Chinese Water Deer: A tale of hunting hubris, or is that being hunted by hubris?

The idyllic nature of this shot can never show the sheer agony my butt cheeks were in after a couple of hours sitting on the bare metal slats that had once supported the seat

There's two trophies: a full freezer and a great tale. Ticked those two off, nearly got the other kind too. Nearly. Pull up a log, warm your hands by the fire, pour yourself a tin mug of scotch, this one has to be the most SBW hunting saga yet

Long term readers will remember the blogger known as Shooter and his Mountain Lion hunt. In the intervening years his kids have grown up a bit and he's moved to the country. Back in touch I was delighted to accept his invitation to a walked up day which I'll tell you about later, obviously we agree to catch up next time I'm in the area.

The ACL [who features in a few of the more recent tales] and I had made the journey to the fenlands, a hundred miles north east of London, for Shooter’s walked up birds, we'd got chatting to the gamekeepers; they'd shown us some pictures of substantial Red Deer, we'd seen some bloody deep slots left behind by some even bigger deer, and listened to their tales of many many Chinese Water Deer seen on the thermal scope while Foxing. These are the closing weeks of the season. With a much needed freezer top-up on our minds before we sack most stalking off until the big boys are back in season on the first of August. We eere both keen as mustard to get out there

Having been the victim of the curse of the Bushwacker- where I invite you stalking, shoot two deer and miss a third while every deer you see will be siluetted against a farm house or scared off by a dog walker, the ACL had booked us in for a couple of stalks so he was inviting me Prudent

My favourite Russian saying : we wanted it to be different, it happened just the same

The usual early start, the usual delays for all the usual reasons, [misplaced firearms certificate, wrong socks, only one boot] then once on tbe road it’s the usual realisations that the usual X,Y and Z had been left behind. That exhilarating feeling of the open road, the frustration of rounding the corner into a slow moving morass of traffic, the inevitable phone call to announce our arrival would be significantly delayed and the surreptitious roadside consumption of banned foodstuffs

Fortunately the ACL is excellent company and has been avidly following the war in Ukraine and so knows all kinds of great stuff about it. that soaked up a couple of hours and we found our way to Shooter's place. Only driving past it twice

Shooter, the long suffering Mrs Shooter and all the little Shooters are all in fine fettle. The new house is perfect for playing Tom and Barbara The menagerie has expanded to include rare chickens, peacocks and goats have been ordered. Theres even a puddle rather optimistically being called the pond

Where as the ACL,has one rifle per task, all rare and charismatic, Shooter has a vast collection of rifles all as horrible as i remember them being. On the other hand his shotgun cabinet is as glamorous as a weekend at Downtown Abby and he’s the only person i know with ore than one 10 bore shotgun

After a hearty and sustaining lunch and some trading over a .410 we set off to meet the keepers

Norfolk is pretty big and pretty flat the fields are punctuated by drainage dithlches the locals call sewers. Great banks of rushes line the sewers. You can really see how a deer with water in its name would be at home here. The road kill count suggests there are lots of them. Every 200m there's another dead deer by the side of the road

Chinese water deer are natives of the Yangtze flood plain and Korea. They were introduced to Woburn Park, Bedfordshire, in 1896, and Whipsnade Zoo in 1929-30. I’ve not tracked down why they were deliberately released into surrounding woodlands from 1901 onwards, but that release is often sighted as the start of their spread. Since then there have been numerous releases, translocations, and escapes. Adapting to live in gardens, deciduous woodland, grassland, arable land as well as their native wetlands, coastal & marshland,

A small, even compact deer, a pale fawn colour, with large rounded ears and button-like black eyes. The Bucks are antlerless, but have moody long tusk-like canines.
A bit taller, and paler than muntjac, lacking that hump-backed look. They look more like a mini roe deer.
Between 82-106 cm long with a tail length 2.5-9 cm tails and about 42-65 cm at the shoulder Males weigh 12-18.5 kg; females 14-17.4 kg. Some study’s show them living to at least six years old.
As the name Water deer would suggest they seem to prefer wetlands adjoining woodland and fen, though they often range onto nearby farmland where they will feed in the open. They are most evident in the Norfolk Broads and the coastal wetlands. Although a feral, uncontained, population in the grounds of Whipsnade park inhabits parkland and dry woodland, with no wetland available.feeding mostly around dawn and dusk, on weeds, grasses, herbs and some browse. Although they often feed in arable fields, they seem to be eating weeds rather than crops.

