With my first stalking trip arranged to take place just four days after my 16[SUP]th[/SUP] birthday, I had a bit of preparation to do: First, I had to zero my new ‘scope, which was a birthday present from SD member 'Kalahari'. Then I had a change of plan, and decided that I wanted to shoot without the moderator, so I then had to re-zero it again without the mod. By this time I was thinking that I wouldn’t have any ammunition left to go stalking! Next I had to remove the bipod, as I’d be shooting from a highseat. As I’d never shot from a highseat before dad thought I ought to get some practice, so he quickly made a mock-up seat on the yard at home. I sat in this while he rolled a football across the yard from different directions, and I had to dry-fire at it wherever it stopped.
Dad reckoned it would take us three hours to get to our destination, so when the day came we actually allowed three and a half hours, planning to get there in plenty of time. However, we lost all our spare time due to dad having a disagreement with the satnav.
We arrived at the garage where we had arranged to meet Wayne at 6:30pm, and found him already there waiting for us. It was about another 20 minutes drive to the stalking ground, so I hopped in Wayne’s pickup with him so that I could have a briefing of what was going to happen and so that he could explain a bit about the estate. Dad followed along behind with all the gear.
When we got to the woods I got all my kit out, and having already had one safety briefing from Wayne I had another one from dad: “If Wayne says don’t shoot, don’t shoot; If Wayne says shoot and you don’t want to shoot, then don’t shoot!”
Once I was ready and had everything I needed for an evening up the highseat, Wayne and I set off into the woods with his dog, Max, leaving dad twiddling his thumbs in the pickup with a flask of tea and a packet of sandwiches to keep him company.
We walked down the ride and I found it fascinating to watch the dog. Wayne explained to me how the dog indicates what he can scent, so I watched him carefully to see what he could smell. It was only a short trek to the highseat so we were there in no time at all, and I stood at the bottom thinking: “How on earth am I going to climb this thing?” Leaving my sticks and the roe sack at the bottom with the dog, Wayne climbed up ahead of me so that I could pass my .222 up to him before joining him in the highseat. Being rather short I found climbing up a problem, because the rungs of the ladder were so far apart, so I just scrambled up as best I could.
Once I was finally up, I took my rifle back and settled down into a comfy position (if there is such a thing in a highseat). I loaded up, applied the safety catch and waited. Wayne explained to me where the deer were most likely to appear from, and pointed out the crossing points on the rides. I was scanning around constantly, from the woodland to my right, the ride straight ahead and the ride to my left, and also watching the dog who was sitting at the base of the highseat. I was in suspense the whole time hoping for success, and then found I was getting too exited and wouldn’t be able to take a shot if the opportunity arose, so I had to concentrate my mind to think only of what was around me, not all the ‘what if’ scenarios.
The sun slowly disappeared, and I was completely unaware of what time it was. I heard a church clock striking in the distance, so I tried to count the chimes with the hope of estimating the time. I counted 7, but it had been seven o’clock when we left the pickup and set out for the highseat, so how could this be right? I decided to add an hour or two onto this time so it must have been 8 or 9 o’clock, but then I wasn’t any better off because I still didn’t really know what the time was! I gave up guessing and turned my full attention back to the rides in front of me. Daylight seemed to hover, not knowing whether to stay or to go, and every time the dog shuffled under the seat I’d look up into the woods eagerly thinking I’d heard something among the trees. Wayne had his thermal imager with him and scanned around with that regularly, so that I would have more time to prepare myself for the shot if needed. Although having the dog was handy for indicating any deer, we had no way of knowing how far away they were, whereas with the thermal we could tell.
After what seemed like ages Wayne whispered to me to bring my rifle up into a shooing position pointing down the ride directly ahead, because he had seen something with the thermal that he thought was a muntjac in the bushes at the edge of the ride, and that it would come out in a minute. Sure enough the muntjac hopped out from the vegetation at the side and I had a relatively clear view of it, so I took off the safety catch. Initially I couldn’t see it down the scope. It was definitely there, but it took me what seemed like ages to bring the rifle onto the buck. The whole time I was thinking: “omg, it’s just going to cross the ride and I won’t even have got it in the sights!” However, I got everything lined up at last, and the deer took one more step forward, further out of the bushes, and stood stock still for me to take the shot. There were a few blades of grass in front of it, but considering that the vegetation was so high at this time of year I came to the decision that I was unlikely to get a clearer shot, so I slowly squeezed off the trigger. I saw a blur of red and then nothing. What just happened? Did I hit it and it dropped? Did I completely miss it and it ran away? Did I hit it and injure it and it ran away to die? I had been relatively calm throughout the whole evening, and I was steady while I took the shot, but now my heart was racing! Wayne assured me that the deer had dropped, but I reloaded my rifle just in case.
