Another weekend was organised that we could attend the usual haunt near Mitchell & things were locked in.
We left straight after work on Friday & drove until we reached a familiar spot on the side of the road where we had pulled up to camp once before. In the swag a tick after 10:30 & snoring in no time. The wind was strong & gusty most of the night, but it didn't faze me one little bit.
I woke early & grabbed a couple of pics as the sun graced our presence, before making enough noise for Grom to get the hint I was keen.
Not too long after, we were pulling up at the shearers shed, unpacking the ute & settling in. Lyle wondered over to greet us, letting us in on the where & when everything was hiding. Not much sign for the pigs, but that was ok, we were in search of goats anyway.
My main objective for this trip was to get Grom a kill with the bow, if not a couple. With that we kitted up, checked the bows over & headed for the area we thought was going to be our best chance would be.
Grom had his newly acquired Bear Buck master 3000 compound bow, kitted out with all his new bits & pieces he had acquired recently. While I had chosen to hunt with my new Gringa Long bow that was hand crafted with nothing short of Love by a top bloke (Thanks again Rod). I have named her the Red Belly Black stick as she was built with a strong Brazilian bloodwood handle, with black glass front & back on the limbs. I had been having trouble with getting timber arrows flying to my liking, so I was hunting with some carbons fletched with bright pink feathers to hopefully help me find them if they headed stray. The carbons had come in a little light for weight, so I had fitted some secret arrow weight increaser to them to get the up around the 650 grains. It is amazing what one can come up with when needed, I am not sure if fitting clothes line cord wrapped in teflon to quiet it down inside the shaft, is highly looked upon, but it did its job & worked damn well & they flew great.
We had soon reached our destination in the ute & the time for walking was here, off we went & things were looking good, a bit of sign so close to the road was a good thing. My hopes were high & enthusiasm was good. The wind was blowing a good 30 knots & I was glad I wasn't fishing. But although the wind was so strong, it was very inconsistent, swinging some 90 degrees at times, not to mention dropping out & sucking your scent back when you really didn't need it.
We stumbled into an open area & we discussed a few tactics & I mentioned your hat is over there somewhere Grom, a few laughs about the last trip & we headed around to some cover. The next thing I know we are 25m from a small young mob with them not really have spotting us. I give Grom a few instructions & sent him on his way. Nothing short of overzealous, his arrow shot way wrong & spooked them off. I sent them on his way again into the scrub after them, very close to where I sent him last trip when he lost his hat. Things didn't go to plan & he was trying to fish a broad head out of a log when I caught up with him next.
I think they have headed over here Grom ---->
Yer No worries, you go find them & I will get this out of here.
So off I toddled, not really sure if I was going to find them, then I spotted them, my heart was racing as I spent a good 40 minutes getting into 25 metres. I sat & watched them for a while, I figured it would give them time to settle & me time to calm myself & get the head right. I ran a couple of pics off with the trusty Canon 40d sporting the 75-300 D.O. lens. Pics aren't the best as I didn't want to get busted, so I was shooting through the tree I was hiding behind.
With the pics in the bag, it was obvious they were not coming my way , so I started the gut sliding snake like crawl through the grass in an attempt to get closer. Reaching the 15m mark things were looking good. Then it happened, the barking cough of a nanny spotting something that wasn't Kosher. I laid dead still for what must have been 10 -15 minutes, before watching a few of them graze to the other side of some shrubs losing interest in this weird looking log that caught their attention. With the Grey/Blue young Billy I had my eye on now being far from out of range, I shifted my attention to a Brown nanny that was shading herself under a tree. I crept in to 15 metres once again & rose to my knees, drew the mighty Red Belly Black back to anchor & let her go.
The high tech carbon had flown Straight & true from the Traditional long bow although seeing the arrow embedded in a log behind her caught me off guard. In an instant I had another arrow knocked & on its way, once again flying true hitting her damn close to where I could now see blood coming from near her shoulder. Not have taken an animal with the long bow, I was expecting to have the arrow stay in the beast, not get 2 complete pass throughs, needless to say she stumbled only metres before laying her head down for the last time.
I was stunned, I was excited, I was proud, I was so many things, then it hit me...... ****. I was supposed to be getting Grom a kill. I was then a little embarrassed that I had just spent the last couple of hours on a self indulged Trad kill. With that I called Grom on the uhf & we met up for photo's & congratulations, he was not fazed I had taken the kill, if anything, he was just as stoked as I about my 1st trad kill, although calling me a smart **** in there somewhere. We set on, with me now more determined than ever to help Grom reach his goal.
Off we went, every step being as quiet as if we were in full stalk mode, after the last effort where we nearly stood on them before we seen them, we were taking it easy as we could while covering ground as quick as we could.
An hour or so later we were on t another small mob. Grom's head filled with as much useful information I could cram into 30 seconds & he was way.
Where the hell is he going ? I thought. I watched him walk straight upwind & scare them all away. he walked back & didn't realise what he had done. We discussed what happened & he had soon realised he had been so focused on the goats & where the next tree was, he didn't even give the wind another thought. With that lesson learnt we kept on moving. Picking up another mob not to far away, the wind was not in our favour so some back tracking had us in a prime position & with me hiding in the bush's with the Canon again, Grom set about his stalk.