The keepers drop me off and I walk to my highseat, wish I’d noticed what I noticed later. I climb up to find that the seat is missing, tentatively I settle onto the slats that once held the seat arse rest. For a while I manage to space out and even doze a little, but the sheer agony brings me back I roll my jacket up and that alleviate a some of it now I’m cold This is clearly what Buddhism refers to as the sheer unsatisfactoriness of existence Some very encouraging barking is coming from the reeds behind me to pass some time I spend a while twisted round looking into the standing reds and willing something to wander out what looks at first sight to be a car gliders silently past, a human head pops up , it’s the roof of a boat

Meanwhile at the other end of the field The ACL has found his highseat knee deep in water and looking precarious so he sets up shop in the hedgerow a while passes, a couple of Hares bounce past, a Fallow doe rocks up, spooked by something behind ACL. Weary of this life she sets herself down within range and waits to be shot, ever the gentleman stalker ACL decides it’s somehow outside of the pact between hunter and prey to shoot while they are both seated, not used to being ignored she waits a while and then ups sticks and toddles off in search of someone who will release her from the wheel of earthly suffering

Meanwhile back at the SBW end of things three deer have ventured out of the reeds if they turn left they’ll at the only buildings in the neighbourhood. I’m willing at them, trying to lure them in my my Jedi powers it’s actually working ….

ACL feels a bustle in his hedgerows and a little CWD saunters into range having got all his nerves out of the way with the Doe ACL turns theory into practice, pops his cherry and her right through the shoulder. Text book

His story proves something of an interruption to mine. There’s a fizzing whoosh from his moderator, the posse of three deer disappear. Spooked deer usually run them pause to add whatever scared them to the database, if they check and it’s looking like a false alarm they often resume their previous behaviour. I’m promising Artemis the earth and everything on it, for once she delivers and the three of them come back down their unseen camino towards me The X from the X Yz of left at home were my posh binos, the short comings of the Bushnells the ever cost conscious Shooter has lent me are becoming clear, but that’s the only thing that is, I resort to spotting through the scope the Deer’s on the right is wearing some pretty impressive mandibles

The balancing act: wait but don’t let chances evaporate while waiting for better chances

The bolt of the SR30!acts as the safety catch, by some kind of German engineering voodoo it snicks forward into battery without a sound our boy turns slightly to look up hill and catches one in the pocket behind his front leg the 120gr S&B blue takes the top off his heart and purées his lungs we are both unaware of this development and he takes off like South Side D’s Porsche for the first time in my life I’m completely invested in the trophy, they usually stagger and die, i e only ever had one run off into the last light and hail of a Scottish hillside I can’t bear to risk it he’s arcing back towards the reeds, he breaks stride and gets another one, staggers a bit and lies down twitching the other two are watching Muntjac doe points herself towards the reeds, the buck presents a shot, jumps to the bullet and legs it too. If it’s in the Reed bed that’s all she wrote the light is dying and the keepers and a dog are a long way off

A long time ago someone who gave me a rifle lesson told me he’d spent a summer reading the accounts of deer stalking written by army officers in the late 1940’s and 50’who brought the concept of Roe stalking home from Germany. smoking wouldn’t be bad for you for years, so smokes were a unit of time ‘Shoot the deer, then smoke a cigarette before going to look’

I’m still worried the Muntjac will have made it to the reed bed. I’ve not walked 25 meters before I find him must’ve pulled the shot a little, bullet entered third rib mashed things up a bit and destroyed the off side shoulder from the inside. Dead is still dead



Finally. The Money Pit a Heym SR30 in 6.5CM doing the job I've always believed it was born to do.

Ive just taken the picture above when suddenly it hits me, a wave of illation the joy of not having to hear my own whining as i look for my much fettled Lapua cases in the long grass beneath the high seat! Turns out there’s a lot to be said for factory ammunition i leave the spent cases where they fell, walk past where much needed seat from the high seat lies almost at the bottom of the ladder and head off to find the ACL

The Y is why did I leave my rifle sling behind?




