Well I've been dreaming about this for a long time... my 1st trad hunt. What a weekend! 7 of us (5 compound shooters, myself with a longbow and 1 crossbow shooter) went off for our annual fallow deer hunt near Bedford in the Eastern Cape province of South Africa. All together we took 9 animals - 7 stags (6 recovered, 1 lost), one doe and one spiker over 3 days all walk and stalk, not bad going.
I only arrived there late on Friday afternoon and took what light was left to shoot a few practice shots. I took a lot of abuse and it was suggested to me that I rather hit the animal over the head with the bow because that was the only way I'd get an animal with a trad bow. Saturday morning I was in the veld around 6:30 and made my way up a road that runs above a dry river. I spotted a herd of fallow deer a few hundred meters across the dry river bed and made my way down. Long story short I ran out of cover but saw they were moving slowly upstream towards the river at an angle. I made my way back into the river bed and followed them up, 2 of them just beat me to their crossing spot but while one of the stags was attacking a tree on the opposite bank and the other stag that had entered the river walked upstream away from me, I managed to close the gap to about 20m. The stag that had walked up river now turned back and was making his way out towards the road side. I was ready and gave him a grunt, he stopped quatering away and I let the arrow fly. It went in just behind his left sholder and the broadhead lodged itself in the opposite shoulder. As he ran up the last portion of the bank I saw the arrow fall out and when he reached the top of the bank, he started to stumble. I heard him go down. At that stage the other stag that was attacking the tree now turned his attention to my stag and started attacking the now dead animal. He then came back down into the river bed where I could have taken him as well. I was happy with one animal and didn't need another. After about 15min I went to find my arrow which had broken off about 2" behind the insert but there was a lot of blood down the shaft. There was also blood on the ground where the arrow had hit him. He was lying not 25m from the place of impact. My animal was hanging by 9am and I was enjoying the cool shade in and around the house while the other guys were still climbing mountains in the worst heat carrying their heavy compound bows!
This animal will definately go down and the most exciting and memorable one I've ever taken, it will be very hard to beat my first animal taken with a trad bow.
Pronghorn takedown 55#@28"
CX Heritage 150 shaft, 100gr insert, 125gr Silverflame broadhead
Topic: Fallow deer (Read 3868 times)
