With Rod and Gun.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XXIX, Issue IV, 26 July 1902, Page 219

With Rod and Gun.

Deer are fairly plentiful in the Waikato. Between tam bridge and Okoroire very fair sport may be had if the hunter is lucky. They vary a lot in colour, from lhe ordinary brown to .-late, and others are marked something like the African gazelle, being of a fawny yellow colour, with a black mark down the lack, and barred white spots. A correspondent tells us that a few weeks back he shot a perfectly white one. This year several good heads have been obtained, the most successful method being to find out their haunts and stalk them at daybreak. Mr McVitie. one of the most successful shots, pursues this method. He may be seen on this page taking aim at his prey from horseback. This photo. is almost i nique of its kind, it being next to impossible to snapshot the wary animals with the camera. In this instance the photographer, by means of a telescope and camera combined, obtained what is really a wonderfully good result. As an evidence of the good sport

to be obtained in this district, our picture showing 1 the six deer is interesting. These represent the work of two sportsmen —Mr Joe Mack. of Cambridge, and Dr. F. J. Rayner, of Auckland —during a two days’ visit to the Whitehall estate. As the doctor's account of his trip gives a good idea of what deer stalkers may expect in this locality we venture to give it as lie related it. He and Air Mack put up at Mi- Harry’s for the night, and made an early start next morning. After a hearty breakfast of beefsteak, said the doctor, we shouldered our Winchesters and proceeded to a turnip pat h close by. where deer had been seen the night before, only to find, after a long- wait for day to break, the tracks of deer throughout the whole patch where they had been playing. However, after a quiet look round we discovered twelve of them grazing on the hillside some three hundred yards distant, but the discovery was mutual. and they started to rim. so we laid quietly for a few moments, and they finally came to a standstill a little nearer to us than before. Taking aim. one of

our party broke* the leg of one of them, and it started oft* with the rest, going for some 500 yards, and then racing down a hill to a swamp, where it took cover. We started after it through ti-tree and fern four feet high, up hill and down, until we came to the swamp where it had taken

shelter. We had not long to wait before it started out again, and made up the bank at full speed. lie was too late, however, for one of our dum-dums brought him low. No sooner had we prepared and hung him safely in tin* close ti-tree. Continued under “Our Illustrations.”