quote:

Originally posted by Nakihunter:

quote:

but in this case, to remove some 30,000 animals within 12 months

Where does this number come from.

I doubt if there are more than 15,000 tahr in NZ. Possibly a lot less.

Shanks

Good work my friend. Wish you all the best.

The All Black/Puma Rugby test held here in Nelson three or so weekends ago was attended by about 20,000 people and for other well attended Super 15 or provincial games we have 10,000 to 15,000 people attending. Sounds like a lot of people but when you see them in real life and imagine them spread out in the vast tahr country we have I can assure you there are substantially more tahr than probably the highest count done by the Aussies.

I'm not defending the current idiot government minister and DOC, although I think DOC are probably being railroaded somewhat by the idiot and if I had my way I would use such numbskulls as sighting in fodder for the cull.

I just don't believe despite maybe best efforts that we will see decimation or extermination. As I posted earlier, never happened despite years of best efforts by the helicopter gunships and government policy to wipe the "noxious" animals from the face of NZ, Despite open slather on the poor old possum we haven't succeeded by a long shot to exterminate those animals.

Well and good if the cull is stopped but we in the hunting fraternity better be prepared to do our bit, instead of coming back from a tahr hunt posing over a trophy bull tahr and having shot fuck all else don't fucking complain when someone else has to step in and do some culling.

I can understand our overseas members questioning and decrying some of our practices, helicopter gunship culling and 1080 poison drops for possum control but until you have been here, really been here, not just on a guided hunt on a nice easy East Coast station, you cannot begin to understand our situation.

Yep done!

When I first started hunting Tahr on the Eastern side in 81-82 Tahr were almost wiped out then, I spent weeks climbing & not seeing a single one, a few Chamois & Red Deer, no Tahr but a couple behind the homestead on Messy, I think the Deer Stalkers Club even had a save the Tahr campaign back then ?

But I must say in 6-7 years after that the numbers did pick up quickly !

Good for DSC to get involved. Where is SCI in all of this?

The cull start date has been postponed.
ostensibly to consult but the truth is the pressure plus it seems that the importers of ammo have refused to sell the Dept. the ammo need to operate.

Its a great start and hopefully if the pressure maintains we can force real consultation and a managed cull that works for all.

Bt im not that hopeful yet, still going to be an uphill battle.I think we have a crack now though.

Good news, initially anyway!

quote:

Originally posted by eagle27:

quote:

Originally posted by Nakihunter:

quote:

but in this case, to remove some 30,000 animals within 12 months

Where does this number come from.

I doubt if there are more than 15,000 tahr in NZ. Possibly a lot less.

Shanks

Good work my friend. Wish you all the best.

The All Black/Puma Rugby test held here in Nelson three or so weekends ago was attended by about 20,000 people and for other well attended Super 15 or provincial games we have 10,000 to 15,000 people attending. Sounds like a lot of people but when you see them in real life and imagine them spread out in the vast tahr country we have I can assure you there are substantially more tahr than probably the highest count done by the Aussies.

I'm not defending the current idiot government minister and DOC, although I think DOC are probably being railroaded somewhat by the idiot and if I had my way I would use such numbskulls as sighting in fodder for the cull.

I just don't believe despite maybe best efforts that we will see decimation or extermination. As I posted earlier, never happened despite years of best efforts by the helicopter gunships and government policy to wipe the "noxious" animals from the face of NZ, Despite open slather on the poor old possum we haven't succeeded by a long shot to exterminate those animals.

Well and good if the cull is stopped but we in the hunting fraternity better be prepared to do our bit, instead of coming back from a tahr hunt posing over a trophy bull tahr and having shot fuck all else don't fucking complain when someone else has to step in and do some culling.

I can understand our overseas members questioning and decrying some of our practices, helicopter gunship culling and 1080 poison drops for possum control but until you have been here, really been here, not just on a guided hunt on a nice easy East Coast station, you cannot begin to understand our situation.

