The buzzard cruises above the treetops, looking for dinner, in the most beautiful light on the horizon, with the sun's rays on its wings.
The manor owner is hunting in Latvia, which is a bit further along in the season due to the continental climate and slightly more northern location. Read his account here.
The landscape in the area where I am hunting varies with meadows for haymaking, surrounded by forest patches, and with limited agricultural activity. A few cows are tethered for the day, here and there. There are low hills, typically forested, and smaller streams cut furrows into the landscape. It is a delight for the eyes and mind.
There are an incredible number of apple trees in the region, and they are teeming with apples of all colors. It won't be long before they are harvested by local farmers. But the animals are already harvesting them, and red deer are feasting on the juice and energy under the trees.
The temperature has dropped below 20 degrees during the day, and is down to 2-6 degrees at night. This initiates the red deer rutting season, and they roar lustily in the forest edges and meadows early in the morning and late in the evening. During the day, they stay deep within the forests, which are literally deep, with gorges and ravines, and are very difficult for humans to access.
This inaccessibility in the forest areas sparks my imagination, especially in this area, which borders the core of Latvia's largest national park, Gauja Nacionàlajà Parkà, where human access is prohibited. I can hear violent roars from inside the forest, sounding like a forest troll who is very angry. "One day, a real troll might emerge from the forest?", I thought. But it's "just" red deer drawing attention to themselves.
Some evenings, there was brilliant moonlight from the full moon, making it extra exciting to sit out by the forest-fringed meadows with powerful binoculars and observe the deer's mating rituals. If two stag males meet in the clearing, they assess each other's size by the strength of their roars, and if one is a greater opera singer than the other, the smaller one wisely retreats. If they match each other in volume, the matter can only be settled by combat, and direct physical altercations ensue. They crash together, and the collision of their antlers can be heard far and wide. Shortly after, the loser flees, and the winner sends a couple of roars after it and attempts to mount the females who have been observing the activities. A very exciting experience.
Normally, wild boars also appear in the arena, but due to the feared swine fever, their numbers are severely decimated, and for the first few days, I didn't see a single one and had almost given up hope of taking one down.
"How did it go, hunting-wise?" you might wonder. The first few days, a couple of the other guys had fired their cannons, while I involuntarily took on the role of the peaceful bull Ferdinand, sniffing flowers under a tree. But life is beautiful, regardless, and experiences abound for the observant. Among other things, one morning a host of small birds landed in a tree right in front of my post, including a flock of migrating wagtails, and several titmice and reed warblers. A beautiful experience.
Well, back to the question of my hunting luck: Due to widespread swine fever in Eastern Europe, the Latvian authorities have decided to allow hunting of wild boar with night vision equipment to reduce the population in the hope that this will curb the spread of the disease. Thus equipped with a borrowed rifle with a night vision scope, one dark evening I spotted something that initially looked like large stones under an oak tree, far out in a grassy field. But knowing that wild boars love fallen acorns from oak trees, I looked an extra time, and sure enough, they were wild boars, called "mezacuka" in Latvian. Equipped with one cartridge in the chamber and one in my pocket, I crept out into the grassy field and approached the tree where the pigs stood gorging on acorns. Fortunately, they were busy and in all the noise of their eating, they did not notice the hunter slowly approaching. Once within shooting range, a pig was selected, and "BANG"...a shot was fired. Quick reloading in the dark, with my pulse pounding in my body, and up to aim again. The entire herd of pigs was in wild flight, and to the left stood the wounded pig, and a few seconds later it apparently fell dead. The minutes after shooting a wild boar are always very exciting, because IF the pig is not dead, you risk being attacked. It was quite nerve-wracking for me to approach the animal in the dark, because my pulse was pounding so hard in my body that it repeatedly generated sounds that sounded as if something was running towards me. Imagine what I must have looked like something out of a war movie, as I moved forward in the dark, swinging the rifle from side to side. Fortunately, the pig was dead, and all was joy and merriment.
PS: I think I saw a wolf, but I'm not sure.
PPS: Apologies that some of the pictures are a bit blurry due to poor lighting. But they are still good to include in the report. And we promise that if we get some decent audio recordings of the deer's roaring, we will share them here as well.