After 10 minutes or so I emptied the rifle chamber, but left some rounds in the magazine in case we needed any to dispatch the deer. I climbed down the highseat in the most ungainly way imaginable and Wayne passed down my rifle before climbing down to join me. Keeping my rifle in my hands in case a second shot was necessary we approached the place that the deer was shot, and there it was! It had dropped on the spot! I felt at that moment a sense of pride at the thought that I had just killed my first deer, yet my heart was still pounding. I felt overawed at the concept of having shot my first deer, and I realised I could never shoot my first deer again.
We bundled the deer into Wayne’s roe sack without gralloching it, because I knew that dad would want to take a photo, and we gathered our stuff and headed back to the pickup. We strolled back quite casually, with no apparent need for hurrying, although had we hurried it would have saved dad a lot of worrying! We arrived back at the pickup and there was dad sitting on the edge of the seat, eagerly looking round the corner waiting for our approach and he jumped out when he saw us coming. He couldn’t see us carrying a deer, and had completely forgotten that Wayne had a roe sack, so he though I must have missed. Then Wayne gave him a ‘thumbs up’, and once he got over his original panic of seeing us returning ‘without’ a deer he was extremely proud and happy and was smiling almost as much as I was.
We took several photos of the deer, and then Wayne and I set about to gralloch it while dad recited his tale: He had taken a stroll along the road that ran alongside the woods, and had then been sitting in the pickup when he heard the gunshot. He immediately sent a text to mum to say that he had heard a shot, but we had not returned yet, and then sat in anticipation waiting for us. He had all the thoughts running through his head as to why we hadn’t got back yet. Perhaps we couldn’t find the deer and we had to go looking for it? Perhaps I’d missed?! After waiting what he thought was ages, he looked to see what the time was and realised that he’d only been waiting about four minutes since the shot, so he forced himself to calm down a little, and of course we returned shortly after with the deer!
We finished the gralloch and loaded the deer into the back of the pickup to take it back to the chiller for the night. We arrived back at Wayne’s yard, and having sorted out the deer we went in to his little lodge behind the house. By this point I was starving so I ate some of the sandwiches that we had brought with us and we had a beer while we listened to a few of Wayne’s hunting adventures and he showed us his trophies. It was very late by the time we eventually got to bed.
In the morning, we transferred the deer into the back of our pickup and sorted out all our stuff, we were ready to hit the road for home. On the way home I was constantly re-playing the moment in my mind, and I had a good laugh at dad because he had been more worried than me. We arrived back home tired, but satisfied and I feel a sense of accomplishment now that I have taken my first deer.
This was an excellent experience for me because it has proven that I definitely want to follow the career path that I have always dreamed of. I am very grateful to Wayne for taking me out and giving me the opportunity to experience deer stalking, to everyone else who offered me a trip, to SD member ‘Spaniel’ who gave me my rifle, and to dad for introducing me to the shooting world and for being my taxi driver.
Dad reckoned it would take us three hours to get to our destination, so when the day came we actually allowed three and a half hours, planning to get there in plenty of time. However, we lost all our spare time due to dad having a disagreement with the satnav.
We arrived at the garage where we had arranged to meet Wayne at 6:30pm, and found him already there waiting for us. It was about another 20 minutes drive to the stalking ground, so I hopped in Wayne’s pickup with him so that I could have a briefing of what was going to happen and so that he could explain a bit about the estate. Dad followed along behind with all the gear.
When we got to the woods I got all my kit out, and having already had one safety briefing from Wayne I had another one from dad: “If Wayne says don’t shoot, don’t shoot; If Wayne says shoot and you don’t want to shoot, then don’t shoot!”
Once I was ready and had everything I needed for an evening up the highseat, Wayne and I set off into the woods with his dog, Max, leaving dad twiddling his thumbs in the pickup with a flask of tea and a packet of sandwiches to keep him company.
We walked down the ride and I found it fascinating to watch the dog. Wayne explained to me how the dog indicates what he can scent, so I watched him carefully to see what he could smell. It was only a short trek to the highseat so we were there in no time at all, and I stood at the bottom thinking: “How on earth am I going to climb this thing?” Leaving my sticks and the roe sack at the bottom with the dog, Wayne climbed up ahead of me so that I could pass my .222 up to him before joining him in the highseat. Being rather short I found climbing up a problem, because the rungs of the ladder were so far apart, so I just scrambled up as best I could.
Once I was finally up, I took my rifle back and settled down into a comfy position (if there is such a thing in a highseat). I loaded up, applied the safety catch and waited. Wayne explained to me where the deer were most likely to appear from, and pointed out the crossing points on the rides. I was scanning around constantly, from the woodland to my right, the ride straight ahead and the ride to my left, and also watching the dog who was sitting at the base of the highseat. I was in suspense the whole time hoping for success, and then found I was getting too exited and wouldn’t be able to take a shot if the opportunity arose, so I had to concentrate my mind to think only of what was around me, not all the ‘what if’ scenarios.
