The dust swirled in the midday heat of the Zambezi Valley, as we lay motionless behind a small outcrop of black rock that reflected its heat towards us. Shade was sparse apart from a clump of green about 15 meters ahead.
This was directly in line of the two Dagga Boys bedded down in some jesse 40 meters further. Just a small patch of black and a flick of an ear gave them away.
The day had started with a cup of freshly brewed coffee hot off the campfire. The staff were jovial as they loaded the Cruiser with Cokes, a couple of beers for the trip home later that evening, and a whole lot of water. Our ‘scoff box’ was filled with sandwiches and biltong, apples and some crisps – a five-star meal for the field. The shrill screech of a barred owlet broke the pre-dawn silence as we sat enjoying the cool dark morning. My client and good friend had hunted several times with me over the years, and we knew after yesterday’s trek in the hot Zimbabwean sun that today might not be different.
The drive from camp to our chosen area for the day was uneventful in the dark, with the headlights occasionally picking up the darting gleam of a springhare’s eyes as he hopped across the road. About five kilometers from camp we bumped into a young hyena as he casually trotted up the road towards the skinning shed. Hyena are a common menace around camp, attracted by the smell from the boneyard, and often stir up feelings of fear among the staff.
We began to make out the looming hills of the Zambezi escarpment, and a light breeze stirred the leaves of the mopane trees, but steep ravines, hills and a myriad of gullies leading into Lake Kariba turn the wind into a living thing. Mike (not his real name) had pushed himself to the limit over the last several days: long sessions on the tracks of groups of bulls, terrible winds, and one group of irate elephant cows that made us expose our position while on a closing stalk on some buff all made us pay the price, and Mike’s feet were no exception. Large blisters had formed on his left heel. Moleskin and double socks were helping for now, but another one of those days would mean possible complications and an inability to walk long enough to get into position for a shot.
A tap on the roof indicated that Steve, my trusty tracker and good friend of many years had seen something. We stopped and walked quietly towards the waiting crew who were excitedly pointing at a large deep imprint in the mud of a small wallow just off the dirt track.
“Nyathi,” Steven whispered, shaking his ash bag. Small hand gestures, and subdued excited chatter by the staff was all we heard as we slowly walked back to the vehicle to prepare ourselves for the hunt.
We huddled around the vehicle waiting for the darkness to lift enough to see. As the first rays hit, shadows shifted and the bush came alive with the hum of insects, the cooing of doves and distant roar of a lion. I was filled with the joy of doing something I love, thankful for being fortunate to experience the beauty Africa has to offer.
A small whistle alerted me to the whereabouts of my trackers. Steven has mastered the art of mimicking small birds, and we often communicated like this while on the hunt. Steven in the lead, followed by myself and then Mike, with the rest a few meters behind us. Heading west, we picked up freshly imprinted sign behind some soup plate-sized tracks of Dagga Boys a couple of hundred meters further on.
Mike was carrying a .416 loaded with 400-grain ammunition. His initial shot would be a soft, followed by solids if necessary. This is my preferred method when hunting Dagga Boys. I was using a .470 double. Given to me by General Norman Schwarzkopf while hunting together in Northern Botswana in the late nineties, this rifle has a special place in my heart. I have carried it ever since and it has saved my life on a few occasions.
There were two bulls, both huge-bodied buffalo judging by the tracks. It also meant four eyes and four ears, and having hunted this portion of the Zambezi Valley for many years that meant potentially wise old warriors, veterans of many failed stalks. I was sure that the human smell was imprinted in their DNA, and a mere whiff on swirling winds would mean a long day playing cat and mouse.