I'm not that informed about all this in NZ myself, but it does seem that some people who really know the country and its politics think the poisoning is misguided, ineffective and dangerous to humans. My sis-in-law's boyfriend, Kiwi, is how I first heard about all of this. He worked on the Old Ghost Road for several years. Going back, he trapped possums and was a commercial meat hunter. He absolutely detests the poisoning campaign and believes that some powerful folks are making money from the policy. Considering the information that the 1080 is showing up in fish it's difficult to understand why the resistance to the practice has gained so little traction. Our politics here in the US are as F'd up as can be, but if this was going on here, there would be an uprising.

quote:

Originally posted by JeffreyPhD:

I'm not that informed about all this in NZ myself, but it does seem that some people who really know the country and its politics think the poisoning is misguided, ineffective and dangerous to humans. My sis-in-law's boyfriend, Kiwi, is how I first heard about all of this. He worked on the Old Ghost Road for several years. Going back, he trapped possums and was a commercial meat hunter. He absolutely detests the poisoning campaign and believes that some powerful folks are making money from the policy. Considering the information that the 1080 is showing up in fish it's difficult to understand why the resistance to the practice has gained so little traction. Our politics here in the US are as F'd up as can be, but if this was going on here, there would be an uprising.

It is rather ironical though that the people here who oppose the 1080 poisoning programme on the basis it is ineffective use the argument against 1080 that it decimates birdlife and other animals including deer. So is the poison ineffective or the programme? The possum is no more immune to 1080 than any other animal so certainly 1080 is effective in knocking down large numbers of possum, unfortunatel like all things in life there are unwanted effects too but the undesirables have to be weighed up against the desirables.

As to poisons in general, god forbid any of you don't, but if you do ever develop cancer I'm assuming you won't be turning down chemo drugs or any other drug (read highly poisonous) available to you to help preserve your life. Unless you have been there and done that like I did 16 years ago I don't think some appreciate how heavily reliant we are on poisons to enable us to live in the world we have today. Possums were introduced into NZ as a fur trade animal and found the country so to their liking they spread like a plague to every nook and cranny in NZ from the sea to the middle of the alps.

Come to NZ and get out in our countryside and tell me how you are going to control possum numbers, or tahr numbers for that matter. You can spend as long in our Alps as you wish at any time of year and shoot as many tahr as you like of any sex and age, all for free, no questions asked. Do that and tell me how many you got.

This from the Tahr Foundation today.

Hunting lobby wins concessions over tahr cull.
This was the Radio NZ headline this morning. The minister seems to have announced the outcome of yesterday’s meeting, stating there will only be 6,000 tahr culled this year, plus up to another 4000 next year if needed. Basically DoC and the minster appear to have accepted the Game Animal Council’s well thought out and whole of hunting sector consulted tahr management plan. It was a very constructive meeting yesterday and common sense appears to have prevailed. Doc in particular were very constructive and appeared to only want a workable and sensible outcome.
We posted up the link to the GAC plan a couple of days ago, but here are the most important points, as agreed upon by all of the hunting sector:
Initial cull before mid-November kid drop of 6000 targeting the hard to get at and highest density areas and leaving the most accessible areas for recreational hunters.
Any remainder to make up the initial 6000 to be taken in April 2019 so as to not early-wean any kids and stunt their growth in that most important first year.
No bulls to be shot anywhere in aerial culls.
WARO to be used where possible to utilise the carcasses.
Maximise the effectiveness of ground hunters by allowing more access and targeting them to where they can be the most effective.
The commercial and recreational hunting sector to take trophy bulls as they do now, and tahr meat recovery of nannies only, and also establish an ethos of taking far more nannies by recreational hunters. This combined approach will for account for another 4000 tahr over the forth coming season.
Re-evaluate after a year and re-target as necessary – using adaptive management principles.
Even though its early days yet and we’ll wait until we’ve seen the proposal in writing, this result shows what we can achieve when the whole hunting sector is totally united under the GAC. While we have the application for the court injunction waiting with our lawyers at the moment in case its needed, hopefully the majority of the donations can now go towards constructively moving forward - gathering robust data and working towards establishing the tahr as herd of special interest under the GAC!

