havgunwilltravel
Active member
Towards the end of 2015 a mate and I headed to Hungary to see good friends over there and hunt a few species of game. Their management principles and game policies are incredible, deeply entrenched through centuries of hard work and study. Coming from Australia where there is very little thought to any management at all of our various herds, it was very refreshing to be a part of this and see it all first hand. I had hunted this country a while back, but this trip over was a lot different and planned better.
We caught the tail end of the roe deer season, looked over a few bucks and I shot a nice male from a herd. It was pouring rain and when i went over to check the buck out i fell over and covered myself in mud. It was a not so elegant moment and we all had a good laugh. He was a good representative of the species and a mature animal. Roe deer are fun to hunt, they like a bit of sunshine and seek good tucker on the crops and improved pasture.
Then the fallow season started, we were a whisker early for the peak of the rut, but we had to go when we did due to the roe deer season ending. Bucks were just starting to make some noise, working scrapes and cruising around looking for does. It wasn’t easy hunting though, I did a lot of bush stalking, looked over a few animals and missed a snap shot at a big malform buck in tight cover. Then an opportunity to hunt up north a little on another hunting area came up and I went there for the afternoon. Looked over a heap of deer, found a true monster at 300m, but the guide wanted to get closer and they legged it out of there. We circled around where the buck went and on the way to the heavy timber he ran into we came across another fully mature buck, around 11 years of age he was heavy and long beamed with big palms, time was running out a bit so I put the crosshairs on him and shot him off the sticks from around 80 metres.
My hunting partner had been keeping busy, he had shot a good roe deer, a couple of great fallow bucks and even managed two golden jackals. They are super rare, and many hunters go a lifetime without seeing one let alone shooting a jackal. He was very fortunate and of course took on the new name of the ‘White Jackal’ and he even came up with a ‘Double Jackal’ hand sign that he still manages to use and remind us of his luck on the jackals. He is currently over there hunting again and I’ve warned him no more jackals!
From this area we travelled to the mountains in a scenic wine region and settled into a hotel in a little village. It was a superb location to be visiting and in no time we met our respective guides and headed into the forest. We looked over a few red deer and found some mouflon ewes and lambs, they have incredible eyesight, probably equal to anything I have hunted. Towards dark we snuck into a little clearing in the mountains and found a herd of ewes, then underneath them there were a group of males, two were very nice and one was superb. I was ready to shoot, but the guide had to look him over to check to make sure he had the right horn style as the flaring rams with horns growing out are often left to grow old and big, where as the ‘suicide’ rams with the horns growing up into their neck/chin region are preferred to be harvested as these types of rams are running on limited time as sooner or later their horns will kill them. Trying to get the right angles to look at the big ram in the fading light was a challenge and in the end we backed out not wanting to shoot a ram that possibly needed to be left.
That evening we visited a local 800 year old cellar that was dug into the hillside under a house and enjoyed some local red. My guide spoke solid English and the robust conversation revolved around hunting in the different countries we had been to.
Next morning we were up in a tree stand watching over the same clearing. A young male mouflon came through, but not much else, some red stags were roaring in the distant and with the morning wearing on we headed to another area.
This consisted of a scrubby ridge surrounded by forest. Far below was the little village, it was quite a scenic location. Glassing the scrubby ridge we soon picked up a couple of rams heading across the ridge seeking the timber on the other end. We didn’t have time to waste and raced up their in the hunting vehicle, climbed halfway up the ridge and sat in a high seat hoping they would pass by within sight. We waited and waited and just as we were about to leave to work around the ridge a flash of colour caught my eye. The rams were coming through. We had got enough of a look to determine one was a definite shooter and the other too young. As the rams entered the only small clearing I could shoot though I steadied for a shot. Just then the guides cell phone rings on full noise. It’s in his pocket, the small ram in front takes off immediately and the larger ram pauses trying to work out what to do, my guide is in a fizz trying to get another look at the ram to make sure its exactly what we need at the same time as he is trying to retrieve his phone out of his pocket. It was all systems go and I knew I had seconds before the opportunity was over. So I let one rip and the ram collapsed. The guide was a bit speechless, we were quite confident the ram was the shooter and he asked me if i had shot the right ram as he didn’t have the same view I had. It was all good though and we celebrated with a few handshakes and laughed at how the only time his cell phone rang for the entire hunt was when we had a mature ram at 60 metres. Some pics and a solid drag out and we had the ram in the back of the 4wd.
The next day I went out with my mate who managed to shoot a very nice heavy horned ram in the forest and that rounded out a very solid trip.
We visited some street festivals in our remaining days, checked out some great culture and unfortunately we flew out on a day when the hunting museums were closed. Next trip we will find time to check these out and see some of the wonderful hunting trophies Hungary has produced.
It’s a superb destination, the trophy fees go back into the hunting areas for management of the animals and paying the game keepers wages and if you don’t harvest an animal the costs are minimal. You pay by weight system over there and it’s a very fair system. Basically the guides have to produce animals in order to generate revenue for the hunting areas and everybody is working towards a quality age class of animals harvested each year. Dealing with local connections we have there is no outfitter involved wanting to make extra and complicate things.
