Andrew Bishop- Pheasant Hunting
Here is a trip we did at the end of the Bay of Plenty game bird season to get you wing shooters excited about chasing cock pheasants in 2012!
As the sun rose on the Sunday of closing weekend for pheasants in the Bay of Plenty, the ute was loaded with three dogs (2 Labradors and 1 Weimaraner) and four shooters bound for a private farm near Taupo.
This trip has become an annual pilgrimage for Tom and myself, however this year with bird numbers reported to be in excess we invited two more shooters.
After checking in with the farm manager we slowly navigated our way via farm races to the flats at the back of the farm. As we came over the crest of a hill two cock pheasants were feeding in the newly sown grass on the flats around 200 metres away. They quickly scurried into the mature trees of a planted gully splitting the recently cropped paddocks.
The boys were jumping around like kids in a candy store upon seeing this activity as we new we were in for a good day!
With four shooters and three dogs we put two shooters in the gully and a shooter each flanking each side with dogs working furiously through the undergrowth. It was obvious there were a lot of birds in the area due to the dogs excitement and lack of ability to follow one trail. Multiple scents confuse the dogs as to the exact movements of the birds.
However it was not long until a running cock pheasant had no where to hide with the two labs aggressively hunting around one patch of gorse, with two shooters poised, the pheasant flushed and immediately quartered away from me, without hesitation a shot was fired and the cock bird replaced breakfast bread for lead! A short retrieve in an open paddock ensured for “boy” my chocolate labrador. At one and half years old and his first pheasant shoot there was no hesitation bounding after the dropped bird, however he did take his time to retrieve, mouthing the bird a few times.
As we made our way through well planted gullies, a fenced wetland with folded flax and grass proved to be the mecca. It was obvious this is where the pheasants were roosting and by the looks a healthy number of birds to boot! Surely birds were not far away. With think undergrowth the dogs had to get beneath the foliage to get results. Toms pointer soon locked on and the labs were unleashed only to present a flurry of hen pheasants, one after another they banked away down the gully. If only they were cocks!
My friend Aaron had a new under and over and this was his first pheasant shoot so he was fizzing at the chance of shooting a pheasant. That afternoon he proved his worth. Toms dog had chased a runner into poplar lined drain, shooters at the ready out popped a fat cock bird being dragged down by the length of his tail, he rose sharply and banked across me, with the bead on his sweed I pulled the trigger only to hear click! Then bang from Aaron! My bolt was not shut properly on my semi auto which presented Aaron the prize bird of the day!
The day soon progressed with each shooter bagging atleast two cock birds each. With limits of 5 cock pheasants per person, our total bag limit was 20 birds, however we had no desire to shoot this many. We finished the day with 10 cock birds which is an outstanding shoot by most peoples standard.
I personally have never seen so many birds on one farm other then beating at a pheasant preserve! Hens were in abundance which bodes well for future years here. Happy hunters and dogs resulted!
Andrew Bishop – Goose Hunt
With Canadian Geese now on the pest list and able to be hunted all year round, hunters can now reap the rewards!
After a phone call from a dairy farmer complaining about geese destroying his paddocks, a reconasince mission was put in place.
The key to any goose shoot is doing your homework. You need to find out what paddocks the geese are targeting, is there are particular crop they are eating or just grass? Is there a pattern to their behaviour such as following maize silage being feed to the cows as this will determine where you setup your blinds and decoys.
However the most crucial information is finding out what time the geese are coming in, morning or night or are they sitting overnight. During the months around February and March the new geese are small and are trying to bulk up for winter and generally feed twice a day.
In our case the birds were eating chicory in two paddocks close to a lake in the Waikato. They were sitting overnight, so we needed to push them off the night before we chose to shoot.
Last weekend when the weather bomb was due to hit we pushed around 250 geese off, setup the blinds and decoys facing down wind in anticipation of the next days shoot.
With rain and 100km hour plus winds forecast my XTR jacket and pants were essential. Being summer I only needed one other layer, my micro fleece Ascend Top which provided the warmth when raining and wicking ability when the sun came out.
As the sun rose, the boys were all hidden in their layout blinds awaiting the excitement of the 1st flight. Around 7am the first mob of geese lifted from the lake and tracked straight toward our setup, with a stiff wind blowing in their face they stayed low all the way to the decoys. With goose callers honking and a couple of quick waves of the flag, the geese were set for landing! The geese tried to land just short of the blinds, however 10 geese were no match for 5 guns. Everyone picked their birds and demolished them!
