John Gryphon
Well-Known Member
Mate Chris came over for a catch up and to recount his recent great Wapiti hunting trip in the US and was told "bring a rifle with you" we might have a sit.
First off a couple of home made veni/pork/chilli/fennel/garlic snags were cooked then we geared up for a sit out.
A dithering wind made it a tough choice for a location and stuffed up the original gully choice with the changing breeze being the wrong direction so we headed back to a 'secondary' spot and while it wasnt perfect we had to cope with it.
The wind changing constantly was a real pain and after a long sore arse sit a hind was seen standing warily in the edge of the cover at a ranged 200 yards but she turned and vanished. "did she whiff us" is always the thought.
Sometime later I alerted Chris to a pair of foxes upstream from us and we eventually realised that they were cubs playing on and around their earth. Five were counted.
We watched them playing and the vixen appeared as well,some time later a sharp hard 'bark' was heard and we realised that the vixen had left the cubs and had given them the stay home command,the bark made my old dog jump up with a wtf and the two hunters wft-ing also ha ha.
As I whispered to Chris the wind was good otherwise the foxes would have vanished on scenting us and that was a real bonus and made us more comfortable with our location.
Constantly scanning for deer or even a dog as the light was starting to fade had me thinking of another nil return for our sit out.
Sometime later I saw a hind`s head appear in the fern and cover, passing Chris my tripod he quickly laid the .338 WM over it and was right on the job,a second hind followed. Chris showed restraint by not shooting as we thought a stag may be following. His decision and not wanting meat it was the correct decision.
The hinds stopped above the creek and scanned the schitt out of their world,they were side on and offered the best shot options and then started towards our position,whoa! they are going to walk right into us 'this will be interesting' and then at 100 metres distance turned and crossed the creek into the clear. They were very very wary and made sure that it was all clear for their night feed. We were both well cammed and even though they looked right through us they saw sfa. They crossed about 100 yards downstream from the fox earth.
We scanned and scanned for other deer to no avail and watched the two deer wandering about until even the quality optics couldn't deal with the fading light.The red dot was very useful of course and C had them covered way past the use by date of conventional cross hairs.
I found a dark "something" in the grass approx where the hinds had crossed and put it down to being a wombat which didn't look right but poor light and long grass didn't give me a really good look but when we finally walked back that way my old dog was quite animated in showing me that it was probably a wild dog that was seen,he does not react in any way to wombats..
A walk back through the bush to the ute then the drive home for two things...cold beers and fresh sambar liver sangas!
It was great evening watching sambar again but I have to add that there have been many many times when I haven't seen a deer turd let alone a deer back there so seeing a few hinds made it a rewarding night.
First off a couple of home made veni/pork/chilli/fennel/garlic snags were cooked then we geared up for a sit out.
A dithering wind made it a tough choice for a location and stuffed up the original gully choice with the changing breeze being the wrong direction so we headed back to a 'secondary' spot and while it wasnt perfect we had to cope with it.
The wind changing constantly was a real pain and after a long sore arse sit a hind was seen standing warily in the edge of the cover at a ranged 200 yards but she turned and vanished. "did she whiff us" is always the thought.
Sometime later I alerted Chris to a pair of foxes upstream from us and we eventually realised that they were cubs playing on and around their earth. Five were counted.
We watched them playing and the vixen appeared as well,some time later a sharp hard 'bark' was heard and we realised that the vixen had left the cubs and had given them the stay home command,the bark made my old dog jump up with a wtf and the two hunters wft-ing also ha ha.
As I whispered to Chris the wind was good otherwise the foxes would have vanished on scenting us and that was a real bonus and made us more comfortable with our location.
Constantly scanning for deer or even a dog as the light was starting to fade had me thinking of another nil return for our sit out.
Sometime later I saw a hind`s head appear in the fern and cover, passing Chris my tripod he quickly laid the .338 WM over it and was right on the job,a second hind followed. Chris showed restraint by not shooting as we thought a stag may be following. His decision and not wanting meat it was the correct decision.
The hinds stopped above the creek and scanned the schitt out of their world,they were side on and offered the best shot options and then started towards our position,whoa! they are going to walk right into us 'this will be interesting' and then at 100 metres distance turned and crossed the creek into the clear. They were very very wary and made sure that it was all clear for their night feed. We were both well cammed and even though they looked right through us they saw sfa. They crossed about 100 yards downstream from the fox earth.
We scanned and scanned for other deer to no avail and watched the two deer wandering about until even the quality optics couldn't deal with the fading light.The red dot was very useful of course and C had them covered way past the use by date of conventional cross hairs.
I found a dark "something" in the grass approx where the hinds had crossed and put it down to being a wombat which didn't look right but poor light and long grass didn't give me a really good look but when we finally walked back that way my old dog was quite animated in showing me that it was probably a wild dog that was seen,he does not react in any way to wombats..
A walk back through the bush to the ute then the drive home for two things...cold beers and fresh sambar liver sangas!
It was great evening watching sambar again but I have to add that there have been many many times when I haven't seen a deer turd let alone a deer back there so seeing a few hinds made it a rewarding night.
