Hunting
A midwinter surprise
Jonny Christie goes hunting in the snow and offers some advice for safe, enjoyable winter hunting
When I was younger I had this American computer game called Big Game Hunter. On the screen you could shoot bears, moose, deer, cougars and all sorts. It gave me that hunting fix until the weekend would roll around and I could go hunting for real. The game let you track animals or sit in a stand and you could even follow an animal’ s footprints in the snow until you caught up with it.
“… I had never seen really fresh prints in the snow.”
I’ m used to seeing fresh sign when out hunting but I had never seen really fresh prints in the snow. Usually they’ re old, round hollows that have been there for days. I had always wanted to follow prints in the snow, and catch up to an animal just like in big game hunter.
My girlfriend Georgi and I don’ t normally get the same time off work but there was this one July weekend that we did, and we planned this trip weeks in advance. As the date came closer, the weather forecast became worse. Up until the day we left there were extreme weather warnings: torrential rain, thunderstorms and snow.
But the final day was looking good. We didn’ t have the same time off again for months so this was our only chance. The spot where we were planning to go required no major
Jonny enjoying stretching his legs on the second night during a short break in the weather
river crossings so we thought we’ d just go for it and sit the weather out if need be, as we had a few days up our sleeves.
With the food shopping done and packs packed we headed off and in
There’ s not much colour in the bush during a snowfall. It’ s mostly black and white but that means a deer stands out better when you do see one.
NZ Hunting & Wildlife 196- Autumn 2017 13