Shultz and Larsen Victory in 6.5x55 Swedish Nice

He’s standing around looking at his dead deer with a ‘I always wanted one, now I’ve got one I don’t know what to do with it’ look on his face I give him a hug I remember that moment all those years ago, when I had the same face on ‘Sheeet I’m a deer hunter!’

Gralloch and back to Shooter’s place

Just because that part of the story ended on a high don’t think for a moment that the feral failure ends there oh no not for a moment

The hour back flies by but it’s been a long day Shooter is a wonderful host, and a fantastic cook we hang our deer in his outbuildings and set about the feast he’s laid on Pile of carbs and a bucket of Islay malts later we hold a snoring competition for a few wee hours.

“Are you still alive? I thought you were dead for a moment there”. “Why had i stopped snoring?”

I’ll leave it to you dear reader to guess who said what

A brief tussle with Shooter’s coffee machine and hit the road

Trying to learn the ground we set up near a wood we saw muntjac in on our walked up day. Not a lot happens. I start to regret not wearing a smock length coat. By now I’m not only cold but busting for a piss. Out of the high seat and out of the wind it’s a beautiful morning still sling-less I’m pissing with the money pit leaning against me Who should pop his little antlered head out of the bushes but Mr Muntjac, by impatiently raising the rifle when I should have made like a statue , I spook him

The ACL tells his usual tale of dog walkers and we make a shameful detour to the Golden Arches

We’re three little deer up, its a beautiful morning, we’re a hundred miles from home, neither of us is wearing sunglasses and ACL is making all kinds of rash promises to Mrs ACL regarding his arrival time

You could say its all going swimmingly. Could

As we walk over to the hanging Chinese Water Deer Shooter gasps in administration “you didn’t say they were that good! Those tusks are Bronze, or maybe Silver” I grab the CWD lift and turn to check the symmetry and im met by a sickening tale of rural vandalism. During the night something with immense bite strength has grabbed hold of the lowest part of the carcass and rented at it, trying to break it free from its rope the broken off tusk is nowhere to be seen, my broken dream lies all around










Best crack on with the butchery Chinese Water Deer have hair, but unlike other deer it looks almost fur-like and is hardly attached at all, moving the carcass onto a different larder hook it’s coming off in clumps The skin too seems barely attached, even this end of the season theres an impressive layer of subcutaneous fat, you call pull the skin off with no knife work The ACL has just been on a butchery course so Shooter and I are at our most encouraging

“You’re actually in luck today. You want to process your first deer and we're here. I don’t know if you know this but Shooter was in the Indian National team for butting in, and I’m an exceptionally gifted amateur, if you'd like us to mither at you and butt in while you do it, we’re standing by. ready to interfere.”

All bagged up and ready to go we wend our now weary way back home

I cant help but wonder what might have been, so I make one last mistake..I post the good side picture on Facebook

Next time it’s pigeons
Your pal
SBW

Muntjac - Mini Deer With FANGS!

The Northern Monkey calls me from his way home from a building site just to the north of london. “I’m at some traffic lights and there are two little deer just standing on the grass staring at me, look a bit moody, they’ve got fangs!”

Muntiacus muntiak reevesi aka Reeve’s Muntjac are our smallest and soon to be most prolific deer. Regular readers will know I’ve hunted these 30 lbs mini deer a few times, seen them, and heard them, all without ever firing a shot.

It’s still called Hunting, it’s still not called shopping.

They bark, not unlike a dog but not quite as loud, they’re skittish, they never really seem to stand still even when nibbling, they are aggressive and armed to the teeth. Or at least armed with long curved canine teeth. They may only be the size of a Labrador but only the most aggressive kinds of terrier would stand a chance against them.

Introduced into the substantial gardens of his ancestral home, Woburn Park, by serial wildlife scallywag [this isn’t the only invasive he released] the Duke of Bedford in 1894, Reeves Muntjac have spread a long way since then. Up and down the country and even ‘swimming’ the Irish sea to appear in Northern Ireland. Of the six species of deer we have they are the most successful. Increasing not only in distribution but at 8.2 percent a year, population has soared from a guesstimate of only 2,000 in 1963, to more than two million today, a Muntjac doe will mate within days of giving birth and will give birth again every seven months. Their diet, the tender shoots of woodland flora like; bluebells, oxlips, native orchids, and the wood anemone, means that they are seriously unloved by the conservation organisations. Rose gardeners particularly hate them, apparently they can, and will, eat a grand’s worth in an evening. They are yet to develop any road sense, of the 42,000 road accidents a year involving deer, resulting in 20 human deaths and £10 million damages, they are about 9,000.  A cull plan of 25-30% would stabilise the population, it would take 50+% to reduce their numbers and that would mean taking a shot at every one you ever saw, which just cant happen.

