Home Forums Hunting & Shooting General Big Game Back From My Latest Hunt

I've finally found a few minutes to write-up my most recent trip. I was thinking hard about heading back to BC to try a stunt cartridge on an elk hunt. However, I received an offer I couldn't refuse, from a great friend in Germany. So, I took to the air and went across the pond, to join up with our own Ready. He had guided me on a AK sheep hunt 2 years ago, and apparently was once again willing to tolerate my idiosyncrasies. (One of which, obviously, is snapping photos with my fat mouth full...)









After mailing over my credentials, and some passport photos, and a note from Mom, Ready had all my paperwork completed when I arrived. We began with a trip to the wurst stand, this being Germany, and all:









We then proceeded to the range to check zero on the Blaser R8 he was graciously providing, and to obtain certification from the resident Poobah that I wasn't an outright atrocious marksman.

I was most impressed with the facilities. They had a dining hall, a pro shop, and, of course, a bar. The shooting lanes had soundproofing panels on the walls and ceiling, and automated target holders. This Midwestern rube had never seen such a swank setup.







They even had a reminder of why I came over:








And so, after nearly 30 hours without sleep, I found myself in a shooting stand with my host. He'd arranged for permission with the local forester to hunt a honey hole not far from our quarters. Though we didn't score that evening, it was a great experience to be back on-stand.

The next morning found us in another stand, overlooking a couple of narrow shooting lanes. And two roe deer decided they wanted to be the ones to begin my hunt.









Not knowing roe deer from Adam, I was surprised to see that they very much resembled long-legged chihuahuas. Ready assured me, however, that they were indeed fine animals, and gave me a hearty, "Waidmannsheil!". I would come to hear the word many a time over the next week.

We brought the roe deer livers home, and took them directly to the skillet, where they made for a hearty breakfast.









In what seemed like no time at all, we were back in the stand for the evening hunt, where yet another roe deer presented itself:



[img]http://i225.photobucket.com/albums/dd77/jkubesch/IMG_4478_zps2e89698d.jpg[/img]



In the 25 minutes it took us to slink out of the stand and recover her, a #^%$! fox had decided to have a nibble at the exit wound hole.


The next phase of the trip was to join a group of 20+ other hunters for a fallow deer cull hunt in a large forest nearly 2 hours away. The vast majority of said hunters were forest service folks, who proved-out many of my preconceived notions about Germans having exacting standards for EVERYTHING they do. We were briefed about the goals of the culling, and the order in which the animals should be taken: spikes first, followed by calves, then mature females if no calves were present. I would come to find that they judged the shot placement, distance run by the animal, and quality of the field dressing for each animal. While it brought a lot of pressure at first, I came to embrace the challenge.

We were shown to our shooting house:



[img]http://i225.photobucket.com/albums/dd77/jkubesch/IMG_4479_zps3dd88027.jpg[/img]




And the first deer came in seemingly no time at all:



[img]http://i225.photobucket.com/albums/dd77/jkubesch/IMG_4483_zps7f67a9cd.jpg[/img]





Over the next 2 days, Ready and I waylaid 8 fallow deer and 1 roe deer, and the cull netted nearly 100. After each hunt, the cooler looked like this:



[img]http://i225.photobucket.com/albums/dd77/jkubesch/IMG_4484_zps01413df5.jpg[/img]



... continued...