We had been walking slowly through several small patches of jesse bush when we came to an opening on the side of a low-lying hill. As is common, there is often a lot of seepage into these drainage areas creating, luscious patches of green grass. The tracks led through the grass, leaving freshly chewed snippets of fodder, obvious signs that the buff spent some time here feeding. Cautiously we glassed the thicker brush on either side and ahead, hoping for a glimpse of black among the grey. The wind was good and, being early, the dew made things quiet. The tracks led along an elephant path through a large thicket towards a pan that I had frequented on my last safari. Knowing the area well, I knew the pan was about two kilometers away, secretly nestled deep within some cathedral mopane. There was no road into this portion, and the area was untouched. A yellow-billed hornbill flew close by, hopping down in front of us, catching insects we disturbed from the grass.
Gradually the bush became louder with the sounds of birds, indicating we were getting close to water. Slowing our pace and staying close together, we crept forward until we could see the glimmer of water through the trees. Sweat fogged my lenses. Kneeling, we peered through the fallen trees and branches, we slowly made our way closer until were we at the edge of the waterhole. We picked up the tracks that led around the water and saw noticed that the bulls had ran through the water. Was it the wind? Had they see us? Heard us?
Then Steve pointed to a neat imprint from a lioness. She must have been what we heard early that morning from the truck. A curse under my breath made Mike laugh a little as he noticed the disgust on my face… “Bloody lions,” I said, “we found them first!”
The trackers had perked up a little, walking a little more carefully while sending cautious glances towards the greenery. We followed a good 500 meters and saw that the buff had settled to quick trot, still knocking over small shrubs and showing no sign of calming. We continued for another kilometer till the tracks turned into the hills and slowed to a walk. Beads of sweat were forming on our brows as the sun hit our backs, and a few annoying mopane bees started gathering around our eyes and ears. Glassing up the steep side of the hill, we had a fairly good view of the ridge as well as a few hundred meters to each side. There was only one sure route up and the buff had taken it. A wide ngwasha or elephant path wound its way up the hill, through fallen boulders and across steep gullies formed by many years of torrential rain.
Shouldering our packs we pushed upwards. Every step gave us wonderful views of the escarpment and the river that carved its way through sandstone cliffs to finally spill into Lake Kariba. With each step I tried to picture the terrain ahead. I had hunted this certain range for several years and had some idea of possible springs and decent bedding areas for cranky old buff. Nearing the ridge, we stopped for a breather and took a swig of cool water. Chatting quietly to the crew, we all agreed that the bulls were heading to a steep ravine between two hills, a common resting area for them as we had often found remnants of their dung. If my memory served me right, they had chosen an extremely difficult area for us to approach.
Large hills and gullies made midday winds a nightmare; steep rocky slopes with minimal cover made a stealthy stalk impossible; we needed luck and lot of it. The trick was a combination of stealth and speed. If we took too long, the heat would build up, winds would become fickle, and the buffalo restless. Too fast, and we risked spooking them if they saw us first – odds were definitely in their favor.
We stopped, crouched, and motioned for the rest to do the same. Both Steven and I had heard a sound – ox-peckers – a sure sign that we were close. We scanned the horizon and picked up a few buffalo ahead. They disappeared into the tree line about 300 meters in front. Game on! From this point forward, odds were slightly better as we potentially had a direction and idea of where they were. A short group discussion, and we carefully took positions and started the slow approach to where they could be resting. It was 10 a.m. and the sun was fierce, humidity was high and sweat drenched us. Steven’s back behind his water pack was soaking and my hand felt clammy against the comforting grip of my double.
Meter by meter we crept forward, coming to a stop every time we heard a noise, a rustle or if we had an opening through which we could glass ahead. The tracks led down the side of a ravine through some fallen black rocks that looked exactly like bedded-down buff. The bulls were walking slowly and dragging their hooves – the warmth and heat making them drowsy. They would sleep well, especially after a night of feeding and the fading of adrenalin from their encounter with the lioness.
How wrong could I have been!
