Sponsored by: Journey Hunts, Grim Reaper Broadheads & Black Eagle Arrows
By: Matt Guedes
Hunting in New Zealand is always a good experience. It becomes a great experience when you end up hunting the South Island at Glen Dene Station. For two years running Journey Hunts has taken its clients to Glen Dene Hunting which is owned by Richard and Sarah Burdon. We have had 100% success on harvests of red stags. Many of these hunters have taken additional animals also.
This past month we were able to see 31 hunters and observers spend a week in New Zealand on their dream hunt. Every one of them left the South Island very excited about the journey they had just completed. My focus this year was on chasing a Tahr with a bow. I will save that story for another time. My secondary focus was to take an animal with my Bear Archery Take-Down Recurve. I used my Black Eagle Arrows brand new Vintage Arrow which was tipped with a hundred grain Grim Reaper Hades Broadhead.
It was the last day of my trip and I decided to pursue a South Pacific Goat with my recurve bow. I set out by myself with a GoPro strapped to my head, my vortex binos and rangefinder, and my Tenzing backpack. I forgot to take my back quiver with me to New Zealand, so I ventured out with my bow and 2 Black Eagle Vintage arrows in hand ready for action.
It was early afternoon and I climbed to the top of the peak in order to get a vantage point. At first all I could find were a bunch of Red Deer and Stags along with a large number of Fallow Deer. I had seen some goats in the area the day before, so I was hoping they weren’t far away. It was a very windy day with about 30 to 40 mile-an-hour gusts and it felt like even more on top of the peaks. I started to just put miles on and walk out the ridge tops so that I could see everything that was below me. After about an hour of walking, I finally spotted a small herd of goats.
These goats were located about 500 yards out in front of me and they were about 200 yards below me just over a small ridge. With the wind in my face, I started to move slowly toward them hoping to be able to use that slight ridge to my advantage. I had no trouble getting into approximately one hundred yards of the goats. From that location I only had a little bit of terrain to work with and no trees at all. At this point I began to crawl on my hands and knees because there was one bush about 20 yards from the animals. I was able to stay concealed as long as I was lined up with the bush that was between us. This crawl took me all the way into about 22 yards. It took me about 15 minutes to complete crawl and get in range.
The largest goat in the group was facing away from me and had no idea I was there. I rose up onto my feet quickly, drew back and released a Black Eagle Vintage Arrow into a quartering away goat making a perfect shot. My arrow came out the opposite side of the goat about 5 inches. The goat went about 10 feet, fell to the ground, and rolled down the hill as it expired quickly. Traditional archery is something I’ve only pursued for the last year in a serious manner. This is now the third animal that I’ve been able to take with this bow and I’m very excited about my arrow set up with the Vintage 400’s and my Grim Reaper Broadheads.
For video of this hunt: South Pacific Goat
Sponsored by: Journey Hunts, Grim Reaper Broadheads & Black Eagle Arrows
For more please go to: Matt Guedes,
If you are looking for a New Zealand hunt of a lifetime, please message me at matt@journeyhunts.com We have 4 weeks reserved for 2017. You can also go to www.journeyhunts.com and sign up for our newsletter so you have access to all of our last minute hunts and hunt specials.
