Before I knew it,
he must have
copped a nose
full of me and
he was off.”
through my head before I even
moved from my spot, I didn’t want
to stuff this up. The roos posed my
biggest problem, they were bloody
everywhere. I stayed low and in
the shade of trees and made about
200m of ground, still at least 400m
out, too far. I spied a spiker off to
my left only 100m away, but the
wind was fine, so I thought he’d
just walk straight past. I was
wrong, before I knew it, he must
have copped a nose full of me and
he was off, pronking his heart out,
sending roos in all directions. My
eyes were glued to the big boy and
his girls, who were now surveying
the situation very closely. With
roos going left, right and centre, he
shot off up the hill, his does not
far behind. “Bugger!” or maybe a
similar four letter word was said,then I sat back down and waited.
I knew he hadn’t seen or smelt me,
he was simply put off by all the
roos and that annoying little
spiker. I wanted to go after him
straight away, my buck, the one
I had chased for so long was so
close, but I knew better. “Better to
let him settle Reid, he’ll be
checking his back trail anyway”
I muttered to myself.
Thirty minutes passed before
I got up and made a move, ample
time I thought. The roos had now
gone which made things a lot easier.
I followed up his trail before I got to
a 200m long clearing. There was no
way around it, I just had to cross it.
I contemplated crawling the 200m,
but I didn’t even know where he
was, so just walked across as
normal, keeping an eye out for him
as I went. Nearing the end of the
clearing, I noticed some movement
up ahead in the trees. Quickly
raising my bino’s, I had the buck
ID’d in no time flat, quickly
calculated the distance in my head
at 250-ish metres as I dropped to the
ground, flicked off the safety and let
a 155gn ACP out of my 300WM fly,
front on into his chest as they were
all eyeballing me at this stage.
The deer scattered, the big fella
too. He went to the right and I18 | SPORTING SHOOTER _ APRIL 2015
FA LLOW
DEERfired again as he ran. At the shot,
he turned uphill and I quickly
sent another ACP at him and still,
he ran. As I bolted the fourth and
final round into the chamber
from the magazine, I noticed the
slightest faulter. Lining him up,
ready to send another one at him,
I watched him collapse mid
stride. I dared not move, I was
ready in case he got up, finger
caressing the trigger, waiting for
any movement. I needn’t have
worried, he was done for and
finally mine. I gathered up my 3
spent cases and walked up for a
look with a big grin on my face.
Looking him over, my first shot
hit slightly off to the right side of
his chest, the second hit him in
the paunch as he ran to the right
and the third grazed his right side
shoulder, which opened him up
like a zipper for about a foot long,
so I suppose it was the first shot
that killed him in the end, he just
didn’t know it.
The journey was now over; five
months of persistence had finally
paid off. If he had jumped the
fence earlier, I might have shot
him sooner, but then again, I was
kind of glad in the end, it was
a great birthday present and
a birthday I’ll never forget.4
5
4
The “gun that
won the
buck”, Reid’s
Tikka T3 in.
Win.Mag.
5
150gn ACP
projectiles
did the business
on Reid’s trophy
deer, propelled
by ADI AR
2 213 SC powder.
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