I firmly believe that most good trackers that have spent time doing what they love have a sixth sense, and Steven was no exception. His uncanny ability to read the signs and his acute knowledge of the area enabled him to almost pinpoint where an animal would be at a certain time of the day. He froze, slowly crouched down beside the tracks and pointed ahead. Moving to the side and slightly right as he has done on countless hunts, Steven gave me room to scan ahead.
The jumble of fallen branches was enough to hide a fully-grown elephant bull, the intertwined limbs of the ‘shaving-brush combretum’ formed an almost impenetrable wall. Glassing from left to right in a slow arc, I slowly adjusted my binos to be able to see through the wall of green and into the dark shadows behind. A kudu barked in the valley below, and the shrill calls of a few ox-peckers ahead alerted me to the general direction of the buffalo, and I turned slowly around and peered intently towards the fading sounds of these “policemen.”
Mopane bees… It felt like thousands of the annoying little buggers were trying to get into both my ears and eyes. Glancing back, I noticed that I was not the only one bothered, as I saw Mike had the same issue, except one had made its way into his left eye and secreted a fluid that was making it water, temporarily blinding him. Steven took a bottle of water and flushed it out as best he could. A few minutes later we were back on track and with each step, the sound of silence grew as birds and animals alike found shade in which to escape the intense heat.
As I trained my binoculars at a certain discolored spot ahead, my eyes and mind played tricks on me – whatever it was, it was motionless, perhaps a rock, a buttress of roots or a fallen tree. Minutes ticked by and just as I was about to look elsewhere, a small movement made me hit the brakes. I stared fixedlythrough the brilliant optics of my 10×42 binos for what seemed like forever, when I saw it again… An ever so slight movement. My eyes adjusted, I tweaked the optics and wham!
The gentle flick of an ear!
The bulls were bedded down about 40 meters ahead and currently everything was in our favor. The wind was good, cover was ample where we lay motionless and, most importantly, we had seen them first. My heart beat a little faster and I could feel a small rush of adrenalin. They say this is a fight or flight reaction, and we were definitely in it for the fight.
No matter how many times I find myself in a similar position, the feeling always surfaces – it’s one of the reasons we do what we do. It’s not about shooting off a truck, sitting at a waterhole or in a machan. I am talking about the freedom of hunting large, unspoilt areas of the Dark Continent, about pitting oneself against a worthy adversary in his own back yard.
Judging from their position, the buff would begin to feel the heat on their huge, mud-caked bodies and might shift slightly, giving us a better opportunity for a shot or a better approach, or a glimpse at their horns. Old and solid, nothing beats a buffalo trophy than age.
Time went by and still we sat. Bees buzzed incessantly around our moist eyes. I felt dehydrated and my tongue felt thick. I was sure Mike felt the same and slowly pushed a half-empty bottle of tepid water towards him, careful not to make sudden movements or any noise. Startled ox peckers flew up as one of the bulls pushed his heavy body to his feet, and the small patch of black tuned into a behemoth of muscle as he stepped briefly into a small opening and further into the thick safety of cover.
Mike had his rifle ready, shouldered with the safety off, and knelt down. He preferred at that range to shoot freehand. I had hunted enough with him to know his abilities and was very comfortable with his skills. The fleeting glimpse did not allow enough time for an accurate trophy judgment from me or for a shot by Mike. But the silent message between us simply translated as “amazing!”
Then the other buff decided to join him and we heard some small twigs snap as he rose from his position. We were not so lucky this time as this bull walked directly away from us giving us a look at his tail or what was left of it. A small stump, sheared off about a foot from his anus was all that remained, totally healed and almost comical as it moved from side to side in a futile attempt to brush the biting flies from his flanks. He too disappeared from sight, leaving us huddled in the half-shade calculating our next move. Effort, our water bearer and assistant tracker to Steven, whispered in excitement:
“They are both big, bwana, especially the first one, did you see how fat he was… so much meat.” I was amused by his simple idea of a trophy – horns were great but they did not taste nice!
