I’ve been missing my shots of late. I’d blame my rifle scope, but truth be told, the problem lies directly with me. As a shooter I go through phases – sometimes I’m Annie Oakley – sometimes I’m Aint Likely.
During the Aint Likely phase, I flinch and pull my shots – badly. Awareness is the first step towards self-improvement.
To this morning, and my first harvest opportunity is awkward. A standing shot, in terrible light. My target, a red hind, is aware I’m here and watches me, intrigued. Only when my bullet shatters a rock immediately to her right does she forgo her ticket and bolt out the back door – clown show over – for her and for me.
I continue, frustrated. Hoping against hope that another animal has not heard the wayward shot and that I might get another opportunity. It isn’t over till the fat lady sings, right?
Yeah, nah. Further on I feel a wind shift. That tiny tickle on the nape that deals a bitter blow.
Stubborn, and perhaps a bit stupid, I stalk on.
Several corners later there’s a back. A broad brown back, a hundred metres away and just off the track, so I crumple into the dust before rearranging myself and my kit.
Ready!
I peer through the scope, heart racing, certain that another backwash of breeze will alert the deer to my presence. Sure enough, it flings its head high and looks all about.
Me and Aint Likely begin a serious discussion – I tell her that she can feck right off – but she is tenacious, and with tentacles far-reaching.
Satisfied that there’s nought to fear in his environment, the deer, a large red stag, resumes feeding.
No urgency then. A welcome moment to compose my body and my thoughts – to regulate my breathing – to focus. And, when the opportunity presents itself, to shoot like Annie. Sending a teeny tiny projectile to do its handiwork.
Aorta severed and heart deprived of blood, the stag bolts for the nearest cover, which happens to be the scrub-skirted creek. Here he tumbles over the bank and into the waterway, thrashing and splashing momentarily before coming to rest.
Like a limbo dancer Big Red has gone as low as he can go. To retrieve him now, the only way is up, up and away.
Shrug. Sigh. These things are sent to try us. ‘Us’ being me. Me being alone and significantly smaller than my expired prey laying in his watery resting place.
Buoyed by a squirt of adrenaline and a misguided sense of purpose, I decide that I will get Red outta there intact if I can – he must be removed from the waterway anyways so why not go whole hog. Why not indeed!
A thorough site inspection includes a re-introduction to another of my imaginary friends, Highly Unlikely. She’s Aint Likely’s big sister, and she’s got attitude.
Undeterred, I walk back to my distant ute, my brain abuzz with retrieval options.
On my return the sun and the temperature had risen, and my brain was not alone in its buzzing. A swarm of blowflies, all of which had suicidal tendencies, buzz both me and Big Red. Once I behead him and open his gut cavity I’ll have to hurry, or they’ll be dropping eggs faster than I can keep them at bay.
With a halo of blowies and boots full of water, I tug the stag downstream centimetre by centimetre. My piggin’ string is tight about his oesophagus, his body trailing behind. Every slippery rock is an impediment, every pool a win.
To a game animal crossing where generations of deer have worn a gutter deep into the bank and there’s minimal vegetation barring the exit.
Here, I set the stag up then reverse my ute as close as I dare. I lay out every piece of baling twine, every dog lead and strap – all knotted or hooked together. A straight pull from stag to tow ball – engage low gear, idle forward, gently does it.
Of course it was never going to be that easy. The stag is big. The gutter is steep and narrow. Twine frays and pops. Straps snap. But, like the flies, I will not give up.
I heave and wrestle and relocate Big Red in the gutter. I reapply, re-tie and re-hook. Then, not so gently, pull. Again, and again till we’re gaining metres and traction.
The win, when it comes, is bittersweet, for the mission is only halfway done.
Stage two is the transition from dragging to lifting. The stag, a floppy deadweight of more than one hundred kilos and laying at ground level, will not be coming home till he’s on the back of my ute. The height differential will entail more grunting, more wrestling and more cunning tricks before I succeed.
The trusty dog ramp, an aid in my shifting and lifting efforts, only holds for long enough to give me false hope. Bony forequarters are inbound before it buckles – ‘stag overboard!’ – and I lose the lot.
Back to ground zero but now with less energy, less conviction and Highly Unlikely taunting and teasing.
I trade centimetres for millimetres. Tiny mini-wins, each of them in the right direction – upward.
Hindered by the tow ball, then the tailgate, I jump off the deck to clear the obstructions, then clamber back to heave and lift.
I’m smiling despite the skin off my hands, the sweat in my eyes and the halo of infuriating flies. Smiling because I am slowly, ever so slowly, winning.
Only my imaginary friends and I know the war I have waged. It has been brutal and demanding but, more importantly, I’ve put both Aint Likely and Highly Unlikely in their proper place – behind me.
I brace my shoulder under Big Red and give one final heave, job done, mission accomplished. Then it’s goodbye to a thousand flies, and, with the company of my ute radio, this fat lady may possibly sing.