The sun slowly disappeared, and I was completely unaware of what time it was. I heard a church clock striking in the distance, so I tried to count the chimes with the hope of estimating the time. I counted 7, but it had been seven o’clock when we left the pickup and set out for the highseat, so how could this be right? I decided to add an hour or two onto this time so it must have been 8 or 9 o’clock, but then I wasn’t any better off because I still didn’t really know what the time was! I gave up guessing and turned my full attention back to the rides in front of me. Daylight seemed to hover, not knowing whether to stay or to go, and every time the dog shuffled under the seat I’d look up into the woods eagerly thinking I’d heard something among the trees. Wayne had his thermal imager with him and scanned around with that regularly, so that I would have more time to prepare myself for the shot if needed. Although having the dog was handy for indicating any deer, we had no way of knowing how far away they were, whereas with the thermal we could tell.
After what seemed like ages Wayne whispered to me to bring my rifle up into a shooing position pointing down the ride directly ahead, because he had seen something with the thermal that he thought was a muntjac in the bushes at the edge of the ride, and that it would come out in a minute. Sure enough the muntjac hopped out from the vegetation at the side and I had a relatively clear view of it, so I took off the safety catch. Initially I couldn’t see it down the scope. It was definitely there, but it took me what seemed like ages to bring the rifle onto the buck. The whole time I was thinking: “omg, it’s just going to cross the ride and I won’t even have got it in the sights!” However, I got everything lined up at last, and the deer took one more step forward, further out of the bushes, and stood stock still for me to take the shot. There were a few blades of grass in front of it, but considering that the vegetation was so high at this time of year I came to the decision that I was unlikely to get a clearer shot, so I slowly squeezed off the trigger. I saw a blur of red and then nothing. What just happened? Did I hit it and it dropped? Did I completely miss it and it ran away? Did I hit it and injure it and it ran away to die? I had been relatively calm throughout the whole evening, and I was steady while I took the shot, but now my heart was racing! Wayne assured me that the deer had dropped, but I reloaded my rifle just in case.
After 10 minutes or so I emptied the rifle chamber, but left some rounds in the magazine in case we needed any to dispatch the deer. I climbed down the highseat in the most ungainly way imaginable and Wayne passed down my rifle before climbing down to join me. Keeping my rifle in my hands in case a second shot was necessary we approached the place that the deer was shot, and there it was! It had dropped on the spot! I felt at that moment a sense of pride at the thought that I had just killed my first deer, yet my heart was still pounding. I felt overawed at the concept of having shot my first deer, and I realised I could never shoot my first deer again.
We bundled the deer into Wayne’s roe sack without gralloching it, because I knew that dad would want to take a photo, and we gathered our stuff and headed back to the pickup. We strolled back quite casually, with no apparent need for hurrying, although had we hurried it would have saved dad a lot of worrying! We arrived back at the pickup and there was dad sitting on the edge of the seat, eagerly looking round the corner waiting for our approach and he jumped out when he saw us coming. He couldn’t see us carrying a deer, and had completely forgotten that Wayne had a roe sack, so he though I must have missed. Then Wayne gave him a ‘thumbs up’, and once he got over his original panic of seeing us returning ‘without’ a deer he was extremely proud and happy and was smiling almost as much as I was.
We took several photos of the deer, and then Wayne and I set about to gralloch it while dad recited his tale: He had taken a stroll along the road that ran alongside the woods, and had then been sitting in the pickup when he heard the gunshot. He immediately sent a text to mum to say that he had heard a shot, but we had not returned yet, and then sat in anticipation waiting for us. He had all the thoughts running through his head as to why we hadn’t got back yet. Perhaps we couldn’t find the deer and we had to go looking for it? Perhaps I’d missed?! After waiting what he thought was ages, he looked to see what the time was and realised that he’d only been waiting about four minutes since the shot, so he forced himself to calm down a little, and of course we returned shortly after with the deer!
We finished the gralloch and loaded the deer into the back of the pickup to take it back to the chiller for the night. We arrived back at Wayne’s yard, and having sorted out the deer we went in to his little lodge behind the house. By this point I was starving so I ate some of the sandwiches that we had brought with us and we had a beer while we listened to a few of Wayne’s hunting adventures and he showed us his trophies. It was very late by the time we eventually got to bed.
In the morning, we transferred the deer into the back of our pickup and sorted out all our stuff, we were ready to hit the road for home. On the way home I was constantly re-playing the moment in my mind, and I had a good laugh at dad because he had been more worried than me. We arrived back home tired, but satisfied and I feel a sense of accomplishment now that I have taken my first deer.
This was an excellent experience for me because it has proven that I definitely want to follow the career path that I have always dreamed of. I am very grateful to Wayne for taking me out and giving me the opportunity to experience deer stalking, to everyone else who offered me a trip, to SD member ‘Spaniel’ who gave me my rifle, and to dad for introducing me to the shooting world and for being my taxi driver.
Well done
, but we must not forget Wayne in all of this as his part was a top draw gesture on his part and now will be part of your story that will last you a lifetime 
