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AH elite
“I’ll be honest with you, this is my first day at work.” We had sped down a dark serpentine road towards the mouth of the valley, where we joined up with our head guide Peter Melmer, and apprentice Benedikt Kolp.
Piling into their compact hunting 4×4’s, we then crawled up a steep trail towards the hunting area in low gear. This was when Benedikt revealed his neophyte status to me. His first day of many as a professional hunter… let’s hope we could make it a memorable one.
It was the end of July, the roebuck rut was well underway, when my boyfriend Philipp and our families drove the Autobahn down to Austria. It was our first mutual family hunting trip. Mountain after mountain flashed by as I stared out of the rental car’s window. Our destination was at the very source of the Pitztal valley, a small village named Mandarfen.
The Pitztal is crawling with activities for the whole family. Hunters, hikers, hotel connoisseurs, there’s something for everyone. Our legs welcomed a well deserved stretch, as we examined the accommodation before us. The Verwöhnhotel Wildspitze truly is the Pearl of the Alps. Our rooms were tastefully decorated, the spa facilities utmost relaxing, and the meals were an experience in itself.
Last year, I had joined the Zerfass family on this vacation, and the idea that both families travel together this year was put to action. That first evening Georg, Philipp’s father, shot a roebuck on one of the steep sidehills towering above the valley floor.
Several day hikes, spa treatments and sundowners later, it was opening day for chamois in Tyrol. This was when we met our fantastic guides Peter and Benedikt. A few minutes into the vehicle’s ascent, we spotted a chamois standing in the trees next to the trail. It was indeed an old buck, but we continued higher. The landscape changed and we found ourselves in a wide basin with waterfall-forming terraced arrangements. It looked like a scene out of Lord of the Rings, or that of a tahr hunt in New Zealand, such as that from which my Dad had just returned.
1, 2, 3, we counted the chamois in the panorama before us. High on the slopes I watched a roe buck traversing a ridge, nose to the ground. Later that morning, as we battled the alpenrose bushes to gain elevation, we would hear him spook, barking as he bounded away. From out of nowhere, two chamois tumbled down the mountain at break neck speed. An epic chase was taking place as I’d only ever seen in YouTube clips.
The way that they appeared to be conquering surreal vertical distances in one bound left me speechless. Not too speechless though, as I quickly called Peter and Benedikt’s attention to the rapidly approaching game. The fleeing animal was a young buck of two or three years, the pursuer a big buck! After the larger animal had defended his territory, he retreated to the high bluffs. We shouldered our packs and started after him. The rain had saturated the bushes, leaving us completely drenched. Up top, we caught a glimpse of the bedded buck for a minute, but were then completely engulfed by a heavy mist.
The fog lasted an hour and did its Austrian nickname Gamshütter, the Chamois Protector, justice. That’s certainly what it was today. We sat huddled and shivering. Dad crawled over to Benedikt and commented, “sometimes one has to question his choice of career eh?” His response I’ll never forget: “It’s just water.” Looking over at Aika, the Bavarian Mountain Hound, shuddering with each inhale, I also questioned and admired a hunting dog’s truly insane dedication to its owner and the sport. When the mist finally cleared, Peter judged the chamois to be a nice trophy, but probably just quite not old enough to make the 1. class age mark.
Across the valley, another buck was spotted, lying bedded in an accessible location. We decided to move closer. An hour long “standoff” began. The buck was still laying down and refused to offer a shot. We tried various things to encourage the R. rupicapra to get up. A game call, a couple of hikers loudly wandering along the trail we were laying on, nothing made him budge. The entirety of the wait, fog continuously threatened to roll into our valley.
Jokingly, Dad said the buck was waiting for such cover before making his getaway. Sure enough, as the opaque, white chamois guardian closed the distance, the buck got up. Dad, who had been laying in wait the entire hour, now had his opportunity to shoot. The 6.5x65R Blaser K95 barked, and the chamois reacted to the shot like no other game I’d witnessed before. From a standstill, the buck sprang over a metre straight into the air, all four legs spreading out to the side. Our guide Peter was completely awestruck, and so was I.
“In my guiding days, it’s not very often that something like that happens!” The buck hit the ground running and dashed into the brush. We watched the grass helms parting for his path, and then saw how he collapsed and lay motionless. Less than thirty seconds later, the fog swallowed the rock on which the chamois had been laying, and we were left visionless.
While all this was taking place, Philipp and Georg had also been successful hunting near the top of the valley. After hiking above and in the clouds, they had only spotted younger bucks, so they descended to the valley bottom. From there, they harvested a buck fifty metres distant from the location where Georg had shot last year’s chamois!
My family has a curse; Dad always (rarely with exception) shoots his quarry on the last day of the hunt. For once, we had put it all together on the first day. The first day was the last day, so to speak. The buck was, with his 8 years of age and gracefully swept back horns, a very fine trophy.
Everyone was euphoric and the mood was infectious, kindled by Aika who was beyond pleased with having been the first to the animal, giving the stereotypical “animal dead” bark. She was a well tempered dog and we all shared plenty of laughs as she photogenically posed with the buck and even gave us a little smile for the camera.
Memories were immortalized by frame, the buck eviscerated and folded into a backpack for Benedikt to carry down, and we left the mountainside. We drank a traditional Zirbenschnaps, made by Peter from the trees on those slopes, in Waidmannsheil, for Benedikt’s first day, and in honour of the buck’s last day.
Author:
Savanna Koebisch
The German-Canadian Savanna Koebisch was only 12 weeks old when her parents took her hunting for the first time. Her childhood and youth were marked by outdoor and hunting adventures around the world, and hunting has become an integral part of her daily life. She recently moved from her home in Alberta to Bournemouth, UK to study chiropractic.