Steve threw an angry glace at Effort and mouthed something in Tonga that made Effort bite his lip and step back slightly. Pecking order is common on the hunting team, and every now and then Steven needed to show who was boss.
The wind was still in our favor as we moved back a little to the shade of a pod mahogany tree. These trees have an iridescent green hue at this time of the year and are one of the only large tree species with fresh new leaves. After some cool water to drink we were ready to go. A few words to Mike about the condition of his blister and a thumbs-up from him was a huge relief to us all. The sky was cloudless except for distant balls of puffy white over the escarpment towards the lake, and the only movement was the slow tumbling of a bateleur eagle in the thermals.
It was now 11.30 and we had been motionless for some time. To our left and down a steep embankment, was a major river, currently, wide, sandy and mostly dry. A few small pools had formed in some of the rocky portions and in areas where the water during the rainy season had cut away at the bank to form deep hollows. In some there were still had small fish in the oxygen-depleted muddy water, and were devoured by gathering maribou storks and fish eagles. To our right was an open patch of sparse woodland, dotted with outcrops of jagged black rock. About seven kilometers behind us was the vehicle. Ahead lay our quarry, two battle-worn buffalo, each armed with memories of previous encounters, cunning, and potentially deadly.
Standing into a semi-crouch, trying hard to keep our heads down, we grouped together and took our positions. Steven gripped the shooting sticks, shouldered his batonga axe and edged forward. Stepping in each other’s footprints to lesson any noise, we crouched, crawled and slid slowly forward, stopping every few meters to check ahead.
The acrid buffalo smell was strong. A fresh pile of light green dung with hundreds of tiny flies showed where one of them had bedded down.
Piles of dry dung littered the sandy patches below the low overhanging branches of the jesse. With lots of fresh water that trickled out from the rocks below to form a natural pool, the area was a wonderful cover.
The hair on the back of my neck pricked up as a cool breeze hit my sweat-drenched collar. The wind was shifting as was typical in the valley during the heat of the day, and the odds would be shortly in favor of our quarry. We were safe for now as our scent would be carried over them… once down in their domain, this might not be the case. Drying our hands on our shorts, we firmed our grip on our rifles, checked sights and safeties for any irregularities, and moved forward as one, doubled over like “U” bolts, ducking and weaving our way slowly through the branches and vines.
Steven knelt. We followed suit and my right knee clicked loudly. It sounded like a gunshot to me, but no one looked my way. I stared ahead. In a mass of vegetation, with grey and black shadows and rocks, 15 meters ahead lay a solid mound of black, facing away, with large worn horns splayed out on either side of his head. A torn ear and heavily scarred back was the result of a narrow encounter with his arch-enemy and the reason he had lost his tail. Slightly ahead lay his companion, another huge-bodied, almost hairless old bull.
Both were well beyond prime.
Although I had a pretty decent view of the buffalo to the right, it would have to be taken while he was lying down. Mike had branches blocking his sight picture, and could not move without the bull seeing him – we wanted close, but perhaps this was too close! Finding ourselves between a rock and a hard place, we attempted to flatten ourselves further into the ground while the trackers behind blended into the foliage.
The bull on the left shifted forward a little and went out of sight. The remaining bull rocked himself to his feet and vanished, leaving us slightly relieved. We decided to walk down a small game path towards the water. It took us over 20 minutes to reach the pool to have a quick drink.
The rustling of bushes in front quickly alerted us. I could see the crew on edge, every single muscle frozen. We could see the movement of branches and leaves about 40 meters ahead, moving violently. A crack of a branch echoed through the valley and silence was all that remained.
Minutes ticked by, not a soul moved.
The faint sound of a hoof clicking on a rock gave their position away – they were on the move, heading down towards the scrub mopane below.
