Quick Afternoon Hunt.

Arriving at my fallow property late one afternoon last week, I was eager to see how the rut was going and it was safe to say it was in full swing as I could hear the bucks were croaking and reds were roaring as soon as I stopped the car at the top of the hill.

I immediately started glassing and started to spot deer and began my stalk up the gully in search of what may lay ahead. The fallow were going ballistic with does and bucks going full ball all over the hillside milling around on almost every hill. I was glassing some nice bucks on the hillside opposite with a few stand out bucks in the 215-220 mark bedded in the open and a few other satellite bucks that were up chasing does around.

I managed to get in close to a few deer early and ended up roaring in a young red spiker whilst trying to get another young 12 pointer fired up in the background and maybe lure him out of the scrub he was holding up in. It was great getting film of a young red spiker that came tearing over the hill coming into my roars. I was quite happy just sitting on the hillside listening to the exciting sound of Red Stags and Fallow bellowing in most gullies as far as I could hear.

I soon spied a big old Fallow buck on the ridge feeding out of some thicker scrub. Time was getting on and this 12pt red stag was really starting to fire up so the plan was made to head around the base of the system knowing that my scent will blow most of the deer and goats that are between me and the ridge line out the way and down the system, that way a stalk could be made on the vocal red stag.

Moving around the head of the hill it was abnormal in the sense that the deer rutting on the down wind side of me were not fazed one bit by my scent, they were all on high alert but most the bucks kept on croaking and chasing does around with out too much worry at all. if I was lucky maybe 5 old mature does fled the scene making sure the wind was still right I continued on.

I was soon cresting over the hill and as luck would have it I popped up right on the Red Stag and at under 40m I was wearing my long sleeve “veil” Prime Summer top and long “Hydrapel” pants with the “Veil” face Buff on I found the stag was very approachable and the camouflage pattern was defiantly working, he knew something was not right but he wanted to stay and defend his ground from the aggressive red stag that was roaring in my direction about 5 mins earlier (that stag was me).

Following the stag and hinds for a little while I managed some nice film but stills were grainy as my camera had been switched from auto to manual focus. We walked right around to within 50m of my feeding fallow that I had glassed earlier. Getting a good look at him I noticed he was a great buck to clear out of the gene pool.

So the choice was made in the ever fading light that I would take him. So with the camera on record I sent the 130G barnes TSX straight into his vitals. Poleaxing him on the spot. Now the work was cut out to try and get some snaps before complete darkness had set in. Upon the shot the fallow bucks just below me did not even stop croaking and the red stag just kept staring in my direction until I started to head over to my buck that’s when he gathered his harem and took off over the hillside. I have placed the video on my youtube account for anyone that may be interested in watching it, until next time thanks for reading

Cheers Beau