Central West Branch. 35 Prince St Perthville NSW Sambar s Roar

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1 Central West Branch 35 Prince St Perthville NSW 2795 Sambar s Roar March/April 2013

2 Branch Directory President: Daniel McBryde Esq. Ph: Vice President: James Leven Ph: Secretary: Andy McBryde Ph: Treasurer: Dean Rich Ph: Hunter Education: Clem McKinnon Ph: Publicity: Daniel McBryde Esq. Ph: Firearms Registry Locked Bag No 1 Murwillumbah NSW 2484 Phone: Game Council NSW 59 Hill St Orange NSW Firearms Licences We are able to conduct tests for people wishing to apply for a firearms license. If you know anyone who is interested in applying for a license put them in contact with the branch. The branch now receives all the monies from license application testing. In an effort to build membership, a deal for people who are applying for a license for the first time has been implemented. Instead of the usual $77 for the license test, $80 to join the ADA and $10 to process a Game Council license, an all up cost of $105 will be charged (the club only receives $25 but gains a new member). This has been very popular with people applying for their Shooters License for the first time. Using ADA as a Genuine Reason Don t forget if you use your ADA membership as a Genuine Reason for having a Firearms License, please remember that you are required to attend a minimum of two (2) branch activities. Whether they are shoots, meetings or club hunts, it is your responsibility to ensure you meet the requirements. The secretary is required to submit attendance records to State on a regular basis, who in turn collate attendances for the Firearms Registry. Meetings Meetings are held the third Tuesday of the month, February to November commencing at 7.30pm unless otherwise specified. Newsletters If you would like to submit an interesting article or photo, please send it to the below. Articles must include the name and address of the author. If you have some trick new hunting or camping gear why not write a couple of paragraphs about it and send it in. More than two-thirds of the newsletters are now delivered via . If you would like to receive the newsletter via , please drop me a line at centralw.editor@austdeer.asn.au so I can record it for use. Newsletters received via will have the benefit of full colour photographs. Don t forget to send any articles or photos into me to be included in the newsletters. Let the other members know what you have been up to. me at centralw.editor@austdeer.asn.au. ******************************* Coming up: Club Hunt: 6 7 April, Mt David State Forest Royal Bathurst Show: April, Bathurst Show Ground. April Meeting Tuesday 16 April, 7:30pm, Victoria Hotel, Cnr Havannah and Keppel Streets, Bathurst. Club Hunt: April, Corryong, Victoria. ******************************* Disclaimer: The Central West Branch of the Australian Deer Association takes no responsibility for the views expressed in any article in this newsletter. All articles submitted are signed by the relevant author. Cover Photo: This fallow doe was spotted and stalked early one morning in February Photo by Daniel McBryde.

3 Bathurst Show Stall. The Central West Branch of the Australian Deer Association will be running a stall at the 2013 Royal Bathurst Show. The club has booked a site in the Pavilion close to the door facing the highway. It was decided that it would be a good way to promote the club to the wider community as well as pick up some new members. We will be running a raffle with the prize being a dome swag. Tickets will be two dollars each and can be purchased directly from the stall at the show. We will have a few mounts on the wall and so far we have a red deer and a rusa deer shoulder mount, two fallow deer skull mounts and a pig. Several members have volunteered time to run the stall, though there is always room for a few extras, even if only for an hour to relieve members. So if you re in the vicinity, come and say hello and buy a ticket or two. If you know anybody interested in deer hunting, then pass this message along to them as we would like to see them and say hello. If you would like to volunteer some time on the stall, please contact Andy McBryde on We hope to see a few of you there. Club Hunts. There are two club hunts in the pipeline for April. The first is a local trip to Mt David State Forest. This will be over the weekend of the 6 th and 7 th of April. Mt David holds a few fallow deer as well as pigs, foxes and a few goats at times. Be warned though that the deer are very cagey little buggers and are very switched on. Contact Dean Rich on if you have any enquiries. This is typical country that can be expected in Mt David State Forest.

4 The second club hunt will be to the Corryong area of Victoria from the 25 th to 28 th April. We have had several trips to the region before and have seen numerous fallow and several sambar sightings. Hopefully the fallow will still be in the rut as it is a great experience to hear the bucks croaking in the mornings and evenings. The chances of taking a fallow for meat are very good and there are a few bucks around for those who put in the effort. Sambar are in the region though will require a little bit more effort to see one, though a member recently stalked to within 10 metres of a young sambar stag in the exact region planned for the hunt, so the rewards are there for those who put in the effort. Please ring Dan McBryde on if you have any enquiries about this event. Fox Tally A fallow buck chasing a couple of does in the Corryong region in April After the success of the fox tally over 2012, we will have another one over this year. Last year the club shot a total of 114 foxes. Let s see if we can beat that this year. So far the total is 2 foxes, with Dan McBryde and James Leven both taking a fox each. That has got the tally going so let me know if you have shot any foxes so far this year and please keep me updated as the year goes on. Contact me on the following address with numbers and any pics. centralw.editor@austdeer.asn.au

5 Out and About What the members have been up to. Several members have been busy so far this year. Dan McBryde was out through February scouting and saw a few fallow about. Several were stalked with the camera and a few pics taken, though a bigger zoom lens would be handy. Andy McBryde and Dean Rich have just got back from a few days at Corryong in Victoria. They saw plenty of fallow including several bucks. The weather was quite warm with temperatures in the high twenties so they passed up the opportunity to take a meat animal. The bucks were in the two-anda-half to three-and-a-half year range and were passed up to let them grow a bit more. Well done lads. Andy McBryde also stalked to within 10 metres of a young sambar stag that was feeding in a very dense patch of vegetation. He noticed the stag browsing at 45 metres and took an hour to stalk a bit closer. The stag had small antlers so it was passed up, but what an experience! James Leven and Dan McBryde had an early morning trip to a local state forest in March. With the misty rain blowing in sideways, they stalked to within 30 metres of two fallow does in the gloom before dawn. It was too dark (and wet) for a photo but it was a great experience all the same. Good sign was seen indicating a few deer were in the area. James took a fox later on that morning which helped him christen his.300 WSM. Andy has also been taking his family out for a hunt and picnic in a local state forest. He took his wife and two daughters for an evening stroll and managed to see a pig feeding out in a gully. The girls had a ball spotting rabbits and other animals so the trip was certainly worth the effort. What a great way to get the kids active and interested in the great outdoors. It s a good idea to have all persons wearing at least one article of blaze orange when hunting in state forests, even if they are not actually hunting. Be safe and be seen. Craig Colley has been getting quite a few pigs lately but also took a bit of time out to chase the old green fish again. He recently spent a day on a local river with a mate and took a few good cod on lures. Below are a few of the fish he caught and released. James with his fox on a very wet and cold March morning.

6 Dan McBryde snapped an interesting photo of a young powerful owl one morning. It was interesting as they are not usually seen all that much. It is only the second one he has seen in his life so it was quite a moment.

7 Below are a few photos of some very recent fallow buck sign. I thought I would include this for the new members to see what they should be looking out for. The bucks mark their territory by rubbing the horizontal branches of pine trees. The sign is typically found on the pines around the edges of glades in the pine forests. Also, the bucks tend to have a small scrape below the branch which can also be used to determine the freshness of the sign. Look for horizontal branches that have broken sprigs or branches that have been stripped bare. Check the freshness of the sprigs on the ground to see how old the sign is. Broken pine sprigs can stay reasonably fresh for a couple of days so may not be within the last 12 hours. So get out there and get after them. Good luck!

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