Brothers return for Queensland’s red deer roar

We only just seemed to blink our eyes a couple of times and 12 months had gone by. Now it was almost time for the annual roar in south-east Queensland again. My brother Darcy and I made a pact a while ago to hunt together every year for red deer at rut time (‘Two old-timers’ – Australian Hunter edition 66). We don’t walk all that far anymore, it’s rather about being in the bush and enjoying it. Just the smell and sounds, the different things you see and experience on each hunt. Sitting around the campfire at night after tea listening to stags roaring to each other and telling old worn-out hunting stories. But they sound good anyway.

This year I was hoping to find Darcy a good stag carrying a top set of antlers to mount and put on the wall. Of course, some venison would not go astray either. Darcy could not claim time to come with me until late in the roar. That being the case, I decided to go to have a look at our hunting spot three weeks early to see what was around.

Arriving after lunch at our campsite on the property, it looked a bit bleak for an afternoon hunt, as one flurry of rain followed the next, in five-minute intervals. Luckily for me just after 2.30pm it started to clear away. Heading off around 3pm, the bush smelt clean and fresh after the rain. Half a kilometre from camp I noticed a lace monitor sunning itself in the fork of a round leaf ironbark tree. He looked to be enjoying himself so much, I stopped and took a photo of him.

Not long after that I saw my first deer, which was a doe. She was 150m to the north-east from my position in a little gully covered with gum saplings. Taking off my backpack, I crawled under the barbed wire fence. One deer turned into two then three; one doe and last year’s fawn plus a young stag carrying his second set of antlers. Unable to close the gap for a clear shot in the thick cover, by sunset I headed back along the walk to camp in the dark and rain. Back at camp I boiled the billy and drank a hot cup of tea while sitting in the rain wondering what tomorrow would bring. Then I changed into dry clothes and climbed into the tent for the night.

Next morning walking along the ridge top looking down into the gully, there was no sign of deer. Fortunately the young stag roared and gave away his position. Just 10 minutes later I was only 200m from him. I gave him a bellow on my cow horn and two minutes after that he was standing 10m away from me on the other side of a big lantana bush. Slowly moving through the lush grass he heard me and ran off across the gully. He stopped some 160m away. Leaning the rifle against a nearby tree for a steady rest I took aim at the stag’s side-on stance. Bang! The echoing rifle shot shattered the still morning air, as the beast bucked sharply.

He was lying dead over a ridge. After retrieving the venison, I only had to carry it uphill some 200m, putting it in a shady place then returning in the car to pick it up. When I left the property that day there were three stags still roaring.

When Darcy and I returned three weeks later the weather was fine and sunny. Our first hunt was an afternoon trek, as Darcy carried his .7-08 while I scouted for him. However, not one stag roared that session. While walking downstream along the creek a black wild dog took three paces out from behind a lantana bush and stopped side-on only 40m away to look at us. Darcy was to my right and two steps behind me. While I looked through the binoculars at the dog watching us, I could hear Darcy load the rifle and sit down in the long grass. It seemed to take forever before he fired the shot. The black dog yelped and jumped in the air before dying. The exit hole was as big as a 50-cent piece. With another calf killer gone, the property owner would be pleased with that. There was no more excitement that afternoon as we walked back to camp. We had an early night in the hope stags would be roaring well into the morning.

During the night, we heard two stags roaring in different places. Next morning the kookaburras woke up the crows, who woke us up. We moved quite slowly as Darcy said: “That stag across the creek sounds like he is on the move away from us, we had better get after him.”

Even on the move and in pursuit of him, the animal still had a 1km head-start on us. Darcy was struggling with the pace to try and catch up with the stag. He was suffering with a medical problem at the time. By the time we reached the far boundary fence of the property, some 3-5km from our campsite, Darcy was completely spent. Meanwhile, the stag was still a half-kilometre ahead of us on the move on the wrong side of the fence. It took us 4-5 hours to slowly walk to camp.

Late that afternoon we drove the car to the other side of the property, then went for a much shorter walk down a razorback ridge towards the creek. Along the ridge Darcy spotted a creamy coloured eastern grey kangaroo feeding in the gully to our left. Contouring on to the sharp ridge end we sat down on some rocks. I gave a bellow on my cow horn and an old stag answered moments later across on the timbered hill on the other side of the creek. “There is your stag,” I said to Darcy, pointing to him. The stag was about 600m from where we were behind the tree line. My holler seemed to anger him and he started roaring full on. He then came out into the open, thrashing the grass madly and rubbing small saplings.

By this time, it was about an hour before dark. Darcy said to me: “Brother, I’m just too tired to go after him – you go and take him.” Well, I didn’t need any more encouraging. As fast as I could move, I was on my way downhill and heading towards the creek. But I went down the wrong gully and reached the creek in a bad steep 30m drop-off covered with lantana bush. Desperate to make time I went under the lantana, down the steep bank, holding onto whatever I could grab before finally reaching the creek bed.

I climbed up the 18m creek bank and poked my head over. The stag was 280m away near the base of the hill with two does, and roaring madly. Climbing over the bank, I walked 12m to be behind a big gum tree. Resting the rifle against the tree, I took aim at the full side-on beast. The .7-08 boomed once more and the shot felt good.

Walking up to the place where he had been standing, the does turned away towards the gully and hurried off for 60m before stopping for another look before leaving. It was just light enough to see when I found the stag dead on the other side of the gully, lying on top of a fallen tree head. The wear of the stag’s teeth pointed to him being at least 12 years old. By the time I cut his head off and all the meat I could carry in torch light, it was well after dark. It was a long, slow, painful walk back to the car where my brother was waiting for me. Back in camp we enjoyed our last night in the bush, until next time.