Finally, I’ve found some time to post a report on my big game hunt in Argentina this past spring during the last week of March. I’ve hunted in Argentina for many years and this past season was no exception. I’m a bow hunter and have been fortunate enough to take several red stag, a water buffalo, and blackbuck over the years with my bow. This year I returned to hunt with Caza Pampa at the La Mota Hunting Ranch. I hunted there last year during mid-April, but the roar ended early and unfortunately I only caught the tail end of it, so I wanted to return when the action was really hot. Even though I was late to the party last year I still saw several very nice stags and did manage to take a great free range blackbuck with my bow.

Caza Pampa offers approximately 60,000 acres of free range hunting for red stag and other exotics along with a 1000 acre high fenced preserve area where they do some breeding and offer limited hunting for gold medal animals for a trophy fee. I was amazed by the quantity and quality of the wild, free range stags that I saw while I was there.







The ranch is located in La Pampa province about 1½ hours south west of Santa Rosa, so it is relatively easy to get there. From Buenos Aires you can travel to Santa Rosa either by air, bus, or car. Over the years I’ve tried them all, but my preferred method now is the overnight first class bus. The bus is great… Once you board you can relax in you first class airline type seat, have hot meal with your beverage of choice including beer and wine and then lay the seat down flat and go to sleep. You wake up to a light breakfast and you’re there to be picked up by a representative of the ranch.

The hunting lodge at La Mota is relatively new and up to this point has primarily catered to local Argentine, Uruguayan, and Spanish hunters and has had relatively low hunting pressure. It is a family owned and managed operation and they take great pride in making sure that all of their guests are treated like family. The owner, Luis Manganaro, lives at the lodge during the season and manages all aspects of the operation along with his wife, mother, and son. The rest of the staff members were warm, friendly, and very attentive to your every request.

The facilities at the lodge include separate sleeping quarters for guests with four double occupancy rooms with their own modern private baths, two of which are handicapped accessible. The main house where meals are served is cozy and comfortable and consists of a large dining room, trophy room, and a great room with a fireplace and satellite TV. It was a great place to relax, enjoy snacks, and socialize with the other hunters. Luis had the habit of breaking out a bottle of champagne every time one of the hunters took a nice trophy stag. Needless to say there were a lot of corks popped during the week.











The kitchen was overseen by Luis’ mother Marta and they prepared some of the best traditional Argentine and international meals and desserts that I’ve ever had in Argentina. They also have a fully stocked bar with name brand liquors and regional beer and wines. Luis was in charge of the asados, which consisted of beef, lamb, and wild boar. They were absolutely delicious.



The women busy at working their magic in the kitchen.


Luis and his son Vicente doing the honors for the asado.


Meals were treated as a family affair. Luis and his family joined us for meals every day.


The terrain at La Mota is fairly typical of most ranches in La Pampa province; rolling hills, with sections of hardwood forest separated by fire breaks and open pasture land. There are also areas of thick brush that the deer and wild boar like to hide in. The hunting is not physically demanding and even older hunters or those with bad knees or other more serious physical disabilities should be able to enjoy the hunt. In fact, the ranch is the only one that I’ve ever hunted at that actually provides handicapped facilities for hunters. In addition to handicapped access facilities at the lodge they also have a few elevated box blinds with wheelchair lifts. Luis has also had numerous double elevated archery blinds built within bow range of water holes so that archers can also have a good opportunity to take animals coming to water.



We just dropped off my fellow bow hunter at one of the new elevated archery stands.


It was really hot this day and a sow and her little piggys came in for an early drink.


While most hunting ranches in La Pampa province are cattle ranches that have populations of red deer that can be hunted, Luis told me that he manages the ranch specifically to attract and keep good populations of deer and other native species. He does raise some cattle on the ranch, but much of it is set aside and managed specifically for deer. He has numerous food plots planted with corn, sorghum, milo, alfalfa, or other high protein native grasses. He told me that his goal was to provide good nutrition year round to help the animals through the winter and to provide good food sources during the spring and summer growing season.









The primary method of hunting red stag is by spot and stalk and the typical hunting day at La Mota starts around 5:00 AM with a hearty breakfast of bacon or sausage and eggs made to order including a large selection of cereals, pastries, orange juice, coffee or tea. After breakfast, we would meet up with our guides and head off to our assigned sections via four wheel drive vehicles. Normally we were out in the field about a half hour before first light. We would then stand outside the vehicle and listen for the sound of roaring stags. The guides can pretty much tell by the sound of the roar the age and size of the animal as well as how far away it is.

Some mornings we only heard a few roaring, but most times we had them all around us. As soon as it was light enough to see, my guide would select the one he thought was best and then we would head off on foot to intercept it. The stags could be anywhere from 50 to 400 yards away and we generally started the pursuit at a pretty good pace, but things would slow down as we got closer. For me, as a bow hunter, close is sixty yards or less. The ranch was loaded with stags and it was not uncommon for us to make four or five stalks during the morning hunt. I’m still amazed that after all the years that I’ve hunted red stags in Argentina how the hair on the back of my neck stands up when I hear the sound of a roaring stag up close and personal. I guess that’s why I’m a bow hunter.