We will go back in 2016 and likely after that keep looking at options for future hunts in different countries within the region. There is just so much respect for the game animals there its hard not to want to explore and see as much as we can.
We caught the tail end of the roe deer season, looked over a few bucks and I shot a nice male from a herd. It was pouring rain and when i went over to check the buck out i fell over and covered myself in mud. It was a not so elegant moment and we all had a good laugh. He was a good representative of the species and a mature animal. Roe deer are fun to hunt, they like a bit of sunshine and seek good tucker on the crops and improved pasture.
Then the fallow season started, we were a whisker early for the peak of the rut, but we had to go when we did due to the roe deer season ending. Bucks were just starting to make some noise, working scrapes and cruising around looking for does. It wasn’t easy hunting though, I did a lot of bush stalking, looked over a few animals and missed a snap shot at a big malform buck in tight cover. Then an opportunity to hunt up north a little on another hunting area came up and I went there for the afternoon. Looked over a heap of deer, found a true monster at 300m, but the guide wanted to get closer and they legged it out of there. We circled around where the buck went and on the way to the heavy timber he ran into we came across another fully mature buck, around 11 years of age he was heavy and long beamed with big palms, time was running out a bit so I put the crosshairs on him and shot him off the sticks from around 80 metres.
My hunting partner had been keeping busy, he had shot a good roe deer, a couple of great fallow bucks and even managed two golden jackals. They are super rare, and many hunters go a lifetime without seeing one let alone shooting a jackal. He was very fortunate and of course took on the new name of the ‘White Jackal’ and he even came up with a ‘Double Jackal’ hand sign that he still manages to use and remind us of his luck on the jackals. He is currently over there hunting again and I’ve warned him no more jackals!
From this area we travelled to the mountains in a scenic wine region and settled into a hotel in a little village. It was a superb location to be visiting and in no time we met our respective guides and headed into the forest. We looked over a few red deer and found some mouflon ewes and lambs, they have incredible eyesight, probably equal to anything I have hunted. Towards dark we snuck into a little clearing in the mountains and found a herd of ewes, then underneath them there were a group of males, two were very nice and one was superb. I was ready to shoot, but the guide had to look him over to check to make sure he had the right horn style as the flaring rams with horns growing out are often left to grow old and big, where as the ‘suicide’ rams with the horns growing up into their neck/chin region are preferred to be harvested as these types of rams are running on limited time as sooner or later their horns will kill them. Trying to get the right angles to look at the big ram in the fading light was a challenge and in the end we backed out not wanting to shoot a ram that possibly needed to be left.
That evening we visited a local 800 year old cellar that was dug into the hillside under a house and enjoyed some local red. My guide spoke solid English and the robust conversation revolved around hunting in the different countries we had been to.
Next morning we were up in a tree stand watching over the same clearing. A young male mouflon came through, but not much else, some red stags were roaring in the distant and with the morning wearing on we headed to another area.
This consisted of a scrubby ridge surrounded by forest. Far below was the little village, it was quite a scenic location. Glassing the scrubby ridge we soon picked up a couple of rams heading across the ridge seeking the timber on the other end. We didn’t have time to waste and raced up their in the hunting vehicle, climbed halfway up the ridge and sat in a high seat hoping they would pass by within sight. We waited and waited and just as we were about to leave to work around the ridge a flash of colour caught my eye. The rams were coming through. We had got enough of a look to determine one was a definite shooter and the other too young. As the rams entered the only small clearing I could shoot though I steadied for a shot. Just then the guides cell phone rings on full noise. It’s in his pocket, the small ram in front takes off immediately and the larger ram pauses trying to work out what to do, my guide is in a fizz trying to get another look at the ram to make sure its exactly what we need at the same time as he is trying to retrieve his phone out of his pocket. It was all systems go and I knew I had seconds before the opportunity was over. So I let one rip and the ram collapsed. The guide was a bit speechless, we were quite confident the ram was the shooter and he asked me if i had shot the right ram as he didn’t have the same view I had. It was all good though and we celebrated with a few handshakes and laughed at how the only time his cell phone rang for the entire hunt was when we had a mature ram at 60 metres. Some pics and a solid drag out and we had the ram in the back of the 4wd.
The next day I went out with my mate who managed to shoot a very nice heavy horned ram in the forest and that rounded out a very solid trip.
We visited some street festivals in our remaining days, checked out some great culture and unfortunately we flew out on a day when the hunting museums were closed. Next trip we will find time to check these out and see some of the wonderful hunting trophies Hungary has produced.
It’s a superb destination, the trophy fees go back into the hunting areas for management of the animals and paying the game keepers wages and if you don’t harvest an animal the costs are minimal. You pay by weight system over there and it’s a very fair system. Basically the guides have to produce animals in order to generate revenue for the hunting areas and everybody is working towards a quality age class of animals harvested each year. Dealing with local connections we have there is no outfitter involved wanting to make extra and complicate things.
We will go back in 2016 and likely after that keep looking at options for future hunts in different countries within the region. There is just so much respect for the game animals there its hard not to want to explore and see as much as we can.
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