Started writing some of my stalks up again.....
After parking up the truck at a suitable vantage point and with the drizzle just starting I decided to hot foot it straight across the first two fields using the track and breaking cover. It was early in the evening anyway and I wanted to get into the woodland quickly rather than jack about in the drizzle and field edges. Also I had the old man with me for the evening and at 76 I didn’t want to exhaust him before we had even got started.
Approaching the woodland we stopped for a good scan on the tree line and cover crops to see what was about and after 10mins of no activity and with the rain picking up the pace we decided to head into the woodland. I had planned the stalk with the old man for about a month and even walked the route a couple of weeks previous to make sure it wasn’t to excessive. Thanks to years of forestry there was a nice logging/access track that followed the woodland edge and allows excellent views down through the timber. Also because the path zig zags a bit I found that this route had lots of natural pause points for scanning the route ahead. What was clear though was that although it was 19:30 by this time the timber company was pulling a late shift and about 300-400 yards away all that could be heard was their felling operations. In my mind this wasn’t helping the stalking chances, but as always you just have to make do and get on. That said there was allot of roe and red sign about so at least I looked like I knew how to find deer. About 6-700 yards down the forestry track i happened to turn back to make sure I still had Dad and I wasn’t killing him with the route and had a quick scan behind.
As is the case sometimes this little scan behind bought up a heat spot and a scan with the binos showed a buck couched down at about 150 yards. We had passed right past him, but he was hidden by the timber and a dip. There is a decent almost medal buck in this area, which is being avoided so in the gloom I asked Dad to stay put and handed him the thermal for entertainment value. I then stalked in closer down the bank through allot of cut brush to get to within 100 yards and better ID range. This showed a 5 point buck just chilling and probably waiting for the timber company to give up before thinking about having a feed. Rifle up on the sticks pop a bit more mag on the scope for a last double check and I pause. I was originally going to stand him up for the shot using the caller in my pocket, but the steep bank he is sitting at the top off and the fact that the old man would insist on helping to recover no matter what changed this plan to a high neck shot instead. The shot was taken and as always the deer surprised me by springing a good 3 feet in the air before tumbling down the slope probably dead as a door nail dead before it even hit the ground. I went through my post shot routine and called the old man forwards to my position where we discussed the tumbling buck and shot site. Having walked forwards the buck was located at the top of another even bigger drop, which was lucky. Quick inspection and a serious drag out later and I had the buck back at a location I could drive the truck too. Leaving the old man in the woods with the deer I jogged back to the truck through the rain and the rest is a quick gralloch and the deer into the larder.
After parking up the truck at a suitable vantage point and with the drizzle just starting I decided to hot foot it straight across the first two fields using the track and breaking cover. It was early in the evening anyway and I wanted to get into the woodland quickly rather than jack about in the drizzle and field edges. Also I had the old man with me for the evening and at 76 I didn’t want to exhaust him before we had even got started.
Approaching the woodland we stopped for a good scan on the tree line and cover crops to see what was about and after 10mins of no activity and with the rain picking up the pace we decided to head into the woodland. I had planned the stalk with the old man for about a month and even walked the route a couple of weeks previous to make sure it wasn’t to excessive. Thanks to years of forestry there was a nice logging/access track that followed the woodland edge and allows excellent views down through the timber. Also because the path zig zags a bit I found that this route had lots of natural pause points for scanning the route ahead. What was clear though was that although it was 19:30 by this time the timber company was pulling a late shift and about 300-400 yards away all that could be heard was their felling operations. In my mind this wasn’t helping the stalking chances, but as always you just have to make do and get on. That said there was allot of roe and red sign about so at least I looked like I knew how to find deer. About 6-700 yards down the forestry track i happened to turn back to make sure I still had Dad and I wasn’t killing him with the route and had a quick scan behind.
As is the case sometimes this little scan behind bought up a heat spot and a scan with the binos showed a buck couched down at about 150 yards. We had passed right past him, but he was hidden by the timber and a dip. There is a decent almost medal buck in this area, which is being avoided so in the gloom I asked Dad to stay put and handed him the thermal for entertainment value. I then stalked in closer down the bank through allot of cut brush to get to within 100 yards and better ID range. This showed a 5 point buck just chilling and probably waiting for the timber company to give up before thinking about having a feed. Rifle up on the sticks pop a bit more mag on the scope for a last double check and I pause. I was originally going to stand him up for the shot using the caller in my pocket, but the steep bank he is sitting at the top off and the fact that the old man would insist on helping to recover no matter what changed this plan to a high neck shot instead. The shot was taken and as always the deer surprised me by springing a good 3 feet in the air before tumbling down the slope probably dead as a door nail dead before it even hit the ground. I went through my post shot routine and called the old man forwards to my position where we discussed the tumbling buck and shot site. Having walked forwards the buck was located at the top of another even bigger drop, which was lucky. Quick inspection and a serious drag out later and I had the buck back at a location I could drive the truck too. Leaving the old man in the woods with the deer I jogged back to the truck through the rain and the rest is a quick gralloch and the deer into the larder.