Since it is so difficult to get within 60 yards of a stag on foot, this year I decided to take advantage of the new bow stands and give them a try in the afternoons. And boy did it pay off! I shot my biggest stag ever one afternoon shortly before dark as it came in with some hinds to drink. The water hole was in a section of trees adjacent to an open pasture and the deer would come out of the woods to drink before moving on to feed. The stand was set back off the water about 30 yards in the trees and he came with his harem from the woods on the opposite side of the water. It was still tough to get into shooting position with all those eyes on the lookout, but finally all the stars finally aligned and I took the shot. The stag was at about 35 yards or so and I hit him right behind the shoulder, but a little high. Not my best… He took off towards the open field and went a couple hundred yards before dropping. There wasn’t any ground shrinkage when we finally walked up on him.



This is where I caught up with my stag. It came from the wooded area to the left of the photo.


The hunting during the week I was there was the best that I’ve seen in years. The next morning we were out again in another section and just after starting to move toward the sound of a roaring stag I could see a group of pigs coming towards me through the high grass and bush. Now I’ve come across a fair number of wild boar in the bush before and had already seen a number of them earlier in the week, but have never been able to get a shot with my bow. As they came closer they crossed in front of me and stopped at about 30 yards. I had a perfect broadside shot and put one right in the boiler room. As the pig took off running my guide looked at me like I was nuts. It wasn’t a very big pig and there were stags roaring all around us and I could just imagine what was going on in his mind, but I didn’t care. I wanted to shoot a wild boar spot and stalk with my bow and I’d done it.

As we were following the blood trail, there were stags literally everywhere around us. There was one off to my right that sounded like it was getting closer and closer until it sounded like it was no more than 75 yards away. My guide was a ways ahead of me looking for blood, so I broke off to my right and snuck up behind a bush to see what would happen. In just a few moments out steps a very wide and tall 5X6 that was angling towards me to the right.

Now for me the ultimate challenge as a bow hunter is to take one of these magnificent animals spot and stalk and as I started to move on the stag I looked behind me and there was my guide mouthing the word “grande”. I thought no kidding Sherlock and we took off angling in on the stag to get within bow range. We were paralleling the stag and got to a point where I had a good shooting lane. I estimated that he’d step out at about 60 yards and when he did I let one fly. Unfortunately it went a couple of inches right over his back. It spooked him a little and he bolted about 20 yards and turned right around and started walking back the way he came.

Now I normally carry four arrows in my quiver when I’m hunting, but I’d used one the night before on my big stag and forgot to replace it before I left that morning. I’d also used one on the boar that I’d shot and I’d just lost another when I missed this stag. So now I was down to one arrow. But what the heck…it only takes one, right.

As we got closer to the deer we could see that he had a couple of hinds with him and after some crawling we were at about 40 yards. I had to wait for the hinds to clear and for the stag to step out from behind the bush and had actually come to full draw twice as he couldn’t make up his mind, but he finally stepped out and I let him have it right behind the shoulder. My guide got a little over excited and took off after the stag, so what should have been an easy recovery turned into quite an ordeal, but at least I’d done it. What a morning! Unfortunately, by the time we got back to looking for the boar we’d lost the blood trail for good. I had hoped to contribute it to the asado that last evening, but we didn’t find it until the next day and by that time it was too far gone.

There were several other folks from the US, as well as some guys from Argentina and Brazil at the lodge while I was there and they were all able to take some nice stags during the week. One of the guys from the US was also a bow hunter and he managed to take a really nice 6X6 medal class stag and the biggest wild boar I’d ever seen taken.







The other folks at the ranch did really well also during the week and I was around to get these photos.







This was a very old "descarte" or management stag taken on the first morning of this guy's hunt.


What a great trip! After all the years I’ve been hunting in Argentina I never get tired of it. Once again I made new friends, enjoyed great food and wine, and to top it all off took the biggest stag of my life. It just doesn’t get any better than that. I’m already looking forward to going back next season.

Beautiful photos. You took an excellent stag! Congratulations. Red Stag is something I have not yet hunted, but is on my bucket list.

Congrats on an outstanding and very informative report. That place seems worth a visit indeed.

Well done...

quote:

Originally posted by Mikey49009:

This was a very old "descarte" or management stag taken on the first morning of this guy's hunt.

That is some hunting ground when a bull like that is a cull! Congrats on a great hunt.

Dean

Thanks for the great report. Nice pictures and some nice stags, especially with a bow.

Nice report Mike.

Thank you for a wonderful story and some great photos...maybe next year for me....

Looks like a great place to visit and hunt.
How about a link so we can contact them?
Thanks, and congrats on a great kill.
George

You can contact them through their website at www.cazapampa.com or you can contact them directly via e-mail at info@cazapampa.com.

Congratulations!

Wonderful report and a wonderful hunt as well.

Stag hunting in Argentina is still my favorite trip I've ever done.

Did you ship the antlers/capes back? How much did it cost?

I WILL be back, when the little kids grow up a bit more.

Mike: Man, many thanks for your fine report. I've just got to hunt the roar one day.