Still to be conformed but the people involved seem positive.

On a side note, this Minister and her intentions has done something no one has managed before- to unite hunters and the community around them. I hope its a beginning of something.

Well done everyone who helped reduce those numbers!

quote:

On a side note, this Minister and her intentions has done something no one has managed before- to unite hunters and the community around them. I hope its a beginning of something.

Shanks,
You are spot on here. I certainly noticed how the wider hunting community gelled as one in opposition to the Ministers plans. I can't remember that happening in many years and is a fantastic example of what hunters can achieve as a united front. Actually I commend Minister Sage for realising her best avenue is working with the groups representing hunters and, although she will need to be watched closey, I am confident future game animal measures on her watch will happen only after proper prior consultation.

Yes Minister on TV this morning saying as I have been, she expects hunters to come to the party and not just shoot trophies but cull out nannies too. How many hunters go in and shoot nothing because they didn't see anything worth shooting, our hunting programs on TV show the hosts too busy promoting their free gear and looking for the big one, the DSA to some extent also guilty of promoting trophies only with their trophy head awards. Have an award for the biggest mob bomb up and don't look sideways at spotlighters getting out and keeping deer populations from getting out of hand in some areas by shooting farm fringes, legally of course.

To be fair, the hunting community has been open about the need to cull females and that has not been the issue around the Tahr cull. The DSA has for many years run organised culls of tahr and In the Karangarua, The DSA and NZ SCI donated and built a hut to make it easier for hunters to occupy some of the toughest country.
But for much of the range the Dept of conservation will need to rethink its hunter access limitations if it wishes hunters to be successful. Large areas are out of reach of all but the most dedicated and adventurous.
I wrote a piece for another site explaining my experiences with that, Ill post it up shortly.

quote:

Originally posted by shankspony:
To be fair, the hunting community has been open about the need to cull females and that has not been the issue around the Tahr cull. The DSA has for many years run organised culls of tahr and In the Karangarua, The DSA and NZ SCI donated and built a hut to make it easier for hunters to occupy some of the toughest country.
But for much of the range the Dept of conservation will need to rethink its hunter access limitations if it wishes hunters to be successful. Large areas are out of reach of all but the most dedicated and adventurous.
I wrote a piece for another site explaining my experiences with that, Ill post it up shortly.

Thanks for posting such a good report and so accurate of the trials and tribulations that are faced when in our South Westland alpine country.

Don't know whether you flown around this area much in a chopper, I've been fortunate in flying these places starting as a 13 year old coming out of the mighty Hokitika River watershed in the Bell "MASH' chopper. One of the first choppers used in this country for commercial work and flown by a Canadian ex Korean war veteran pilot before NZ had trained chopper pilots. Since that day also flew in the old Bell chopper the length of the Southern Alps recovering mineral samples for my first job on leaving school then many a Search and Rescue exercise and real event using choppers and then many a trip in and out of the Alps using choppers, mostly James Scott, for hunting.

To see this vast uninhabited and rugged country of ours by chopper is both awe inspiring and humbling and makes one realise just how small we really are and how vast the untamed areas of our country are.

Not taking anything away from your great experience but our Douglas River is just one tiny portion of the big picture. Despite all the huts and all the intensive hunting of the tahr ballot blocks with hunters in 25 watershed blocks every week for 8 weeks the tahr numbers have exploded. DOC have made mistakes in all sorts of matters in their guardianship of our back country but have also done some great things. My dealings with them have always been courteous and helpful.

I am glad in this latest case there has been a step back,a breath taken and a bit more thought put in but in the end as I have harped on a bit (or a lot probably), we all have to do our bit.