Forest trolls, duels, and roaring in Latvia
The buzzard cruises above the treetops, looking for dinner, in the most beautiful light on the horizon, with the sun's rays on its wings.
The manor owner is hunting in Latvia, which is a bit further along in the season due to the continental climate and slightly more northern location. Read his account here.
The landscape in the area where I am hunting varies with meadows for haymaking, surrounded by forest patches, and with limited agricultural activity. A few cows are tethered for the day, here and there. There are low hills, typically forested, and smaller streams cut furrows into the landscape. It is a delight for the eyes and mind.
There are an incredible number of apple trees in the region, and they are teeming with apples of all colors. It won't be long before they are harvested by local farmers. But the animals are already harvesting them, and red deer are feasting on the juice and energy under the trees.
The temperature has dropped below 20 degrees during the day, and is down to 2-6 degrees at night. This initiates the red deer rutting season, and they roar lustily in the forest edges and meadows early in the morning and late in the evening. During the day, they stay deep within the forests, which are literally deep, with gorges and ravines, and are very difficult for humans to access.
This inaccessibility in the forest areas sparks my imagination, especially in this area, which borders the core of Latvia's largest national park, Gauja Nacionàlajà Parkà, where human access is prohibited. I can hear violent roars from inside the forest, sounding like a forest troll who is very angry. "One day, a real troll might emerge from the forest?", I thought. But it's "just" red deer drawing attention to themselves.
Some evenings, there was brilliant moonlight from the full moon, making it extra exciting to sit out by the forest-fringed meadows with powerful binoculars and observe the deer's mating rituals. If two stag males meet in the clearing, they assess each other's size by the strength of their roars, and if one is a greater opera singer than the other, the smaller one wisely retreats. If they match each other in volume, the matter can only be settled by combat, and direct physical altercations ensue. They crash together, and the collision of their antlers can be heard far and wide. Shortly after, the loser flees, and the winner sends a couple of roars after it and attempts to mount the females who have been observing the activities. A very exciting experience.
Normally, wild boars also appear in the arena, but due to the feared swine fever, their numbers are severely decimated, and for the first few days, I didn't see a single one and had almost given up hope of taking one down.
"How did it go, hunting-wise?" you might wonder. The first few days, a couple of the other guys had fired their cannons, while I involuntarily took on the role of the peaceful bull Ferdinand, sniffing flowers under a tree. But life is beautiful, regardless, and experiences abound for the observant. Among other things, one morning a host of small birds landed in a tree right in front of my post, including a flock of migrating wagtails, and several titmice and reed warblers. A beautiful experience.
Well, back to the question of my hunting luck: Due to widespread swine fever in Eastern Europe, the Latvian authorities have decided to allow hunting of wild boar with night vision equipment to reduce the population in the hope that this will curb the spread of the disease. Thus equipped with a borrowed rifle with a night vision scope, one dark evening I spotted something that initially looked like large stones under an oak tree, far out in a grassy field. But knowing that wild boars love fallen acorns from oak trees, I looked an extra time, and sure enough, they were wild boars, called "mezacuka" in Latvian. Equipped with one cartridge in the chamber and one in my pocket, I crept out into the grassy field and approached the tree where the pigs stood gorging on acorns. Fortunately, they were busy and in all the noise of their eating, they did not notice the hunter slowly approaching. Once within shooting range, a pig was selected, and "BANG"...a shot was fired. Quick reloading in the dark, with my pulse pounding in my body, and up to aim again. The entire herd of pigs was in wild flight, and to the left stood the wounded pig, and a few seconds later it apparently fell dead. The minutes after shooting a wild boar are always very exciting, because IF the pig is not dead, you risk being attacked. It was quite nerve-wracking for me to approach the animal in the dark, because my pulse was pounding so hard in my body that it repeatedly generated sounds that sounded as if something was running towards me. Imagine what I must have looked like something out of a war movie, as I moved forward in the dark, swinging the rifle from side to side. Fortunately, the pig was dead, and all was joy and merriment.
PS: I think I saw a wolf, but I'm not sure.
PPS: Apologies that some of the pictures are a bit blurry due to poor lighting. But they are still good to include in the report. And we promise that if we get some decent audio recordings of the deer's roaring, we will share them here as well.