I’ve been trying to make a point of hunting new areas for the last few years, and while this well-known South Canterbury valley is not new to me, I haven’t hunted there for 25 years, and that time I was using a rifle, so it still counts to me.
The feeling of being unarmed or less dangerous carrying a bow instead of a rifle has faded enough that I thought it’s time I had a proper crack at a tahr before I get too old. I’d shot a young bull on a Wallaby hunt a couple of years ago, but it wasn’t really what I’d consider tahr country.
So with a small weather window and favourable river levels, the dog and I headed south and inland. We bumped into a couple of keen young blokes from Southland who were walking out as we headed onto the riverbed; they’d drowned their quad in the river, lost and broken a heap of gear, carried on hunting anyway, and had an awesome trip , shooting some good bulls , only to find their quad missing when they returned. They’d seen plenty of animals, so things were looking up for me anyway.
After negotiating the riverbed for a few hours and testing some of my recovery equipment, I reached the first area I wanted to hunt. After 30 or 40 seconds of glassing from the truck, I’d spotted my first group of bulls for the trip, fairly low down the hill. This theme continued for the rest of the day. Even while I was transferring my gear into the hut, I could see tahr feeding on the face a few hundred meters above. Things were looking good!
After my usual relaxed start the next morning, I headed up the nearest gully, then cut out of the creek towards a set of bluffs above the hut. About halfway up, I started to see a few tahr here and there, so I climbed higher to get myself in a position to make a move on a small group of bulls that looked approachable; they were feeding on a spur between two large screes, I had to wait for them to move lower and then avoid spooking a large group of nannies on the opposite face two hundred metres away. Half an hour later, I was peeking over the spur where I’d last seen the bulls, only to see that they’d moved across the next scree and were now relaxing in the sun 125 metres away. I watched them for a while, hoping they might decide to feed back towards me again once the sun went down. They didn’t. So with the wind picking up and snow flurries blowing through, I headed back to the hut.
The next couple of days were spent in the hut with strong winds, heavy rain, and snow down to low levels. As the cloud moved in and out, I was spotting good numbers of tahr moving lower as the rough weather continued, much the same behaviour as their cousin, the feral goat.
Once the weather had eased and the creek had dropped enough for me to cross, I headed up the hill again. There was still light rain and sleet passing , and the mist was moving through now and then, but I could see enough. It wasn’t long, and I was above the tahr I’d seen from the hut that morning, which were now bedded out of the weather among the bluffs below me, like they’d been doing for the last few days. I spotted three young nannies bedded in the first gut I looked into, and immediately thought, “ Meat” I made a careful 32 metre shot, before I’d had time to think about why my arrow had barely grazed the now departing “Meat” the gut below me erupted with .ahr going in all directions.
A bull stopped below looking back from less than 20 metres, I aimed for his spine , knowing my arrow would pass through into his heart, and drop him on the spot. Seeing my arrow impact 2 inches left of where I’d aimed was more than a little confusing. While still a fatal shot, I now had to watch as my prize flew down the gut across a scree, to die on top of a bluff out of my reach.
The next morning, after a bit of tinkering, I found the culprit behind my random left-right misses, and we were back on track. I’d seen a bull, further up the valley, several days earlier, that I wanted to shoot, so I headed his way for the arvo. I spotted a group of bulls in the same area and started a fairly intense two-hour stalk up an open face to get into range. Halfway through the stalk, the bull that I was looking for appeared above me and started carefully making his way down in my direction.
Unlike his mates, who were casually feeding, this guy would stand and stare for ten minutes between short periods of eating speargrass flowers. It wasn’t till near dark that he started to relax, and I was able to close the gap, just in time as they were starting to move back into the bluffs for the night. I puffed and wheezed up the last little pinch to see him 60 metres above me on a little spur, I drew back settled my pin on his shoulder and he stepped over the spur out of sight, more puffing and wheezing and I was creeping over the spur where I’d last seen him, with my bow at full draw, expecting to see him at less than ten meters away. I was surprised to see him walking into a gut 40 metres off, I let down, quickly ranged where I thought he would step out, set my sight for 40, he stepped out on cue and stopped to eat his last mountain daisy. Deep breath, draw, anchor, settle the pin, forget the last shot you missed, pull through the shot and watch the arrow disappear just above his elbow, with a textbook pop sound of a good hit coming back to me.
I watched him fall into a steep little gutter, followed by a loud thump, as he landed at the bottom. It was nearly dark. I quickly raced over to retrieve my arrow, which, with some help from my dog, was pretty easy, then back down the hill to find a way in to where my bull was lying, a short climb down a small bluff and I had my bull, with enough light for a couple of glory pics and some butchery, I was on my way back to camp in the twilight.
As I was plodding back down the hill, trying to avoid falling into the abundant speargrass, it dawned on me that this was gonna be the first New Year that I’d seen in for a long time, and I couldn’t think of a better place I’d rather start 2026.
