After our lack of success on Monday (close encounters) I felt bad having mucked up the shot after Meg did such a great job leading me in.
last night I got all my stuff organized ready for a 4am start.
alarm went off and got turned off...bugger the early start I slept in and had breakfast with the Mrs
I managed to get motivated and headed away at the gentlemanly hour of midday
reaching our destination 3 other vechiles were spotted up hill so that would be tops hunting out for afternoon.... suited me as it was hot and getting hotter,changed from polarfleece into polo top loaded rifle and set off into the bush.......first wasps nest showed Meg had learnt and gave it wide berth...
we stalked our way up into the cool deep beech,man what a change from the wet conditions of earlier in the week,ground was still damp but staying upright wasnt an issue thank goodness,we stalked up beside our jellyfern clearings keeping wind heading up to us but Meg just wasnt interested at all....sat down in shade of a broadleaf tree and had a wee spell before continueing on around hill,3rd smaller clearing was crossed with meg a little interested but not wanting to lead off anywhere...this happened heaps of times today and it took me awhile to twigg....fresh poohs on the ground but no air scent of animals....
we went up across rocky face and she got interested under a rock overhang with gap about right size for possum grrrr leave it was all that was needed and she carried on up and over ridge and down the other side.
we kept wind direction to our left as we stalked down and across face,it was weird stalking back n forwards,up and down rathe than just picking a line and moving.
a fair bit of fresh sign had us both keen but still hard to pick up a decent scent,we got lower down face and Meg got keen to head down more so on high alert we continued.........looking down there was red stag with spindly velvets looking up from about 50 yards,up went the browning and back came hammer,crosshairs on shoulder and squeezed trigger animal lept off crashing across face....SIT..SIT down went her bum...looking really hard and letting out wee wimper,shhhh sit.... my patients lasted for all of 60 seconds and we slowly set off down to where it was standing (having watched trusty222s video finn on the wind yesterday I really took time here thanks bud) got to where it was standing and hello someones been spray painting red on the light green crown fern...thats the first and only time Ive found the noisy scratchy stuff usefull
I kept Meg in close and we tracked down the well splattered trail....it was interesting to watch Meg here as she wasnt interested in the blood trail at all her nose was too busy...but I followed it till she moved off it downhill about 2mtrs onto a very dead stag...... huge pat session and out with the sword to do the poohs n wees onto the outside bit. boned the front half out and put hind quarters on my shoulders,that lasted for all of 50 yards before I saw reason and boned that lot out too...slow learner this Kiwi
90 minutes of hard slow plodding saw us back at the wagon for a hard earned cuppa tea,put all the venison into passengers side floor well and stuck aircon on full blast cold for trip home.

lessons I learnt today...
trust the bitch,she has the nose.
possums are there and smell good but she will leave alone.
its funny as hell to shoot a deer while listening to cocky mowing his lawns down below you across paddocks.
its good to have a mate to help carry out venison.

photos may follow if I ever work out how to get them off my new phone

Glad you had success, Elvis. Looking forward to the pictures - can't you just email them?

not sure what is going on with this new phone...internet acess is hopeless and cant sent or recieve smileys or photos......back to the shop if sticking extra $$$$ on plan doesnt fix issue

sorry for quality...after a week of attempting to get phone to send via txt/msm/email/bluetooth I gave up ,but have changed quality down on phone so in the future I will be able to get photos out in future
this is photo of photo on phone

Good enough to tell that you got one in the velvet! (or you scanned an old magazine picture...)All kidding aside, good job Elvis!

try again.....

Elvis, these are the best pictures you have ever posted! You can see the veins in the velvet. Hard to read the text now because the pictures are so large. What rifle were you using? Lever with a silencer?

Awesome pics mate.

thanks guys....ctrl and - at same time twice puts it about right for my old eyes
the rifle is a Miroku made BLR .308 wearing a gunworks suppressor...an oldie but a goodie.