Standing up and stretching, I attempted to get the bloodflow back to my left leg which had gone numb, checked my sights and safety, and motioned for Steve to pick up the fresh tracks. Disturbed mud and water still flowed into the pool left by one of the bulls that had taken a moment to wallow in some rather inviting locally produced ‘sunscreen’. Buffalo, especially the old bulls, love to cover their bodies with soothing mud, which gives them protection from biting insects. When the mud dries it eventually peels off, taking with it the majority of the remaining hair, leaving them almost bald and more grey than black.
Picking our way through fallen boulders and piled-up debris, we inched ahead to where the cliffs on either side were steep and impassable. The base of the cliffs were covered with the white markings of a thousand carmine bee eaters, the beautiful stunningly red-colored birds that live in colonies and nest in holes created in steep river banks, but at this time of the year there none as they had already left this part of Zimbabwe.
As we carefully rounded the bend in the river we saw a small herd of elephant cows and calves making their way through the mopane towards the pool of water below.
The arrival of the elephant posed a small problem as they lay directly in our path, and if they saw, heard or smelt us, they would gather together for protection and perhaps send out a few warning trumpets, and our hunt would be over for the day.
We backtracked out of sight and around the river bend to give them space, and headed up the tangled slope and away from the river and the elephant, using our hands for leverage and helping each other through difficult sections. We finally cleared the crest, and peering over the edge we could see the elephant slightly to our left.
About 200 meters ahead we focused our attention at the confluence of two. Scanning left and right, we could see no movement and had to assume that our quarry was there. We had a couple of options: each came with its own set of problems.
We could carry on in the heat of the day, attempt an approach and hope for a clear shot in the thick stuff, or we could wait it out for the cool of the evening when they would get up and feed.
Option 1 gave them the edge as they were safely and securely bedded down, ears, eyes and nostrils on high alert. We had seen both bulls, so trophy judgment was not on our minds.
Option 2 came with a whole set of new complications. They could bed down till it was too dark to shoot, they could feed into a position with a poor approach, or, if left too late, we would be out here after dark trying to make our way back to the truck through areas that were difficult enough to negotiate during daylight.
We quickly ran through the pros and cons of both options and agreed unanimously that it was now or never.
Making a small semi-circle to keep cover and to refrain from exposing ourselves on the ridge, we kept low and slightly behind a rocky outcrop. The sun was past its zenith and making its slow arc westwards to the distant blue of the faraway hills. Motioning for the rest of the crew to remain on the ridge and out of sight, I removed a radio from the pack and handed it to Effort in case we were separated during the final approach. I took a swig of water and followed Steve.
The three of us moved as one down the sparsely covered hillside, our eyes wary for any resting francolin or other game animals that could reveal our position, and alert the bulls.
Reaching the lower portion of the ridge, where the open bush met the thickness of the riverine vegetation, we stopped to listen. The raucous call of a grey lourie, the “go-away bird” echoed around us as he flew from his vantage point to another position.
Still, silence all around us. Perhaps they had moved further on…
It was 3.45 and as the heat lessened, birds started their cacophony. This would be to our advantage.
Moving forward on hands and knees we snaked our way into the undergrowth, brushing away dry leaves, extra careful not to allow any dirt to soil our barrels. Head down, I almost bumped headfirst into Steve. He had come to a halt, pointing to a dark mass. Once he was certain I had identified what he had seen, he moved beside Mike and myself, allowing us ample room for any possible action.
The buffalo was so close we could hear him breathe; binoculars were only necessary to get the correct position of his body, and to make sure we had a clear shot devoid of branches that could deflect the first round. He was standing, facing slightly away, not the most ideal angle given that a follow-up shot by Mike or myself would be impossible with the cover he had anchored himself in.
Mike shouldered his rifle, his right thumb eased the safety into fire position, and he hunched forward to absorb the recoil. It felt as if time had frozen. “Shoot,” I whispered.
I could see the white of his knuckles as he squeezed the grip on his rifle and carefully moved his index finger behind the trigger guard, to a slow, almost methodical pressure on the trigger… and baam!
