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Click Here to Read the 2009 Newsletter
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Hunting Report Southern
Hemisphere -
March to July 2009 Yet another successful hunting season safely behind us. It is now July and mid winter. The stags are finding somewhere warm and safe in a secluded spot. The Tahr are finally happy as they are knee deep in snow high in the mountains. 2009 was an interesting season for us. Plenty of quality animals again a great team of guides and the 2 Sue’s keeping us extremely well feed and organised. One thing was certain, we now know we are in a recession, this time last year we were looking at the dire signs and wondering what the effects would be on us all. Now we know the effects and thankfully have accepted a few changes in our lives and moved right along. Now we can all get back to being positive about our lives again. 2009 for us was our break through year for the European hunters. For too long I have been ignoring Europe, the US supplied us with a steady and willing list of bookings. By good planning and luck, several pieces of our marketing jigsaw fell into place and all my apprehension about language barriers and hunting heritage proved totally unfounded. Right from the first hunt of the season when Robert arrived in on 10 March from Austria with his bow for a Tahr hunt everything began to come together perfectly. To start the season with a 12” Bull Tahr to the bow was awesome. My season was made right there and then, thanks Robert. There is a message here for our archery hunters that have aspirations for Tahr, came early. Why? Because the Bulls are still down on the summer grazing, in bachelor groups, with lots of daylight and cover to hunt in. Sure, you will not get the big heavy capes of late season hunts but that’s what Taxidermists are for – supplying winter capes. Our hunting country is way better suited to February to April bow hunts for Tahr. We still have a Tahr hunt to complete in August so the figures are not complete on successful harvest. A couple of stag hunters that took day trips up to Tahr country know exactly what to expect when they return for Tahr in a couple of years time. Everybody else that booked in for Tahr took a nice trophy Bull. No monsters this year but still managed to average 12”. Our bow hunters had a very successful season with 5 stags from 5 hunts. Rusty got to experience a couple of successful bow hunts as he guided Steve and Dave onto good Stags. Robert added a nice Stag to his Tahr and Mark and I took a huge old Stag with the bow. Tom, Meredith and I put a lot of sneaks in on a big 10 x 9 Stag that Tom arrowed ,then used his good judgement as we needed to finish the job with the rifle. With all our bow hunts, the rifle is carried as a back up, and in certain circumstances the rifle is used if we deem it necessary. With no specific bow season we can legally do this Most of our archery shots were 30-40m that out to 45 yards, very doable. As any bow hunter knows shot placement is the big issue, if you are not comfortable with shot, don’t take it, we will get you the right shot just do yourself a favour and take the shot when it is there. Stags at Glen Dene our “home” hunting area were again outstanding. Seems they improve a tad every year This season was marked by the high number of 20-25 point animals, due mainly I believe to our wet warm spring. I have never seen so much good grass and clover on the hunting country. Good feed equals good antler growth. 18 top trophies taken this season. The Fallow hunting at Glen Dene also produced some great trophies. Several times during Stag hunts our hunters took the opportunity to shoot some great Bucks. Only down side of this is that our West Otago property was under utilized as a result. I don’t think Gary or Milton minded that at all. Have to say that my hunt with Gary and Rex at the West Otago property was amazing. Talk about the right time at the right place. To be 70-90m from several big Fallow Bucks in full rut carolling Fallow Does was one of those “moments” we do not get to experience all that often. Saw some awesome bucks during our 2 short hunts at Smaill’s property – next year!! We are also happy to say our Chamois hunting went 100% for the season. For us that is a major achievement. The time and effort involved to securing a trophy Chamois is a lot, so thank you to Heinz, Brian, Philip, Juan and Guillermo. Bookings for 2010 are very good and well ahead of previous years at this time. We have got the right animals, great properties and good guides. Our Landowners, as always do there utmost to work in with us. The house/lodge combination worked extremely well once again. We are due any day to start a building project that will see an additional 78 sq m of space available next season. We are building a separate office/sleep out that will give us 7 bedrooms and 5 bathrooms for next season. Have our plans all in place for SCI Reno 2010 and looking forward to seeing a lot of our US friends and clients in January. We will be located at Booth 2929. Just as a matter of interest our hunters this season came from Canada (2), Austria (1), Germany (4), Denmark (3), Norway (2), Spain/Majorca (3), USA (9), New Zealand (2). This was a truly international flavour and another very enjoyable hunting season. Thank you all. G.T To view the Trophies please visit our Hunting Photos page
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