I've not had a lot of good stalking yarns to spin of late. It's not that I haven't been stalking. I've been stalking more than pretty much ever before in fact, partly because working from home does come with some extra flexibility, mostly because I've worked out how to weave it into family life without casting too much extra burden on Mrs Pine Marten, and because after a decade of this, I've now met several kind people within striking distance of home who let me come and play with them. And presumably when they started inviting me, they didn't even know that for the most part, it would cost them absolutely no deer at all! I didn't have it in me to bore you all with 11 threads that start with the disclaimer that "no animals were harmed in the making of this story", and that's why no threads with a title in the format "In which Pine Marten does a thing he finds jolly interesting and deludes himself that anyone else cares much" have appeared for over two and a half years. This one, you may have noticed, doesn't start like that either as I've moved on. And so, to the topic at hand. But first I must warn you:
THIS THREAD CONTAINS DESCRIPTIONS OF SUCCESSFUL DEERSTALKING.
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I may not have shot any deer since 2019, but I had picked some mushrooms, sometimes in lieu of deer. May as well make the trips count. And it turns out someone else was interested in that, against all odds. And by and by, he was a guest one day when I was shooting last season, and he invited those of us of a stalking persuasion to come and try for Chinese Water Deer on his patch at some point later in the year, because he's really generous that way. Now I had planned to go a couple of weeks ago, but when eventually the Met Office issued a Red Flag due to storm Eunice, we postponed, until this weekend, cutting it pretty fine with regards to the end of the CWD season. Still, there were no hurricanes, falling trees, earthquakes, pandemics, fuel shortages, or even 5am traffic jams, everything was fine, this was going to be a walk in the park. Ha!
We set out about 6.30am and almost immediately saw a deer at the other end of a field, that vanished into a hedge, never to be seen again. Shortly afterwards, we spotted another couched on the stubble. We walked along the other side of a hedge to approach it, but the wind wasn't great and it ran off. It did stop to look back and give me a chance to raise the drilling, confirm it was both much too far for sticks, and that it had the most massive tusks, extending far below its lower jaw, and off it scarepered, also not to be seen again. A lot more walking ensued, a lot more glassing, but of deer, there were no more. Around 8.30 we moved to a different patch, and sat concealed against the hedge next to a patch of kale cover crop, which apparently the deer love. Mmmm, cabbagey venison... But not today. The deer had had their fill of cabbage. As I started to mentally drift into the familiar rumination of wondering what on earth or in Hades I had done to Artemis, I started to glass all the spots where there would obviously be no deer because they're all in the lovely kale. Like for example the one that was definitely not couched in the featureless expanse of stubble 300m away. Oh, hang on, what? Oh yes! But how on earth to get anywhere near it? There was no cover at all except the very gentle undulations of the land. Strong wind in one direction so that narrowed the boundary conditions. Plus a lack of obvious backstops. But that wouldn't matter anyway if all we could ever see were its ears. And it would probably run away long before that became a problem. Still, the game was afoot! Well, we were afoot. The game was lying down comfortably with its backside turned to the wind.
Down the slope we walked, keeping under the skyline, losing the deer from sight. Would we bump one of those fables kale-guzzling deer that would give the alarm? No, as it turned out. We reached the tree I reckoned the deer was level with and started back up the slope, trying to come at the deer from the other side, downwind. IF we could find it. And then, incredibly, we did, still unfazed. Hands and knees time, keep under that skyline. Raise head to check ears are still there, crawl a bit while it looks the other way, do that a few times until finally, we could get into a position for a sitting shot. There was even a backstop. What there wasn't was any part of a deer that you could reasonably aim at: ears and backside only. No matter though. I had no other plans. I'm a patient man. I'll wait it out. It will have to stand up eventually. Two hours later, legs stiff and numb, we concluded that actually, perhaps it didn't have to stand up at all! I'd never been in a situation before where the hard bit, finding and stalking, was done. But there was no possible shot.
For two hours, we waited for this deer to stand up. It didn't. It's not sideways on, the rear hump is what turned out to be a properly lardy backside.
So we decided to try an approach from another angle, which may just offer some sort of awkward feasible shot, but of course we'd probably scare it off this time. Except we didn't. The deer did eventually work out something was about, but wasn't worried enough to stand up and do something about it. I was lying on my back waiting for the nod to sit up and set up sticks before the deer looked our way again, did my sit-up, and I was once again aiming at this frustrating deer. Verdict: its shoulders were now peeping out over the crest. That was it. High shoulder shot over the top of the ridge or nothing. Oh, and there was a backstop too. Luxury. This was delicate shot placement so I decided to use the set trigger: wobble, wobble, calm down, breathe, wobble a bit, wobble less... BLAM! went the 7x65R (it really does go BLAM). Over toppled the deer, thrashed for a minute or two, stopped, and smiles all round. Thank you Artemis, thank you fellow mushroom fan, thank you complacent deer!