The recoil knocked Mike back off his haunches, but this did not stop him ejecting the spent cartridge and closing the bolt face on another round, and at the same time I saw the strike of the bullet as dust flew up off the bull’s flank.Despite his bulk, the bull did not show that he had been hit; on the contrary, he spun around and crashed through the brush following the thundering sounds of his partner as if nothing had happened. The crashing continued for a short while and then all was quiet. Dust rose up from the bush and slowly drifted towards us, slowly dissipating
I asked, as was customary how Mike felt about his shot. “Good,” he said, “real good.”
We smoked a cigarette as we looked for sign, when a shrill whistle had us move towards Steve where he pointed to a spot of blood on a leaf. Both of us were loaded with solids, ideal for this type of situation.
Ahead and about three feet or so up from the ground, smeared on the trunk of a young tree was blood, still sticky. We picked up the spoor of the running bulls, careful to watch out for sign of one of them faltering or changing direction. After 100 meters they were still together but slowing down. We found more blood, not large quantities given that the quartering away shot would possibly not have exited. A little further on, and the wounded bull veered left, on a completely different angle to his buddy and slowed down to a trot. We stopped briefly to make sure he had not looped around again, but found that they had definitely separated and we were not far behind.
Now, knowing that we had one target, we could relax a little in the knowledge that the buffalo we would see at the end of these tracks was Mike’s bull.
Cautious, totally focused on what lay ahead, we had time on our hands so no need to rush. Steven continually turned his head left and right, up and down, glancing into the brush ahead to pick up movement or color.
Then the brush seemed to explode ahead of us as a mass of angry muscle burst through, sending dust and sticks flying in all directions. Steve was gone as Mike and I stood shoulder to shoulder, shocked at the ferocity and speed of the charge. Coming towards us, head held high, specks of blood, saliva and fury spewed from the bull’s widened nostrils. Eyes white and wide open, he was like a black avalanche of hatred from years of evading hunters, lions, poachers and drought.
He barged his way through the bush across gullies, taking down small saplings, and finally came to a sudden stop as his body weakened. Then he veered left and circled slightly back to rest and listen.
In front of him and very close he heard them, a breaking twig, and the sound of something unnatural brush against a branch. Then he saw them. Hatred swelled inside him, the pain in his side worsened and the foreign taste of blood in his mouth and nostrils infuriated him.
He launched himself forward, his huge worn curved horns tearing through the leaves and brush, his solid dome of a boss protecting his head.
He had timed it perfectly. His enemy stood barely meters away. He lowered his head so he could smash and hook them. But his lowered head obscured his vision for a split second and at this moment, both rifles barked out in succession.
Mike’s shot hit the bull squarely above the boss, through dense neck muscle, and he stumbled. The stoic old warrior collapsed in a mass of dust barely a few meters from where we stood.
We stepped back into the shade to admire this wonderful animal, and I moved away from Mike a little to give him room to set his emotions free.
The loud chatter and back slapping from the crew that appeared out of nowhere to take their place alongside Mike and his buffalo, was gratifying as each of them individually showed the bull respect.
A look at the bull showed that Mike’s shot had hit him correctly, but given the angle had possibly changed course and ended up missing the vitals.
With a more than 40” spread and massive worn bosses, the tips were all but gone showing his age – a bull with character. He bore the scars from hyena and lion as well as from a poacher’s spear.
Mike was over the moon.
As time was against us and we still had a lot of work to do, we took some pictures as quickly as we could, to be proudly displayed in a far-off land in a framed photograph, to be gazed upon by Mike’s children and grandchildren.
Mike wanted a European mount so we removed the head, and the trackers gutted the bull and tried to cover him as best possible with leaves and branches. We would have to return in the morning, and as it was, we would be walking back in the dark. Steven shouldered the massive head, and using his axe, balanced it on his shoulders and proceeded to make his way to the vehicle.