Where the culinary solution falls down is they might be the best eating deer but they are poor value in the amount of meat you get for the amount butchery it takes to get it. The front legs are scrawny and often bullet damaged, the delicious loins are one per person rarer than a row of steaks, leaving only the haunches which ain’t that big. For not a lot more knife time on even a Roe you’re getting a far greater return for your butchery efforts.

As part of the Adult Onset Hunting program I’ve promised to take a few club members and foodies hunting, this time its The Sailor [yeah I know I've kind of run out of steam with the TLA's]

It's traditional on these pages to start with a description of how hard it is to actually leave town and the snide remarks made by my fellow traveller regarding my time keeping. But you’ve heard it all before. I travel to the far side of london thought he rush hour, then we drive back around london through the second hour of rush before heading not very far north, next time I’m going by train, it literally takes 45 minutes.

There are two schools of thought on which rifle to take: They’re legal to shoot with a .22 centre fire as long as it makes 1,000ft/lb of energy at the muzzle, and delivers a expanding bullet of 50 grains and up. Or in the other school its anything up to a .308, moving at a sedate pace, to reduce meat damage.

The thought of lugging my 15+ lbs Precision rifle across london, let alone across muddy fields doesn’t appeal so I’ve chosen the CZ527, that perfect expression of the mini Mauser. Even with its suppressor up front its only xxxx long and it doesn’t weight a lot. For now mine is chambered in .223 and has a perfect balance just in front of the magazine. I don't know about you, but I was taught to clamber in and out of the highseat with an unloaded rifle, so I’ll always favour a magazine-fed stalking rifle to all that fussing about dropping rounds into my hat and re-stuffing the rifle at each end of the ladder. While I have other favourites the CZ527 is nearly the perfect ‘woodland’ rifle.

We spend a pleasant evening in the ‘spoons gossiping about the other members of the club, slagging off the owner of the chain, and drinking cheap pints.

The Sailor has done us proud finding a hotel even cheaper than the one I stayed in last time and we saunter back for a brief nights kip before hitting the road before dawn. For October its positively balmy even at night its comfortably double figures [centigrade]. All of my stalking trips of late have been by electric vehicle and we whirr though the night past the gallops and stable yards of horse country.

Although I’ve not seen him in an age, it was good to have Mr 7mm as our host and guide; he’s safe, kind to newbies, and has thousands of acres of excellent stalking.
Handshakes dispensed with we clamber into Mr 7mm’s truck and head off into the farmlands. To give the newbie the widest possible introduction to stalking I’m dropped off at a highseat where a spinney abuts a track leading into a block of forestry. Even in the dark it looks proper promising. Mr 7mm produces one of those night vision monoculars that would have been black-ops ten years ago and there are three small deer and a couple of Hares glowing bright green out in the fields.

We walk over to the highseat. “if you shoot a deer, stay in the seat, where you shoot one there will most likely be another a few minutes later”.
A note for new stalkers: please stay in the highseat, I know you want to go and see that deer you shot, but it adds all sorts of unnecessary complications to the enterprise and as Mr 7mm says you might be blowing your chance of deer number two.
As Mr 7mm walks away into the gloom I drop the mag; sling the rifle on my front, clamber up, last quick check that the moderator is screwed on nice and tight, mag back in, chamber a round and settle down to wait. There must be a pen near by as within a few moments pheasants start to appear. Some of the hens are so white I’m compelled to check if they’re albino. At the 87m feeder they mill about and warm in my coat I start to feel a little drowsy. A Hare bounds out of the cover crop and I watch it though my binoculars until it goes back the way he came, my eyes are getting seriously heavy by this time. I’m in that half trance place where it could go either way, the swaying of the boughs behind me, the indistinct first light, a pheasant I made eye contact with earlier stands at the bottom of the highseat and creates me until i’m fully awake again. Out at the 87m feeder the pheasants are having her breakfast interrupted by a Muntjac doe. She circles the feeder and as she drops her head to snaffle a few grains I send her 55 grains of my own. She takes off like a scalded cat, I know I hit her fair and square so I try to suppress the nagging doubts about; myself, the bullet, the scope, the rifle, the shot placement, and how Artemis has abandoned me.

