Until a couple of years ago I didn't realize that the Red Stag hunts in New Zealand were High Fence/Canned hunts. There are free range hunts there, but pretty much all of those monster stags are killed on High Fence Operations. From what I understand, New Zealand has very few game laws and even less enforcement. I'd thought about a trip to New Zealand as I've always wanted to see the country, meet the people, etc. but I'm not about to pay to kill a half tame animal. Plus I can't take the meat home from there!!!

I didn't know that either and have also wanted to hunt NZ some day and see some of the country. We used to have a NZ outfitter who posted on HuntingNet and was a good guy. Wonder if he's still around?

I've hunted ranches in Texas that were thousands of acres in size. These ranches were fenced but not what I would consider high fence hunting.

Most of the NZ operations on the Southern Island is high fence Calhunter but most are some fairly large areas that are fenced. The Northern Island has less high fencing because of the terrain. It has a lot more mountains or steep hills and valleys. Both islands have outside the fence free range as well.

That's good to know. NZ stays on the bucket list.

Ive got a buddy that guided and filmed for scent blocker. He took a group into the mountains in NZ to hunt red stag. When they got them up in the mountains they surprised him and the hunt was actually for him and he got to take a huge red stag.

From the pictures I can't imagine it was high fence as it was really vast and rugged landscape.