SIKA STAG SECOND TIME AROUND

The car was reading minus 3 degrees when I arrived at an area I’d never visited before and my 12kg pack suddenly seemed a little underweight for two nights of those temperatures.

I had decided on my route based on some map studies and it was about an hour before I bumped into my first deer. Soon after this I got a stag roaring and continued to come across lots of hinds throughout the day. That night as I shivered in my hammock, the Sika stags were roaring well in a number of directions but the bush I’d encountered that day was steep and next-level thick, with tons of old snow damage.

The next morning I headed off in the direction of the closest sounding stag from the night before. Eventually I got him roaring again and after a long slow stalk in my socks, I got within 50m, only for him to shut up and