deer for the trip. It was going to be a massive walk back to the car. Freezers would be full and we’d shot a couple of skinny ones to boot.





The next morning was spent boning a pile of venison out. 10 back legs and 10 backsteaks later we shuffled back to the car in about 5 hours, completely content.




Thank god for mountain tutu!