My youngest sons first tahr ballot trip in 2016 was an eye opener to him in terms of animals seen around our hunting block and even just glassing from camp. He shot a nannie off a rock face at about 60 metres for meat one evening and as it fell a youngster appeared looking down at him and obviously looking for it's mother. He couldn't bring himself to shoot it and felt awful for taking the nannie.

He's done more hunting since then and on this year's tahr hunt shot everything in range including a couple of nice young bulls with beautiful coats and reasonable but not trophy heads. Why not leave the young bulls and only take the mature trophy heads, maybe one if you are lucky, two if very lucky? Yep and don't complain when the culling starts. For all the numbers we saw we took 8 bulls, 5 nannies and 2 youngsters, just about killed me and my two young and fit sons and their mates were completely knackered at the end of each days hunting, 7 in total.

I started hunting the coast as a 16 year old myself. 29 odd years ago. First hunt was up the Taramakau, and i've been making my way south as the years have progressed. Waitaha, Wanganui, Copleland, MT cook, Karangarua, Landsborough, Fiordland Wapiti blocks.
First hunted the ballot blocks as a 23 year old. Believe it to not but the figures for animals killed is lower now than then if this years tally is anything to go by.
The ballots dont work and should not be considered anything other than a trophy hunt. I think what is really needed is for successful applicants to be required to do a female cull before they are allowed into the ballot blocks.
We are facing a reduced herd no matter what, and we all are going to have to put pressure on each other not to shoot those young bulls. They are too valuable to the herd and there are too few getting through to maturity. Shooting a 10-11 inch bull has no value to management.

quote:

Originally posted by shankspony:
I started hunting the coast as a 16 year old myself. 29 odd years ago. First hunt was up the Taramakau, and i've been making my way south as the years have progressed. Waitaha, Wanganui, Copleland, MT cook, Karangarua, Landsborough, Fiordland Wapiti blocks.
First hunted the ballot blocks as a 23 year old. Believe it to not but the figures for animals killed is lower now than then if this years tally is anything to go by.
The ballots dont work and should not be considered anything other than a trophy hunt. I think what is really needed is for successful applicants to be required to do a female cull before they are allowed into the ballot blocks.
We are facing a reduced herd no matter what, and we all are going to have to put pressure on each other not to shoot those young bulls. They are too valuable to the herd and there are too few getting through to maturity. Shooting a 10-11 inch bull has no value to management.

How far up the Copeland did you go Shanks, we always struggled get much past those delightful Welcome Flat hot pools, my German hunting friend always got overcome with amorous intentions when he found something better than chamois or tahr inhabiting the pools

'Compulsory' nanny culls would be hard to manage as not many coming from around NZ, Oz and further a field after winning a balloted block could manage or afford two trips down into tahr country. From info on the DOC site this year it seems most are applying for blocks in the first two ballot periods leaving many periods not being used. In some ways this indicates the trophy hunters wanting first dibs before others get into the areas. I bet they don't shoot anything else other than a big trophy.

I'm not, and never have been, a trophy hunter and will generally shoot anything that pops into view. Done too much shooting for money in my day, I just enjoy the hunt and environment. Shooting young bulls is not going to make a lot of difference to the population just as it doesn't when shooting spiker deer. There is always plenty of males around to carry on breeding in our NZ herds. I doubt it that it has any effect on the big trophy stock either, you can never shoot out all the young bulls. Here in NZ trophy hunters have no more rights over animals than anyone else. Pure trophy hunters, especially for chamois and tahr, do nothing for culling animals. The very reason for this discussion is that hunters have not been able to control the growth in tahr numbers so the helicopters are being brought in. Most are accepting that culling is needed it's just a matter of how many.

How far up the Copeland did you go Shanks, we always struggled get much past those delightful Welcome Flat hot pools,

Shanks carted me several k`s upstream from the Douglas Hut..the ground was rumbling enough for him to want to get off the ridge we were climbing on.

Saw totally naked US Geology girl students walking around the pools like bare bum savages...or was that a dream ha ha.