It had been a long day and the thrill of the hunt was replaced by exhaustion. Weary legs carried us home. I was not sure about Mike, but I could already taste the cold beer that waited in the cooler. The last several hundred meters was in darkness.
Finally, in the starlight, we saw my waiting Land Cruiser.
My respect for Mike was huge. After all he was 77.
You have probably heard some environmental activists going on about how air travel is ‘bad’ because it might cause global warming? And were you starting to think that perhaps your trip to Africa to hunt on the great continent was a bit of a naughty thing to do? Forget it! The World’s leaders in their hundreds and delegates in their thousands recently flew from all around the globe to Glasgow in Scotland to attend a conference on how to fight climate change. As they are clearly not worried about the impact of their air travel, why should you be?
The leader of the free world, President Joe Biden, scored top marks for his aviation achievements. He flew to Glasgow via Rome to attend a meeting of the G20 countries and to have a word with the Pope. Now President Biden does not travel light, with an overnight bag. No siree!
President Joe flies in Air Force One, a highly customised Boeing 747 airliner called the VC-25A. The aircraft carries a crew of 26, along with roughly 70 passengers including the President, government officials, Secret Service agents, and others guests. The 4,000-square-foot space in the VC-25A’s cabin allows the aircraft to function as a ‘flying White House’ with the ability to run a country from 40,000 feet.
Other upgrades to Air Force One include: midair-refueling capability; missile-defence systems; electronic countermeasure defence systems; an operating room; the ability survive the electromagnetic pulse emitted from a nuclear detonation; and the communications capabilities to manage a wartime crisis from anywhere in the world. The VC-25A allegedly costs $206,000 an hour to operate, including fuel, flight consumables, and maintenance. Wow!
But hang on here; there are actually two identical Air Force Ones, and both of them flew to Scotland via Rome for the COP 26 meeting! The President, Mrs Biden and their top aides flew in one aircraft, while the other one went along as a ‘spare’. But wait, there is lots more heavy metal taking to the skies for this Presidential trip to help save the world from its ‘climate crisis’.
When Joe gets to his destination he gets to travel short distances by air in a big Sikorsky helicopter, called Marine One. On the ground, he travels in a massive armoured limousine, called ‘The Beast’. Word has it that two, maybe three Marine One helicopters went along to Rome and Glasgow, while there are two identical ‘Beats’, one that carries the President and the other one that is a decoy. The helicopters, Beasts and numerous other motorised hardware are transported in two massive Boeing C-17A Globemaster III four-engined US Air Force transport aircraft. That’s FOUR huge e aircraft to get the President of the USA to Glasgow to help save the world from its looming catastrophe, caused (they say) by naughty people burning fossil fuel!
Do you wonder how much fossil fuel was burnt by those four big jet aircraft making the round trip from the USA via Rome to Glasgow and back again? A few clever folks have added it up, but I am not going to tell you here, because it will make your eyes water!
Each ‘Beast’ presidential limos is a heavy-duty armoured vehicles built on a General Motors commercial truck platform with a Cadillac body. These monsters feature everything from full-ballistic protection to an on-board cache of blood for the President in case of a medical emergency. Each vehicle weighs around 20,000 pounds (nine tons), is fitted with a 5-litre diesel engine and gets about 8 miles per gallon of (fossil) fuel.
When President Biden went to say hello to the Pope in Rome, his motorcade was 85-cars long. As well as the two Beasts (one a decoy), and a large hi-tech surveillance and monitoring vehicle on what looked like a huge Hummer body, it was comprised of gas-guzzling Chevrolet Suburban SUVs, and famously thirsty Alfa Romeo cars driven by Italian police. During that short visit to see Pope Francis, the President of the USA and leader of the Catholic Church discussed climate change. Really.