The Brugger and Thommett  moderator is obviously really good, the pheasants flap about a bit and then go back to eating. My brain is replaying “if you shoot a deer, stay in the seat, where you shoot one there will most likely be another a few minutes later” when not 90 seconds later a Buck turns up. he too circles the feeder and as soon as he settles in the crosshairs I give him a round, or so I thought. With a crouching gait he makes for the cover crop never to be seen again. No pins [pieces of shot-off deer hair], no blood, he literally disappeared.
I go back to waiting for a while I sit and think, for a while I just sit. There’s a gun shot in the distance and my hopes rise that The Sailor has closed the deal on his first outing.

It fully light when a third Muntjac appears at 57m a juvenile pre-antlered male, stoops to look around, and catches a round, dropping like a bag of wet sand right on the spot. If I recover them all I’m now out of freezer space so I pop the magazine and await the chaps arrival.

The feeder at the edge of the crop field is a measured 87m the furthest pale dot on the track is Muntjac No.3 at 57m


I took all the measurements with the nicest affordable range finder I've seen so far. Its by Pro Wild and is now under a 100 on both sides of the pond.

20 minutes later the boys appear. Yes they saw deer, no they didn’t shoot any of them, they too heard the shot, but they didn’t hear my shots. Mr 7mm pulls his ghillie face when I tell him the first one has vamoosed, so I get to pull my told-ya-so face when I recover her from the first gap in the hedge she could have chosen. With no ‘pins and paint’ on the ground its all looking a bit inconclusive for shot number two. There’s nothing. We spend most of an hour having a good tromp around, the cover is very thick and my doubts are growing by the minute. We gralloch and set off for the traditional stalkers breakfast

There is little to report from the afternoon session, my arrival startled a herd of Fallow does in a field Mr 7mm doesn’t have permission to shoot over, and with a .223 I didn’t have the necessary firepower for them. Hare weren’t on the list so i watched a medium sized one bound around through my binos and trudged back across the plowings glad once again to have bought the wand-like mini Mauser.

From the car I message our Alaskan corespondent, the blogger known as Hodgeman, telling him I’d finally been able to close the deal, Alaska is well outside the top of the Muntjac’s northern range [its probably Northern Ireland] so he’s interested to hear about our 365 day a year season and their petite size.

‘Moose birth calves bigger than that!’

On the way home:
I’ve struggled the sports bag full of deer on to a station trolly and with my rifle across my back I’m pushing it like a fat boy with sciatica though the station when I’m hailed by one of a posse of teenage boys.
“Is that your gun? Have you been shooting?”
There’s no ignoring him and his out of town accent means he’s unlikely to be too much of a problem.
I laugh “No its my boss’s Bass, I cant even play”
“You ain’t dressed for playing the Bass”
I catch sight of myself in a reflection, I’m wearing muddy wellies, and blood splattered stalking clothes.
He has a point. I put my finger to my lips, wink and waddle away a bit faster.

Your pal
SBW

Stalking Fallow With The 7mm08

A couple of weekends back I managed to get out of town for the weekend to go stalking with 

Mr7mm on the flatlands of the east coast. Viewed from the train the farms are divided into lots of neat rectangles of expensive fencing. Horse country. Up there its Fallow and Muntjac, the Fallow being more pressured never really get that big, the Muntjac being perfectly sized for living in the margins of these hobby farms are everywhere. I prize Muntjac as an eating deer, but there's not much to them, so only the most committed restaurant chef would put them on the menu, the work-to-meat ratio will never compare well to putting a Fallow in the chiller.  

The season has been so mild in the south of England its been more a very long autumn than an actual winter. Inevitably  the weekend we'd chosen had been the tipping point and the frost had given the ground a crunch with even some former puddles now ice lying in the shade. Mr7mm has some highseats but this is to be stalking on foot. As usual significantly over dressed I wobble along behind him glassing as we go. 

