Twin Elements Podcast · Hunting Stories
My First Velvet Buck: Bull Ants, PB Billy Goats, and a Fallow Buck That Read the Script
Fallow bucks in velvet are one of the most underrated opportunities in Australian hunting, and this January I finally got my own first one on the ground. Before I get into the story, though, I want to break down how to actually find them — because once you understand the pattern, they’re some of the most predictable animals you’ll ever hunt.
First fallow buck down, with the fox pup that wouldn't leave the carcass alone. Image by James Doumtsis
In This Report
From the Field
Finding Velvet Country
Fallow bucks don’t behave like they do the rest of the year. Growing out a new rack means they avoid the thick dogwood and deep gullies they’ll retreat to later, favouring semi-open, sparsely timbered country instead — those delicate antler tips simply can’t afford to be smashing through dense scrub. Not every property holds velvet animals either; plenty of deer will travel ten to twenty kilometres from where they rutted just to grow out their antlers somewhere quieter.
The easiest tell is cast antlers. If you’re finding them on a property — even old, bleached, chalky ones — mark the spot. That’s exactly how I found my own honey hole: Dad discovered a big old white castoff a couple of ruts back on a place we hunt, right on the edge of the property boundary up in goat country. Nobody looks for deer up there, because nobody’s looking for sheep or cattle there either. I went back eight months later and found a genuine bachelor group growing out their velvet in exactly that spot.
That’s really the whole secret: privacy and a tight, repeatable home range. Fallow bucks might only move a few hundred metres a day between bedding and feeding, and they’ll use the same quiet, out-of-the-way gullies year after year unless something drastic — a chopper cull, serious pressure — wipes them out. Find that pattern once, and you can go straight back to it every season without needing to scout all over again.
The Stalk
I only had one afternoon free — venture presentations, YouTube editing, and vet work had eaten most of my summer — so I flew out to a spot I’d already patterned with Matty a few weeks earlier, arriving about 4:30pm with light until eight. I set up what I expected to be an ambush on a west-facing slope where I knew they bedded, boots and pack off, expecting them to feed out toward me as the day cooled. They didn’t disappoint — a mob of fallow bucks appeared 150 to 180 metres out, feeding exactly where I’d hoped. That’s the beauty of these animals: hunting in general is chaos and guesswork, but bachelor mobs in velvet will follow the same script practically every day.
I made one dumb mistake early — moved between cover when I probably should have sat tight — and bumped the first group off about a hundred metres. No real harm done; they settled and kept feeding. But dropping down through the same country, I ran straight into a mob of billy goats sharing the same slope, which complicated things: their perpendicular sightline meant every step I took registered as full-body movement to them rather than the more forgiving side-on silhouette the deer were getting.
The Ants
Then things got properly uncomfortable. I’d taken my socks off to deal with grass seeds and unknowingly planted a bare foot straight into a bull ant nest. What followed was, without exaggeration, one of the more painful stalks of my life — repeated hits around the toes each time I had to stay frozen in place while a buck looked my way, unable to shift my foot without blowing the stalk. At one point it felt less like bad luck and more like a coordinated assault — every time I paused near an ant, it seemed to sense an opportunity and come straight for me. I ended up dispatching a few of them just to reduce the casualties, copping another hit or two in the process.
Eventually the goats moved off, the bucks settled, and I found a decent game trail to work along — carefully, given everything that had already gone wrong that afternoon.
The Shot
I closed to around thirty metres using a scatter of small acacia bushes as cover, moving my feet inches at a time whenever a flock of lorikeets overhead created enough noise to mask movement. The biggest buck in the group was bedded, body facing me but neck kinked to look down the hill — meaning if he stood, I’d likely get the shot I wanted.
“He stood eventually, stretched, looked around — genuinely one of the fattest, most impressive-bodied animals you’ll see this time of year, built like a forty-four-gallon drum on skinny legs — and then, ignoring the script entirely, dropped straight over the round of the hill instead of coming my way.”
Two smaller spikers followed him down, which opened up the ground in front of me nicely. I edged forward another couple of steps and found the second-biggest buck in the mob feeding at thirty metres, slightly quartering away. Settled my thirty-metre pin, released, and watched the pilot-cut broadhead do exactly what it’s built to do — he covered maybe twenty metres before folding over for good. A second, equally handy chocolate-coloured buck stood nearby the whole time, oblivious, looking at his mate — the kind of moment archery gives you that a rifle never would. I let him be; taking him too would have felt like piling on rather than hunting.
The Long Walk Out
Getting photos sorted in the dark with nothing but an iPhone and a Walk and Stalk bar was its own small ordeal — compounded by an inquisitive three-quarter-grown fox pup that kept circling the carcass and my gear, sniffing everything, utterly unbothered by my presence until I’d had enough and dispatched him too at five metres. Purely pest control, not a hunt, but satisfying all the same.
The buck himself carried close to an inch and a half of fat across his back and rump — genuinely impressive condition for this time of year — and I packed out both backstraps, both back legs, one good front leg, and the head across steep, side-hilling country. Didn’t get home until 2am. Completely worth it. A good caffeine hit and the fact that you’ve actually connected on something makes carrying it out feel a lot lighter than it should.
First fallow buck down, and a proper reminder of why I want to make every hunting opportunity count this year rather than just clocking up scouting miles like I did last season.
Field Gear & Safaris
The Adventure Continues
Join the Twin Elements team as they head back into the Australian bush.
Want the full story behind this episode, in James’s own words? Listen here.
Prefer to see it play out on camera? Watch the next adventure on the Twin Elements YouTube channel.