Now this pic is not the best, I had to rush it as Grom drew back & caught me off guard. This very arrow was to bring about his 1st Bow Kill.
With the shot being a little far back, he soon followed it up with a 2nd arrow & he had his 1st Bow Killed goat.
Grom waiting for the rest of the mob to move off so he can claim his prize.
With congratulations all around, photo's were taken & a happy little Grom was keen to move on to the next.
With a quick bite we were off again. We were soon on to another larger mob as they passed through on their way to what we could only figure was to bed down before the weather turned bad.
We quickly assessed the situation & Grom slipped into position for an ambush, for one reason or another they took a wider birth from his location, he waited patiently for his opportunity & took it with both hands when it arose.
1 arrow, from 15m & this little Billy didn't go more than 2 metres before he was down & out. He may not have been the big beast we all dream of, but he was sure as hell taken just the way we all picture it. Down & out in under 5 seconds. A job very well done & Grom was as happy as a bow hunter could be.
We then went back to camp ..................... lol...... As if.
We continued on as we may have cut the mob, but there was still some more grazing on the edge of the trees further up. We got the wind right & we were off, Grom had a couple on the deck, so it was time for me to let the mighty Red Belly Black have some fun.
I got busted on a couple of young Billy's, but they soon moved on without disturbing the rest, so i moved across a road & into some Wattle sprigs which were in full flower. I had 3 billy's with mid 30" spreads on offer, I shuffled & crawled my may to within 10 metres. I was so close, yet so far, the same wattle sprigs offering me uncompromised cover were also offering my 3 prize Billy's the same in return, with all 3 having their vitals covered. I brought my time & stayed put, I had nannies & kids come within 2-3 metres of me. My heart was doing over time again. I waited it out & they soon grazed away a few metres allowing me room to get to my knee's & draw, the shot was 10 metres or under, I had this covered, it was well within my comfort zone, the nice billy was slightly quartering away. Nothing could stop this now..... With that I released the might of the 60lb Red Belly black. It was all in slow motion, as I released the arrow, the 30 knot winds gusted again & I watch a sprig of wattle come in to my perifial vision. What seemed like the longest arrow to leave the shelf, I watched the sprig tough the nock end of my arrow kicking it sideways. the arrow was now just a tumbling piece of carbon heading in the general direction of my prize. I watched as my arrow slapped my billy on the head, not harming him at all, but may have scared the **** out of him. With that the mob was off & I was left kneeling there wondering what could have been. I tried to follow them up across the open, but I was beat, they had me picked & they were not offering me a 2nd chance.
I returned to Grom with my tail between my legs to tell him of my tail of woes, but he had watched it all unfold. Although not realising the sprig was my down fall. We moved on, although not far as the threatening skies soon followed up on what they had been trying to achieve for a couple of hours. The ass fell out of the sky, we must of had a couple of inches of rain as we slip slided our way back to the ute. Game trails & bush tracks looked more like rapids & rivers. It is a long walk in the pouring rain, it takes you all day to get out there & the solid couple of hours walk in the rain back seams to never end. But we made it & were soon dry & warm back at the shearing shed with a beer in hand kicking back & talking about the day's events. We may have lost a couple of hours to weather, but we wouldn't have changed the day for quids.
Sunday as here & we were off, not much to speak of really, we took a couple of young nannies & billy's for dog meat, although not to many pics of this. The camera was a little wet after the rains of the previous day, so I chose to leave it at camp & only take the small point & shoot, which soon ran out of batteries.
Grom still had the trusty Bear in hand I had switched to the Hoyt maxxis for a bit longer range for the day.
We snapped a couple of pics of a Kangaroo that had obviously hit the fence doing some speed close to warp 6.
The bone beside that roo suggests he wasn't the first to do this
We were soon in search of one of Grom's arrows, when we heard a goat bleat from not too far.
So I poked my head over the bush to have a look, there was a little billy milling around about 120m or so away from us, so I thought I would have a go at trying to call it in. To our surprise the next 15 minutes was thoroughly enthralling as I called him into under 10 metres as I was at full draw as he walked around behind the bush I was hiding behind. He was completely un aware of Grom just sitting out in the open. As I rolled him over we were surprised by the very ugly almost sickening set of infected testicles it had.
The last 2 pics we took before we ran out of batteries. Apart from his deformed privates, he was a cracking little billy, he was almost perfectly symmetrical, even black coat with even white ears, even white socks up to his knees & an even white belly. Unusual I thought.
His odd under carriage
Another top weekend, we got the monkey off Grom's back & had a ball doing it, the trip home had its interest as well. with the rain causing some flooding which had us waiting for bridges to be opened & some quick & heavy braking as we rounded corners to find 30 foot wide streams of water flowing over the road.
But as usual, a good time was had & things went well hunting wise. We had a lot of time to observe the younger mobs this trip, so it was a good learning trip as well.
Top trip & let's bring on the cape in October.
Thanks for reading.