The site Mr7mm has chosen is that great classic stalking ground, where the woodland edge provides a browse-line and a wide ride / narrow meadow gives lots of visibility, under the pylons and power lines. The sun is behind us, and across the clear cut,  falls warming the browsing opportunity. Within a few minutes a Muntjac Doe ambles out of the wood to take the evening air. Before I can get into position she's off back into the wood. About 400m to our right a a mixed-sex group of Fallow silhouette against the evening traffic. We wait, birds sing, traffic whooshes, the power line's buzz and the occasional boom of a bird scarer. The far Fallow disappear from view. We wait. But not for long. Two Fallow Does pop out of the trees directly opposite us, even nearer than where the Muntjac had been standing. This isn't the frenzied snap shooting of highland stalking, we have all the time in the world. The deer munch a bit, chew a bit, and munch a bit. We too have time to chew over which to shoot, there's little difference in size or range. Once a Doe pauses for a few seconds longer than usual presenting a perfect opportunity Mr7mm gives the word and I drop her two steps from where she caught the round.

In the time it takes for the firm handshake [no whooping or high-fiveing - we are in England after all] the mixed-sex group reappears milling around not 50m from the dead Doe. They seem totally oblivious to the gun shot. It turns out they are acclimatised to the continual bang of the bird scarer during daylight hours. The Fallow have moved on a bit so Mr7mm gives his scope turret a twist and with a muffled crack drops the Buck to the ground. 

 The guys I've done most of my stalking with are very committed to simplicity and use fixed power scopes with simple reticles. Mr7mm has one of those Swarovski's with the turrets so you can move the scope to range by twisting to one of three pre-set markers on the turret. Very impressive bit of kit, with that little bit of extra light transmission and the red dot instead of a reticle, it was just that little bit easier to get on target in the dying half hour of the daylight. Very nice bit of kit, but literally the price of a NEW Blaser. Yikes! Amongst other 7mm rifles Mr7mm shoots today its a SAKO 85 in 7mm08 with 120gr bullets, doing just over 3,000fps and what a great set up it is. With the combination of; lightweight bullets, the moderator, the 85's stock design, and several layers of clothing, the load recoils so lightly its not far off shooting a really light .22LR. Colour me impressed.

The following morning we make another outing to a different piece of ground, where we see a spectacular opportunity for a Muntjac Buck, which sadly doesn't end up happening. It's called Hunting not Shopping. At our next stop we get a perfect broadside on a Fallow Doe. Which somehow I mange to shoot through the liver. We skirt round the hedge she's hidden behind and Mr7mm hastens her end with a head shot. Slightly deflated from where the day before's text book shot had left my confidence I except Mr7mm's offer of some of his sausages, and burgers, and with plans for the afternoon back in the smoke I head for home. We've not set a date, but one day I will return to the flat lands in search of that freezer full of Muntjac, and while I'm at it I'll get him to give me a few pointers on sausage making. Dude's got skills.

More soon

Your pal

SBW

For more about the 7mm08 Remington you can read Hodgeman's thoughts HERE

DeerStalking: The Search For Muntjac

 Trigger jerk: and it's sighted 1 sq high at 100 yards!

Shooter: "I've got some stalking! and one of my radiators won't get hot. What    should I do?"
SBW: You had me from stalking, I'm on my way

Because this report comes to you from the real world, not from the fantasy land where rich plumbers exercise their R8's on their way to exercise their R8's mid-week, it was more like "I'll be there soon, to soon-ish, early next month, or how's the month after that for you?" Eventually the day dawned, the radiator got hot, Mr Mercedes joined us and we set off for an evening stalk.

As usual we were plagued by bad omens and incompetence:

Shooter (driving): coming up on the left there's a field with a herd of Fallow, every time I go past, if they are there, I dont get a deer.
SBW and Mr Mercedes: Groan
Shooter: Look! loads of them!
Mr Mercedes: Groan
SBW: Jinx

The ground is a 300 acre walled (but not gated) estate to the north east of London, in an area we'll call Campo de Muntjac. It's home to some Roe and lots of Muntjac. The chaps who run the outfit are very friendly and funny lets call them The Keeper and his pal The Rumbler.

