Right, as promised for the few that took the time to read my pig story from NZ I shall now write up a bit about the 5 day Tahr hunt. I will try and answer a few questions but feel free to post below or DM with anything you want clarified.
Location: west coast, south island, NZ, Butler top hut
Time of year: June, NZs start to winter, start/mid rut
Species: Himalayan Tahr, i wanted to try for Chamois but they were up way too high up around 2000metres everytime we saw them
So, monday morning we crack on nice and early just outside of Franz Josef to catch our heli ride into the wilderness for 0900, luckily when we showed up at 0830 the chopped was ready to load and we got off early. A beautiful trip in following the river up through the valleys. If i thought the pig hinting was tough, i knew this was going to be hard when we saw the terrain!
We set up shop from the DOC hut, luckily we were staying alone and had plenty of firewood/food/booze etc. Once set up we looked at the map and headed out on our first hunt around 1100, up through the native bush, into a creek/river bed and then back into the bush. This should have been a warning to us, not to come back in the dark. The cliff face to get into the native bush and onto an old hunting track that hadnt been used in years was near vertical and required the use of an existing rope to get up the 30metre climb. We pushed through the track and came back out along the river bed and spotted some Tahr just over 1km away and way up there so we had some well deserved lunch and came up with a game plan. We set off just after 1300 to tackle this mob of Tahr which had a huge bull in. We started off at 600 metres altitude and when i pulled the trigger we were around 1300 metres. No tracks, just pure rock face slopes, but they had a hidden gem, the alpine parrot known as the Kea, who are very inquisitive and are beautiful birds. We pushed on to the Tahr and got to 290 yards with a 45 degree shot. We identified a nice bull, but we knew there was a bigger one and waited for him to show himself, sure enough he showed and the 7mm rem mag did the business! Boom! The valley erupted, Tahr came out of nowhere, Boom! A nanny hit hard bowling off the cliff face. Somehow, the other bull had just stood there, presented the shot and i was told to shoot as we didnt know what the rest of the week would hold, Boom! Three Tahr, three rounds, happy days! Now, we just had to get to ****ing things!
It was hard going just to get the bull and nanny that had dropped off the face, but it was heartbreaking to realise we couldnt retrieve the massive bull that was just 100metres up on a ledge (part and parcel of NZ hunting). None the less we decided to measure and cape the other bull... 13 1/4 inch bull!!! What a ripper! If that bull was just over 13 inches who knows what the other one was ( will post a still photo from the shot video below). Meat taken from both animals and cape/photos sorted we decided we needed to get off the mountain due to weather and impeding darkness, the descent was hard with the added weight of the cape and meat and the frozen face was very slippery. We got down to the river bed, had some water and snacks and cracked on through the native trail in the dark with head torches until we reached the rope down point. At this point it was agreed to throw the cape off the ledge due to weight and safety concerns. The climb down was horrible to say the least and prevented us from hunting that way for the remainder of the trip (kiwi hated it too, not just a pedantic pom!). We got back into the hut after what must have been 3.5/4 hrs after the shot, we cooked some food, cranked the fire and smashed some tins!
I will post some photos below from the first day and then write about the other days below
Location: west coast, south island, NZ, Butler top hut
Time of year: June, NZs start to winter, start/mid rut
Species: Himalayan Tahr, i wanted to try for Chamois but they were up way too high up around 2000metres everytime we saw them
So, monday morning we crack on nice and early just outside of Franz Josef to catch our heli ride into the wilderness for 0900, luckily when we showed up at 0830 the chopped was ready to load and we got off early. A beautiful trip in following the river up through the valleys. If i thought the pig hinting was tough, i knew this was going to be hard when we saw the terrain!
We set up shop from the DOC hut, luckily we were staying alone and had plenty of firewood/food/booze etc. Once set up we looked at the map and headed out on our first hunt around 1100, up through the native bush, into a creek/river bed and then back into the bush. This should have been a warning to us, not to come back in the dark. The cliff face to get into the native bush and onto an old hunting track that hadnt been used in years was near vertical and required the use of an existing rope to get up the 30metre climb. We pushed through the track and came back out along the river bed and spotted some Tahr just over 1km away and way up there so we had some well deserved lunch and came up with a game plan. We set off just after 1300 to tackle this mob of Tahr which had a huge bull in. We started off at 600 metres altitude and when i pulled the trigger we were around 1300 metres. No tracks, just pure rock face slopes, but they had a hidden gem, the alpine parrot known as the Kea, who are very inquisitive and are beautiful birds. We pushed on to the Tahr and got to 290 yards with a 45 degree shot. We identified a nice bull, but we knew there was a bigger one and waited for him to show himself, sure enough he showed and the 7mm rem mag did the business! Boom! The valley erupted, Tahr came out of nowhere, Boom! A nanny hit hard bowling off the cliff face. Somehow, the other bull had just stood there, presented the shot and i was told to shoot as we didnt know what the rest of the week would hold, Boom! Three Tahr, three rounds, happy days! Now, we just had to get to ****ing things!
It was hard going just to get the bull and nanny that had dropped off the face, but it was heartbreaking to realise we couldnt retrieve the massive bull that was just 100metres up on a ledge (part and parcel of NZ hunting). None the less we decided to measure and cape the other bull... 13 1/4 inch bull!!! What a ripper! If that bull was just over 13 inches who knows what the other one was ( will post a still photo from the shot video below). Meat taken from both animals and cape/photos sorted we decided we needed to get off the mountain due to weather and impeding darkness, the descent was hard with the added weight of the cape and meat and the frozen face was very slippery. We got down to the river bed, had some water and snacks and cracked on through the native trail in the dark with head torches until we reached the rope down point. At this point it was agreed to throw the cape off the ledge due to weight and safety concerns. The climb down was horrible to say the least and prevented us from hunting that way for the remainder of the trip (kiwi hated it too, not just a pedantic pom!). We got back into the hut after what must have been 3.5/4 hrs after the shot, we cooked some food, cranked the fire and smashed some tins!
I will post some photos below from the first day and then write about the other days below
