FORTY YEARS AFTER IT BEGAN, THIS FAMILY RITUAL IS STILL CREATING MEMORIES…

The tradition started in the mid-1980s when my Dad and his school friends decided to go on a trip out west from Brisbane to visit and help out on properties while culling pests such as feral pigs.

This culling helps to support and maximise Australia’s agricultural industries, delivering benefits to our economy and Australian consumers. Over 25 years they had picked up skills in quad and dirt bike riding and various shooting techniques by chasing feral pigs and other pests in and out of dry creek beds, then securing a kill through often unsupported, difficult, snap shooting.

Then, more than a decade ago they decided to pass these skills and experiences on to their kids. This exciting cultural shock of freedom and responsibility quickly became a yearly awaited opportunity.

The kids, having now grown up, still experience a sense of childish excitement in anticipation of these annual trips.

Day 1

This year, our destination was a recently purchased 30,000-acre property belonging to Mark “Dammo” Damman, a very close friend of Dad’s near the NSW border town of Goodooga.

Sixteen of us went out for four nights (three quads, two buggies, seven bikes).

Among them Brad “Webby” Webb – NIOA’s NSW sales rep and his kids Georgia and Harrison.

We brought out Dad’s F-250 truck, towing a new Can-Am buggy and a new Suzuki motorcycle to which we hastily fitted an old rubber gun rest before the trip.

The nine-hour drive saw the landscape transition from the concrete of the Brisbane city with small patches of green emerging, to black soil and small cropping country over the Great Dividing Range.

Then the land became more hardened, eventually with familiar cracks of red dirt starting to emerge, but to our surprise, when we dropped south of the border we were met with more foreign country.

Dammo’s property sits on sandy soil with untamed dry grass. We set up camp that night which involved unpacking the trailer and rolling out a swag in an old shearing shed.

A crumbed chop dinner by Dad, a few drinks and plenty of stories around the fire later, I dozed off in my swag dreaming about Day 2, a day of shooting and exploring.

Day 2

I strapped my Ruger No. 1 on to the Suzuki with high hopes. The rifle was a childhood fantasy of mine.

Its simplicity in design and compact profile, complemented by the blued steel and beautiful wood stock stood out to me as a young man while knowing very little about rifles.

I now appreciate the .303 calibre and falling block mechanism, which while in many ways may be obsolete or antiquated, gave me a sense of nostalgia and sentimentality.

The rifle pairs perfectly with the Leupold optic which has the traditional glossy, anodised finish.

The rifle was drawn twice that morning, but only claimed one carcass, which was enough to tell me I was out of practice and needed to get my eye in. The rest of the day was spent battling my motorbike over sandy soil, occasionally helping Dammo out with his cattle and getting more of an understanding of the property.

My rifle had its first topple of the trip in the heat of cutting a micky bull. It caught a whack to the barrel and ended up with a muzzle full of dirt, but thankfully no other damage.

That evening I parked my bike near a shallow lake that Dammo put me on to and took the No. 1 for a walk. While I didn’t spot the number of boar I was hoping for, I took the opportunity on the otherwise quiet lake to get reacquainted with my rifle.

I left feeling much more confident in my shooting, ready for any opportunities I would face the next day. I joined back with the others and watched the sunset from a bore water spring, then relived the excitement of the day over a stew by the gidgee fire that night.

Day 3

The next morning the crew were eager for a kill and they weren’t taking any chances. In Dad’s Can-Am he brought his Barrett Fieldcraft, a lightweight hunting rifle in .243. If my Ruger is the old then this is the new, with its ultra-short action size, slim barrel profile and carbon fibre stock.

Like the Ruger, the style of shooting we do brings it slightly out of its element but at the end of the day there’s no trade-off for confidence in a rifle and that’s one thing the Fieldcraft inspires.

Sitting shotgun in the buggy was Doug Quayle with his stainless Marlin 45-70, a gun equally confidence-inspiring and one that needs no introduction to our readers.

We headed out with one spot in mind and that was Dammo’s lake. The buggy slowed on approaching the lake and we were immediately met with animal smells and an eeriness that promised a pest or two.

A scan of the lake however told a different story as all to be seen was the silhouette of a slender black feral cat standing side on. This image quickly made its way in the Duplex crosshairs of Dad’s Leupold scope. The shot was fired but eerily seemed to almost pass through the animal. The cat scattered with only a cloud of dust left in its place.

That was not the last we would see of this pest, especially for Dad who replayed that shot in his head all day. The buggy then got bogged in that muddy lake bed and after pulling it out, the bikes struggled through fine sand to the next spot.

Hopes were down and nothing was going right but the quiet optimists among us were at the ready as we approached a small dam. The buggy was the first over the rise and the immediate slamming of the brakes were followed by several shots.

The shots landed and two running pigs were dropped. One by the 45-70 and one by the Fieldcraft. Adrenalin was high as I was waved ahead to chase down a third.

Over a fallen fence and through the scrub I chased a spotted boar until it slowed and while it presented at an odd angle, I knew not to waste the opportunity. I drew the No. 1, loaded a round and fired. He went down, I then drove closer and delivered a finishing shot.

We were soon after called in to help with the mustering of a few wild cattle which hailed from the Kimberley. In the chase my rifle was sitting in one of the buggies and it caught some bruises as that buggy toppled on its side.

Exhausted, but thrilled by the excitement of the day’s shooting, we decided to head out for a spotlight that night. The 360° LED lights made it impossible to miss a set of glowing eyes, of which we only saw one. There was not an animal to be seen that night until we went back past the lake.

While we casually scanned the lake, Dad was looking for one thing and when we arrived he saw exactly that. The phantom cat was back but not for long, it immediately ducked into an isolated bush.

Dad put the car in park as we grabbed our rifles. There was nowhere for it to go. Backlit by the LEDs we crept up on the bush but when we got there the cat was nowhere to be seen. It left us questioning what we saw as we walked back to the car.

In an ironic moment of déjà vu the truck then got bogged, this time in the sand and it took a set of recovery tracks to get us back on our way home.

Day 3 certainly had its ups and downs. Sitting around the fire we were left thinking about the ones we got, and the ones that got away, but exciting news was spread over corned beef that night about a sighting of 300 pigs around a grain store on a nearby property. This set a new direction for day 4.

Day 4

The stage was set by breakfast. Dammo had called his neighbour and had permission for us to go after the pigs on his property, but first up was a trip to the southern side of the property in an area previously unreachable due to flooding, which Dammo was yet to explore himself.

We had no idea what to expect or what this seemingly simple trip had in store. The first paddock gave us an idea, there were no graded paths and our vehicles had to putter at low speeds through two feet of tall, dry grass over branches and logs.

The buggies and quads would lay tracks for the bikes to come through. We held this pace all the way to the clearing at the bottom of the farthest paddock.

I climbed up on a water tank and got great views of the marvellous land and we all took a second to take it in before heading back.

The putter on the way back hadn’t picked up any pace and a couple of the quads along with my Suzuki were starting to experience trouble battling through with little airflow. A few of the vehicles started to seriously overheat and we pulled up to the sound of bubbling engines by another water tank.

We eventually made our way out, having to change a busted tyre on the way. That night we didn’t have that much to celebrate but the usual banter picked up again while chowing down on rib fillets I cooked, and stories of near misses were quick to be exaggerated.

We didn’t quite end up getting the 300 pigs but that day was memorable.

Day 5

Dammo was back grading in the morning and we all packed up and left at our own pace. The experiences of the trip stewed in our minds on the drive home. While its merits as a shooting trip could be questioned, there’s no denying that we experienced a lot and I can’t wait until we’re back there next year.