On a short drive across the we startled a small deer, and as we set up the shooting bench we disturbed a Roe. Hmm maybe we've swerved the jinx?

On the estates you're required to prove your proficiently with a rifle before stalking, on your first visit if you weren't asked to I'd take it as a sign of a poorly run outfit. At Campo de Muntjac they have a 100 yard range. Its traditional to make disparaging remarks about ones accuracy and eyesight before shooting. There'll be a good natured understatement competition, and you take your place at the bench. In the US I've been handed a rifle with the words "its hot and ready to rock" in the UK I just cant imagine anyone doing that. The Rumbler set his Howa up on the bags bolt closed on an empty chamber and I took my place at the bench, Mr Mercedes had already shot his super tight group and Shooter was telling The Keeper that I'm a famous blogger, no pressure then.

My sighter was within the 'ring of death' so I ploughed on with the second a definite improvement, the third looked better at first sight but is actually a square low as The Rumbler has sighted his rifle one high at 100 yards

As usual in england while the whole thing is deadly serious, due to our laws against earnestness no one can acknowledge that. As my group had tightened with each shot the guys were well satisfied and proceeded to regale me with the traditional tales of the German/Scandawegen/American who was here last week/ month who was SO bad even thought his rifle/scope cost SO much. Formalities out of the way we split up to take our seats, Mr Mercedes saw another Roe as he was taking his place.


As The Rumbler and I were setting off, who should reappear but our pal Shooter or "bolt-less" as he's also known. Made it all the way to his seat, without the bolt for his Remy. How we laughed.

Our highseat was pretty luxurious, it even had a roof. The Rumbler and your pal settled down to watch the wildlife, after a while there came a strange rumbling sound, like a brewery really. I ignored the first few but after a while I started to snigger and looked round, The Rumbler, for it was he, looked almost apologetic for a moment, but the couldn't keep a straight face either. Much sniggering ensues.

SBW: Are you hungry?
The Rumbler: I ate before I came out
SBW: Have some Chorizo it might settle your stomach

Our picknick was interrupted by the sound of a Muntjac's bark, and coming towards us too! We both glassed and glassed, I offered up a few prayers but Mr Muntjac decided against visiting our clearing and buggered off.

Shooting light faded fast and it was time to make for home. The Rumbler worked the bolt, so we could exit the highseat with an empty chamber and fumbled the round which promptly slipped between the slats of the highseat's floor. I've done this before and I cant tell you how delighted I was to see someone else make the same mistake (mine bounced off the metal rung of the ladder and The Bambi Basher was without mercy in his mockery).

As The Keeper arrived he was greeted with the sight of our butts in the air as we searched the grass under the seat for the dropped round.

The Keeper: You two look as though you're having fun
The Rumbler [pointing at his stomach] Its been awful, terrible rumblings
SBW: I had to give him some of my sausage
The Keeper:  Whoah! too much information!

More soon
SBW

PS be sure to check out Shooter's blog HERE

Deer Hunting In The UK Pt7

Pricket skulls found in the woods

A chap, we'll call him HunterX, wrote to me a few weeks ago, said he was a reader and invited me to go stalking with him.
We to'd and fro'd over the email and finally his commitments match up with my commitments and we ended up at this weekend, the tail-end of the Fallow buck season. So once again; I set off to meet a man, an armed man, I met on the internet, in the woods.

Escape Velocity

Over the phone - [shouting, not at each other but just to be heard over the din of older brother tormenting younger sister in background]

SBW: Can I take the kids out on Sunday instead? I'm going away on Saturday
Ex Mrs SBW: Excellent! Where are you taking them?
SBW: I can't take them! I'm going deer stalking!
[Sound of The Littlest Bushwacker wailing in the background]
Ex Mrs SBW: She's crying because you won't take her deer stalking
SBW: [laughing] That's why she can't come deer stalking, and her legs are too short

We agree to meet at 4am for the two hour drive to his stalking ground, and what a stalking ground. An estate that borders a national park, four species of deer, lots of small game, and a 200 yard rifle range.

