First Of the season

I have only been out a couple of times so far due to problems with the truck and other commitments and those trips had proved fruitless, seeing only 1 hind. This particular day the weather was much improved ( no mist ) and the wind had turned to the northwest. I had my mate Stuart with me who i am mentoring and this was to be his first encounter with a red.
We arrived about 6.40am and after checking we had the essentials we started off towards a plateau that the deer cross to get back to the forest, the lay of the land tends to act as a funnel channelling the deer across the plateau.
As we made our way down the hill through the gorse and bracken, glassing every few steps , we spotted a few wild ponies but nothing else. We stopped about 40 feet from the bottom of the hill above a Hawthorn bush and settled in position amongst the bracken where we could cover the area. As our eyes grew accustomed to the light we could just make out 3 hinds and a dark stag making there way back to the forest but apart from only just being able to see them the were on a mission and no shot was on.
The light improved fast and it was only about 5 minutes before we saw 3 more hinds appear on the plateau and they were about half way across when a stag appeared. He had a trot on as if trying to catch them up but stopped when i gave him a call but was not in the ideal position for a shot ( quartering towards me at about 95 yards ), he looked for a few seconds then set off after the hinds again. I gave him another call and he stopped and looked presenting a perfect broadside target, i squeezed the trigger and the stag threw back his head and collapsed on the spot. Stuart said he's down mate and was in a hurry to get to him but after a few seconds he got up staggered a few yards to his left then went down again, gave a few kicks got up briefly then down for good.
We made our way to where he laid and took a second to admire a beautiful creature, a nice wide head with 8 points. Performing the gralloch showed the shot had missed the heart but destroyed both lungs . The extraction was a bit of a circus due to the fact the quad we borrowed had very little air in the front tyres but we got him out in the end.
 

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well done tony, that write up sounds a bit like the one when i shot my first deer with you :D really pleased you got one hes a cracker he does look like he has some width across his head.now thats one place you need a quad to get them boys out of.
Atb Andy
 
Well done Tony and nice write up. He does look very wide mate, but a nice head all the same with plenty of hooks to hang your coats on. :D

wadas
 
Wadas, i presume your refering to the width of the deer and not my sylph like physique :lol:
 
Hi Tony
A good write up and a cracking stag;with shooting like that i hope you leave a few pheasants for us when you come over next month
ATB DAVE
 
Hi Tony,
It was a great day, some may question the sanity of people who get up at 4.00am and stomp across a frozen moor in the dark to sit on frost and bracken to wait for the right deer to appear, but unless you've done it and experienced the excitement that it brings then you are in no position to judge us. We're the ones who know - we are completely barking mad!!
I would not have missed it for the world, even if you did frighten the life out of me when you let out that first call to stop him. It was a great shot and the quad bike 'circus' would have been worthy of a slot on you've been framed but we got there in the end.
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Sorry it's taken so long to find your write-up and post a reply, but we really must do it again.:D
 
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