Once again, I can make a credible claim to be a deerstalker. Oh, and people who say CWD are thick and easy to stalk? Not these ones! Hardest stalk I've ever done, frankly. Great way to end my dry patch. And I'm glad Artemis and I seem to be once again on good terms.
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The next installment will be about food and how a high shoulder shot makes a right mess.
THIS THREAD CONTAINS DESCRIPTIONS OF SUCCESSFUL DEERSTALKING.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
I may not have shot any deer since 2019, but I had picked some mushrooms, sometimes in lieu of deer. May as well make the trips count. And it turns out someone else was interested in that, against all odds. And by and by, he was a guest one day when I was shooting last season, and he invited those of us of a stalking persuasion to come and try for Chinese Water Deer on his patch at some point later in the year, because he's really generous that way. Now I had planned to go a couple of weeks ago, but when eventually the Met Office issued a Red Flag due to storm Eunice, we postponed, until this weekend, cutting it pretty fine with regards to the end of the CWD season. Still, there were no hurricanes, falling trees, earthquakes, pandemics, fuel shortages, or even 5am traffic jams, everything was fine, this was going to be a walk in the park. Ha!
We set out about 6.30am and almost immediately saw a deer at the other end of a field, that vanished into a hedge, never to be seen again. Shortly afterwards, we spotted another couched on the stubble. We walked along the other side of a hedge to approach it, but the wind wasn't great and it ran off. It did stop to look back and give me a chance to raise the drilling, confirm it was both much too far for sticks, and that it had the most massive tusks, extending far below its lower jaw, and off it scarepered, also not to be seen again. A lot more walking ensued, a lot more glassing, but of deer, there were no more. Around 8.30 we moved to a different patch, and sat concealed against the hedge next to a patch of kale cover crop, which apparently the deer love. Mmmm, cabbagey venison... But not today. The deer had had their fill of cabbage. As I started to mentally drift into the familiar rumination of wondering what on earth or in Hades I had done to Artemis, I started to glass all the spots where there would obviously be no deer because they're all in the lovely kale. Like for example the one that was definitely not couched in the featureless expanse of stubble 300m away. Oh, hang on, what? Oh yes! But how on earth to get anywhere near it? There was no cover at all except the very gentle undulations of the land. Strong wind in one direction so that narrowed the boundary conditions. Plus a lack of obvious backstops. But that wouldn't matter anyway if all we could ever see were its ears. And it would probably run away long before that became a problem. Still, the game was afoot! Well, we were afoot. The game was lying down comfortably with its backside turned to the wind.
Down the slope we walked, keeping under the skyline, losing the deer from sight. Would we bump one of those fables kale-guzzling deer that would give the alarm? No, as it turned out. We reached the tree I reckoned the deer was level with and started back up the slope, trying to come at the deer from the other side, downwind. IF we could find it. And then, incredibly, we did, still unfazed. Hands and knees time, keep under that skyline. Raise head to check ears are still there, crawl a bit while it looks the other way, do that a few times until finally, we could get into a position for a sitting shot. There was even a backstop. What there wasn't was any part of a deer that you could reasonably aim at: ears and backside only. No matter though. I had no other plans. I'm a patient man. I'll wait it out. It will have to stand up eventually. Two hours later, legs stiff and numb, we concluded that actually, perhaps it didn't have to stand up at all! I'd never been in a situation before where the hard bit, finding and stalking, was done. But there was no possible shot.
For two hours, we waited for this deer to stand up. It didn't. It's not sideways on, the rear hump is what turned out to be a properly lardy backside.
So we decided to try an approach from another angle, which may just offer some sort of awkward feasible shot, but of course we'd probably scare it off this time. Except we didn't. The deer did eventually work out something was about, but wasn't worried enough to stand up and do something about it. I was lying on my back waiting for the nod to sit up and set up sticks before the deer looked our way again, did my sit-up, and I was once again aiming at this frustrating deer. Verdict: its shoulders were now peeping out over the crest. That was it. High shoulder shot over the top of the ridge or nothing. Oh, and there was a backstop too. Luxury. This was delicate shot placement so I decided to use the set trigger: wobble, wobble, calm down, breathe, wobble a bit, wobble less... BLAM! went the 7x65R (it really does go BLAM). Over toppled the deer, thrashed for a minute or two, stopped, and smiles all round. Thank you Artemis, thank you fellow mushroom fan, thank you complacent deer!
Once again, I can make a credible claim to be a deerstalker. Oh, and people who say CWD are thick and easy to stalk? Not these ones! Hardest stalk I've ever done, frankly. Great way to end my dry patch. And I'm glad Artemis and I seem to be once again on good terms.
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The next installment will be about food and how a high shoulder shot makes a right mess.
