‘Best hunter of his generation’ stalked Te Urewera
Alegend among the generation who professionally stalked New Zealand’s high country for deer and other pests, Alan Duncan, who has died aged 84, was a man of few words but great action and deeds.
‘‘Dunc’’, as he was known, was an outstanding hunter and marksman described by many as the best hunter of his generation, possibly the best that has ever hunted the high country.
He was a contemporary and mate of the writer Barry Crump, who through his 1960 book, A Good Keen Man, brought into the living rooms of the nation the yarns and the world of hardworking bush men like ‘‘Dunc’’.
An April 2007
New Zealand
Geographic article on the deer recovery industry described Duncan as ‘‘a member of Crumpy’s bunch in the Ureweras and [was] considered – if such distinction can be awarded – the best hunter New Zealand has produced’’.
In the 1983 publication The Chopper Boys, author Rex Forrester, who first met Duncan in 1951, described him as a ‘‘top hunter, for whatever block he was assigned to he would double the tally of the hunter who was there before him’’.
‘‘He’s revered and respected by all who know him, one of the true greats of hunting professionalism,’’ Forrester wrote.
Alan Trevor Duncan was born in Rotorua in 1933. The family moved to a dairy farm at Hikutaia, on the Hauraki Plains, in 1938 and later to Opotiki, where he got a love of hunting.
The family moved to Hamilton when Duncan was 15. He tried a couple of city jobs before the bush called and he took a job as a government hunter, working first in Te Urewera. In his first seven months, he killed 1660 deer, demonstrating immediately the crack marksman he was.
During his time in Te Urewera, he earned the respect and life-long friendship of another distinguished writer, and former deer culler, Jack Lasenby.
‘‘We saw a fair bit of each other in the early 1960s when Dunc was possuming at the Hopuruahine, and had built himself a snug little A-frame hut,’’ Lasenby recalls.
‘‘He had an enormous teapot, the size of a four-gallon kerosene tin, and never threw out the tea leaves, just adding another handful each brew.
‘‘I was working the Horomanga, and we swapped visits, travelling across country. Dunc was good in the bush, as he was good at anything he turned his hand to.
‘‘He was fairly small, but had a tough, efficient body. Crump once said, ‘Put Dunc up Queen St in Auckland, and he’d come back with half a dozen tails swinging on his belt.’
‘‘Dunc never concerned himself with status. Pomposity and competitiveness were unknown to him. He saw a job and did it. He was probably the most modest person I’ve ever known.’’
In the February 2018 issue of NZ Outdoor Hunting, Hans Willems described Dunc as a ‘‘boots, but no socks, man, who never laced up his boots around camp and was always barefooted’’. ‘‘Dunc applied himself to hunting with a single-mindedness that bordered on the ruthless.’’
He was also a man with a big heart and, after moving south to Blenheim, met the love of his life, Denise. They married and moved to Makarora, where Duncan had hunting blocks, first flying light aircraft and then moving to helicopters, hunting for Sir Tim Wallis and Alpine Helicopters.
When he decided his professional hunting days were over, and the children had all left home, he and Denise retired to a home they built at Maungawera, Wanaka, running a few deer on the property, before moving to Geraldine for their later years. Downsizing only slightly more, they made their final move to Pleasant Point, Timaru.
But his hunting days weren’t completely over – three years ago he and Lasenby decided to have one last adventure together: ‘‘Dunc was staying with me [in Lasenby’s Wellington city apartment], and we went up the Wairarapa to see John McCann, shot a fat hind on Tim Williams’ farm, and brought it home in the boot.
‘‘We dressed it in Dunc’s bush shirt and an old hat, and smuggled it up to my flat on the 13th floor.
‘‘Dunc was kneeling in the kitchen, cursing and skinning the cold carcass. He had my skinning knife in one hand, gore and hairs up to his elbows and across his face where he’d wiped his hand, when the doorbell rang and in came the chairman of directors of my tower block of flats.
‘‘I introduced them formally. Dunc smiled shyly, but it looked like a homicidal leer, and the chairman backed out saying he’d call some other time.
‘‘We cut back the rib cage, fitted it into my weekend bag, and filled it with boned meat and paua from John McCann. Dunc flew home next day, and my last glimpse of him was as he casually passed off the bag to a booking clerk as nearly empty.
‘‘For a while, after his visit, people didn’t have much to say to me in the lift.’’
Duncan is survived by his five children, three grandchildren and three greatgrandchildren. – By Deborah Hannan