The first roar was heard about a week ago and yesterday there were stags out and holding hinds hard across the estate. There were still other groups of stags who were not yet active but we had a hard frost last night so I’m guessing it will go mad in the next few days.

We were stalking up towards the stag shown above using the trees as a cover when the weather turned nasty. So he and hius hinds started moving towards the wood. The need to maintain cover meant that I could not get a clear view but was able to take this glimpse with my telephoto lens. We caught up with him later in the afternoon. He wasa fine 10 pointer, starting to go back but he weighed in at an impressive 20 stone!