My Host HunterX

On the way there the temperature drops and it stars to rain, perfect weather in other words. Our arrival turns out to be auspicious, I've always been taught that an unloaded rifle is just a stick, so load-up as soon as you get out of the truck because your first [or only] chance might be in the first few yards. Hmm yes. This time the first chance was a very chubby Grey Squirrel waiting for us on the estate side of the gate. Air rifle still in truck, 17HMR missing magazine, .308 not really what you'd call a Squirrel calibre, .22LR finally hauled out from under the other cases only for HunterX to miss at, well he called it ten yards but more about his range estimation later.

Woodland Stalking in southern England

Much sniggering ensues as we stalk up into the woods, long 'rides' separate blocks of woodland. Mist clings to the ground, it couldn't look more 'woodland stalking' if it tried. A shootable Roe Buck scoots across the ride we're walking on, head down, and intent on something other than evading us. 

The next opportunity is also a squirrel. We're neatly concealed by some coppiceed Beech trees and the Grey Menace is cavorting on a fallen tree, I crawl into what looks to be child's-play range and send a .22 sleeping pill straight over his head, he doesn't stick around for me to take another shot. Honor looking decidedly sketchy on both sides we retreat to the range.

Not too shabby - for 50 yards!

HunterX was curious about PCP air rifles and had asked me to bring the Parker Hale Phoenix .177 which acquitted itself admirably even out at 50 yards! - i.e + 60% of its effective range. In case you're wondering, yes at that distance the time between 'phut' and 'dink' is a long one!

We worked our way up through the calibres, the .22 first shooting a one inch group which then expanded to a four inch group. Phew! We we're now both able to blame the equipment.

That was a LOUD one! The 17HMR split a case

50 yards is a long way with an air rifle, and 

200 yards is a long way in anybody's book!

Parker Hale .308 - within 4.5in. at 200 yards and within 2in at 100 yards. 

My suburban air rifle practice is starting to make a difference!

Note: Plywood is not an effective backstop

Remarkably, despite the range being 'well used', deer and fox trails cross the range, and both have been taken there.

Perhaps this would be a good place to set a snare?

 Who's House? Mr Fox's House!

Mid Morning

We took a break for an amazing 'full english' breakfast and enough coffee to wake the dead, before dedicating the afternoon to bunnies. 

At the bottom one of the woods we had a great view of some dairy fields which the bunnies were busy mowing. I've never been very good at estimating range, in fact I'm so bad at it that you'd never get me to venture an opinion, having learned my lesson on one one of our trips to Jinx Wood, where The Bambi Basher had shown me the strange optical effect of 'dead ground' when a hidden dip in the terrain can double the perceived distance. HunterX is a very encouraging sort of chap, "I really think it would help if you were ten yards closer" he said. 

Gralloch

At the bottom of the wood we found this Gralloch, as any of the estate stalkers would either have buried it or used it for fox bait HunterX took this as evidence of poachers being there probably less than a week before us

Holding our noses we crawled into a gully which gave us a discrete position to snipe at the Rabbits from, a position which sadly was well outside the .177 Phoenix's range, when after several misses we paced it out, turned out to be some 45 yards beyond the air rifles effective range. HunterX "thanks you've cured me of the temptation to buy an expensive air rifle" 

Some more up-hill-and-down-dale stalking led us back across the estate, we did make sight of a fat Muntjac doe doing a very credible Usain Bolt impression, but no shot was taken. All the walking had

renewed our appetites and we enjoyed forced down the worst Kebab and Cheese burger yet seen before heading to the high seats to try to catch the fallow having their evening meal. On the way we went to see a field outside the permission where this group of 70-80 Fallow were herding, Does, this years fawns and last years yearlings all being bossed about by a one antlered buck. HunterX reckoned he's soon be chased off by a master buck come the rut.

A bossy buck shoo's does into one group and fawns and yearlings into the other

A field of Fallow bait - but no Fallow 

Highseat hunting is always colder than I remember it, as the light started to turn a cool breeze chilled me to the bone. The crop field looked promising but no deer came, at one point a Hare so big that on first sight I thought it was a Muntjac hopped past, but I didn't think the .308 would leave much worth eating so I turned down the shot, and as the light soon faded I walked back to the truck. HunterX smiled ruefully

HunterX: "I guess I put you in the wrong highseat, I saw two prickets you could have shot, sparing with each other"

SBW: That's why its called 'hunting' and not 'shopping'

All in all a fantastic day afield, massive thanks to my host HunterX, one of the good guys.

More soon

Your pal

SBW