As all gamblers will tell you, you’ve gotta
keep going when your lucks in, so I
suggested we hop around the face a little
and look for more tahr. I was still trying to
clear the lenses on my bino’s when Emil
stuttered ‘ttttahhr, lots of tahr!’ through
blue, chattering lips.
I left Emil to watch them while I gathered
everything up as it looked like we should
stay and look over the tahr before we
headed to my stag. Binos, camera, andrifle were soaked in the
steady, frozen rain.
When I made it back
to Emil he’d spotted
Reds as well! Eventually
we made out seven
Reds and heaps of tahr,
we’d struck the jackpot.
Despite the size of the
stag we had just shot,
the rest looked like
they’d been dropped
there straight from
the Ureweras. Terrible
condition with shocking
heads - one even had an
antler out to the side! If
there hadn’t been a whole mob of tahr
right there he would’ve been a tempting
character trophy. They were spooky after
the unsuppressed shot and cut up to
the right, slowly filing over into the next
catchment.
The tahr were much less spooked so we
decided to get closer and find a better
rest, eventually finding a nice bare spur
clear of the big tussock 500 yards from
them. There were tahr everywhere, it washard work keeping track of what we’d
already studied, so it took a while to settle
on the shooter. Once we’d established
we were looking at the same animal
we agreed he was clearly the best
bull with the most age.
It was frustrating setting up for the shot
and also keeping track of which bull was
which. After a lot of ‘No the one of the
left, the other left! No, the one with his
head up’ Emil pulled off a great shot with
shivering hands. Something about those
Europeans, they know the cold!
It was now 3.30 and I was thrilled to be
moving and warming up. As we dropped
down the group of tahr also crossed
the same creek heading in the opposite
direction, but we saw no better bulls.
I tried getting a few pictures but the
camera battery was having an absolute
tantrum in the cold. Crossing the creek on
to the dark side of the hill was like walking
into a chiller. We nearly needed crampons
on the way up to the bull, purely from
water seepage that had frozen into hard,
slick ice.
We emerged right on the scree the
bull was standing on, he had to be
somewhere nearby. Emil found him
quickly, dropped right on the spot. He
had an attractive set of 12 ½ inch horns
and showed 8 years of age, unfortunately
his big winter mane was a bit bedraggled
by the rain. We hurried through the photo
and butchery session as I wanted light for
photos with my stag as well!
We contoured around and I was thrilled
seeing those white tips standing proud
above the tussock. He was a pretty big
animal in poor condition, but an ancient
stag. We sent Emil’s Dad a photo and he
said if it was in Poland he would have said
14, maybe older, but given harshness of
the environment here it was likely 10-- either way he was as big as he would
ever get.
I was delighted with the stag, he
was 38 Inches long and a physically
imposing head. Despite only carrying 9
points there was a real feeling of maturity
and size with the length, width and
My stag as he
spent the whole
day, hiding from
the elementsEmil's bull as he moved
through the herdEmil's with his
bull and Greg's
sublime 7mm
Stumpy6As all gamblers will tell you, you’ve gotta
keep going when your lucks in, so I
suggested we hop around the face a little
and look for more tahr. I was still trying to
clear the lenses on my bino’s when Emil
stuttered ‘ttttahhr, lots of tahr!’ through
blue, chattering lips.
I left Emil to watch them while I gathered
everything up as it looked like we should
stay and look over the tahr before we
headed to my stag. Binos, camera, andrifle were soaked in the
steady, frozen rain.
When I made it back
to Emil he’d spotted
Reds as well! Eventually
we made out seven
Reds and heaps of tahr,
we’d struck the jackpot.
Despite the size of the
stag we had just shot,
the rest looked like
they’d been dropped
there straight from
the Ureweras. Terrible
condition with shocking
heads - one even had an
antler out to the side! If
there hadn’t been a whole mob of tahr
right there he would’ve been a tempting
character trophy. They were spooky after
the unsuppressed shot and cut up to
the right, slowly filing over into the next
catchment.
The tahr were much less spooked so we
decided to get closer and find a better
rest, eventually finding a nice bare spur
clear of the big tussock 500 yards from
them. There were tahr everywhere, it washard work keeping track of what we’d
already studied, so it took a while to settle
on the shooter. Once we’d established
we were looking at the same animal
we agreed he was clearly the best
bull with the most age.
It was frustrating setting up for the shot
and also keeping track of which bull was
which. After a lot of ‘No the one of the
left, the other left! No, the one with his
head up’ Emil pulled off a great shot with
shivering hands. Something about those
Europeans, they know the cold!
It was now 3.30 and I was thrilled to be
moving and warming up. As we dropped
down the group of tahr also crossed
the same creek heading in the opposite
direction, but we saw no better bulls.
I tried getting a few pictures but the
camera battery was having an absolute
tantrum in the cold. Crossing the creek on
to the dark side of the hill was like walking
into a chiller. We nearly needed crampons
on the way up to the bull, purely from
water seepage that had frozen into hard,
slick ice.
We emerged right on the scree the
bull was standing on, he had to be
somewhere nearby. Emil found him
quickly, dropped right on the spot. He
had an attractive set of 12 ½ inch horns
and showed 8 years of age, unfortunately
his big winter mane was a bit bedraggled
by the rain. We hurried through the photo
and butchery session as I wanted light for
photos with my stag as well!
We contoured around and I was thrilled
seeing those white tips standing proud
above the tussock. He was a pretty big
animal in poor condition, but an ancient
stag. We sent Emil’s Dad a photo and he
said if it was in Poland he would have said
14, maybe older, but given harshness of
the environment here it was likely 10-- either way he was as big as he would
ever get.
I was delighted with the stag, he
was 38 Inches long and a physically
imposing head. Despite only carrying 9
points there was a real feeling of maturity
and size with the length, width and
My stag as he
spent the whole
day, hiding from
the elements
Emil's bull as he moved
through the herdEmil's with his
bull and Greg's
sublime 7mm
Stumpy6