Definitely not a dream. 8-10 of them cavorting around naked and covering themselves in mud... Was tough to head on up valley for sure.


The thing is Eagle, All our attitudes have to change and we have to start considering others. Trophy hunters need to start killing, or paying other people to kill more females, and meat hunters need to start selecting what they shoot. The bull Tahr population is severely stressed in comparison to the nanny tahr population. The only reason we have got away with it is because there has been good numbers. Thats about to change to some degree and shooting a 3-5 year old bull is the wrong thing to do. If the population gets down anywhere near 10,000 then there will be less than 1000 true trophy and mature bulls available for each year.Probably closer to 500.
Culling is not killing everything you see. Its knowing what animals to shoot when and in this case, it is 100% leave the young bulls, concentrate on the nanny's, take an old bull if you get the chance.
I remember back to the late 80s and 90s, a 12 inch bull was considered big and true tahr trophy were so rare the hunting magazines would go 5 years without a tahr hunt story. Now we have 14 inch as the mark and very issue has a story. I dont want to see us loose that.

We have a Sambar deer cull this month,first time chopper cull and dont we all just love that too.

Whats the reason for that Gryph? Who's in charge of it?

Too many deer mate.They wont let hunters into that area yet condone the chopper shoot.

https://www.news.com.au/nation...9512870768689a1e150d

The mind just boggles at the element in society that call themselves green, yet they would rather a machine flys around shooting to waste while keeping out people who would use the resource.

Yes a true and real waste of hundreds of tons of meat.

Well the 2018-19 Thar control plan is now operational. After our fist meeting on August 29th, followed by a second on 1st October,attended by Minister Sage an operational plan is set to go. The work by the recreational and commercial stakeholders has yield some reward. NO identifiable BULL Tahr to be targeted by cull. A coordinated approach between now and 30th June 2019 to take 10,000 tahr out of the Tahr range. 6000 of those in the next 6 weeks before kidding begins.
The full details are on the DoC website. It appears that for the time being we have won a battle, still gotta war to deal to but the support has been huge and attitudes(politicians) have changed. Plenty of ongoing work for the Game Animal Council and the Tahr Laison Group stakeholders(hunting) in the coming weeks. A coordinated and united approach has to be maintained, the fate of our Thar herd is in the hands of the hunters so we must get this right. I think we all know what the consequences could be if we dont. Those of use on the TLG think you for your support and need it to continue. This is all about Tahr.

quote:

Originally posted by shankspony:
The mind just boggles at the element in society that call themselves green, yet they would rather a machine flys around shooting to waste while keeping out people who would use the resource.

There is the latest article asking hunters to not contaminate waterways with deer carcases...yet what is the DEPT doing about 1000`s of deer that will be shot and left that will contaminate every waterway as they are shooting the high country.

Wild dogs are gonna have a big breed up too.

quote:

Originally posted by highlander:
Well the 2018-19 Thar control plan is now operational. After our fist meeting on August 29th, followed by a second on 1st October,attended by Minister Sage an operational plan is set to go. The work by the recreational and commercial stakeholders has yield some reward. NO identifiable BULL Tahr to be targeted by cull. A coordinated approach between now and 30th June 2019 to take 10,000 tahr out of the Tahr range. 6000 of those in the next 6 weeks before kidding begins.
The full details are on the DoC website. It appears that for the time being we have won a battle, still gotta war to deal to but the support has been huge and attitudes(politicians) have changed. Plenty of ongoing work for the Game Animal Council and the Tahr Laison Group stakeholders(hunting) in the coming weeks. A coordinated and united approach has to be maintained, the fate of our Thar herd is in the hands of the hunters so we must get this right. I think we all know what the consequences could be if we dont. Those of use on the TLG think you for your support and need it to continue. This is all about Tahr.

Deerstalkers association is saying its not yet finalised Gerald? And issues such as failure to accept private hunter kill returns seem to be big hurdles.