Just as the boys were picking up the birds, another flight appeared on the horizon….but this time a bigger mob. Rushing back to the blinds just in time 15 geese descended on our decoys to 5 x 5 shot 12 gauge semi automatic shotguns! Two birds made it past the anchor man due to a malfuction, however with a quick honk they turned to see what had happened to their mates, only to suffer the same fate!
As quickly as the shooting turned on, the shooting stopped! Some days the geese never show, others you can not do anything wrong. 30 birds at 100% strike rate was nothing to write home about but certainly provided a lot of fun for the morning, especially for a friend of mine Matt, as it was his first goose shoot!
Andrew Bishop – The Coastal Lagoon
High hopes for were set for the next shoot following the mallard massacre on “The Willow Pond.” However with limited (next to zero knowledge of the area, we needed all the help we could get.
The local cocky apparently did a bit of pig hunting, so off to the wholesaler to get a bartering tool it was! A case of Speights later we were invited to shoot a private pond which comprised a man made “U” shape waterway fenced in the farm with a natural coastal lagoon dividing the farm from the sea.
On some vague instructions, the barry crump red Hilux loaded with decoys and layout blinds somehow stumbled upon the piece of water described to us over a few beers. On approach to the waterway we could hear ducks quaking, however it was coming from the coastal lagoon, not the massive man made pond.
Following the cocky’s advise that it shot better at night than morning, the call was made to jump shoot the coastal lagoon and wait for the night shoot, however this would be not be any old jump shoot!
Semis loaded and camera rolling, the three wise men snuck to the edge of the lagoon with hearts in our mouths to how many ducks would be sitting in the lagoon to which we had no idea even how big the lagoon was.
The first few ducks were spooked by our arrival and flew, bang, bang, bang…a serious of rounds were fired and birds were dropping quicker than one punch from Mike Tyson. However this first wave of fifty ducks was only the start!
Once you start you cant stop, birds were getting off in waves of fifty to one hundred! Semis were all unloaded at the mallards as they continued to fall out of sky. Five hundred ducks must have got off the coastal lagoon!
All the boys were speechless as we watched the sky turn black with birds heading out to sea. It looked light a swarm of bees! Luckily we were able to get a quick shot of the swarm….
Yes they are all ducks!
Yes they are all ducks!
After coming back down to earth from agreeing that was the most ducks we have ever seen let alone shot at, the mission was to find all the birds that were bombed to the ground. We accounted for 12 mallards for all the empty shells lying on the ground.
As the dark set in, along with a frosty due, ducks began to trickle back to the lagoon. With the wise men re-loaded, no duck stood a chance! We took our tally past 20 and called it a night, back to the fire.
Still buzzing from the site of so many ducks, we could only think what might have been if we were perched up in our layout blinds the morning those birds chose the coastal lagoon as their home for the day!
That night we decided to leave the lagoon for another day and try our luck on the river….
Andrew Bishop – The Willow Pond
At the close of duck shooting in the Waikato, 2 mates and myself headed for South Canterbury where their game bird season continues until the end of July. We were targeting mallards due to their limit of 50 per person per day, opposed to Waikato’s 6!
Armed with Benelli, Beretta and Baikal Semi Automatic 12 gauge shotguns, 35 gram Falcon 3’s and enough warm clothes make a polar beer sweat, all we needed was a place to shoot!
Day 1 dawned as a frosty -3 degrees. Gloves, balaclavas, XTR Pacstealth Pants and XTR Jacket were essential. Tried and tested in wet weather I was interested to see how effective the outer-shells would be in winds cold enough to freeze the proverbial off a brass monkey!
Arriving to the shadows of The Willow Pond, I was pleased I wore my Hunters Element jacket, not just for the warmth but the generous pockets for ammo and hand warmers! A great feature yet to see rivaled in other jackets would have to be the two lanyards connected to the inside of the chest pockets for my duck callers!
A bottle of beam as payment for the shooting on the pond ensured ducks were a plenty as we blazed away keeping the barrels hot and the ducks shot. Armed with enough duck callers, decoys and ammo to sink the titanic the tally soon passed 60.
As the sun broke through the cloud, the mallards had stopped decoying into our spread of flock head mallards to go and sit on the paddocks to fight the cows for the barley straw feed out by the dairy farmers.
So back to the farm house for lunch and a few beers to celebrate the 1st day shooting it was! After hanging the ducks and adrenaline still flowing a reconnaissance mission to determine the next days shooting was called. As the dark set in, thoughts changed to the prospect of tomorrows hunt -The Coastal Lagoon…
Stay tuned for the next hunt and video highlights from the whole trip!
Robert Wilson
Alex Broad
zanemirfin
James Morris
jamespearse
Bish
mickgibbo
Andrew Sturt