Meanwhile, many world leaders and celebrities flew into Scotland in private jets from all corners of the earth, According to The Times (11 November 2021):
“About 400 private jets will fly into Glasgow for the climate talks, prompting accusations of hypocrisy against world leaders and captains of industry. Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon, led the parade in his £48 million Gulf Stream, with the Prince of Wales, Prince Albert of Monaco and dozens of ‘green-minded chief executives also arriving by private plane.
“A Dassault Falcon 8X belonging to the royal family of Monaco was seen arriving in Edinburgh yesterday, as was a Falcon 7X belonging to the government of Namibia. President Buhari of Nigeria disembarked from his Nigerian air force jet at Glasgow. Planes also arrived in Glasgow from Ukraine, Pakistan, Armenia, South Korea, Australia, India, Rwanda, and Angola — none of which usually have scheduled flights to the airport.”
It has been variously estimated that between 30 and 40,000 delegates registered for the COP26 Conference in Glasgow. The word ‘COP’ stands for ‘Conference of the Parties’, these being the governments which have signed the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). The COP brings these signatory governments together once a year to discuss how to jointly address climate change. The conferences are attended by world leaders, ministers, and negotiators but also by representatives from civil society, business, international organizations, and the media.
The COP is hosted by a different country each year and the first such meeting – ‘COP1’ – took place in Berlin, Germany in 1995. COP26 is the 26th climate change COP and is hosted by the UK in partnership with Italy. Significantly, the Presidents of China and Russia did not attend COP26. China is by far the world’s largest emitter of Carbon Dioxide (about 27%). By contrast, the UK and South Africa each produce about 1% of global CO2 emissions.
For 26 years these COP meetings have made not the slightest difference to ‘fighting climate change’. In fact, when you really look into the matter carefully, there is no evidence that Carbon Dioxide from burning fossil fuels has anything more than a very small influence on the Earth’s climate. Those scare stories of increasing storms, hurricanes, floods, wildfires, rising seas, droughts and the like do not stand up to careful scrutiny – they are exaggerations and downright lies by politicians, climate activists, the media and those who stand to make lots of money from the ‘green energy’ industry.
So if anyone has the nerve to criticize you for flying to Africa to hunt, I know of two quite short word you can respond to them with. Your hunt in Africa will bring tangible benefits to your hosts and the communities in which they operate. Real benefits to African people, not the false and meaningless words of those arrogant jet-set world leaders and virtue-signalling celebrities and the other 30,000 plus Carbon Dioxide-exhaling delegates in Glasgow.
Dr John Ledger is a past Director of the Endangered Wildlife Trust, now a consultant, writer and teacher on the environment, energy and wildlife; he is a columnist for the African Hunting Gazette. He lives in Johannesburg, South Africa. John.Ledger@wol.co.za
The leopard cannot be seen if he does not want to be seen, and that makes hunting him the perfect hunt.If you want a realistic chance to shoot a leopard, you must make him come to you, which means hunting over bait, or following a pack of hounds.
An occasional chance encounter does happen – but getting a shot this way is a gift of the hunting gods and never proof of your own skill or determination. My chance encounter for a leopard was in Namibia a good many years ago. I was actually looking for a cheetah, although then (as now) cheetahs could not be imported into the United States. In a fit of vanity, I wanted to be able to brag that I hunted all three of Africa’ s big cats. As it turned out, my PH Fred Bezuidenhout and I could not find a cheetah, despite mile upon mile of patrolling and glassing the wide-open, rough and treeless terrain. Then one day, accompanied by the land owner, we saw three spotted cats calmly amble up a close-by hillside. Spots they had, except they were leopards, not cheetahs. But the landowner, like ranchers the world over, was no friend of predators, and shouted, “Shoot one, shoot any one of them.” He had permits, so we bailed out of the bakkie, I got on the sticks, let fly at the one trailing behind just before it reached the ridge, and it was down. It was a young male, that I would not have shot but for the rancher’s vocal demand.
This was my third leopard. The other two were on my very first African safari, in each case with spectacular lack of success. My first attempt was over bait in the last few minutes of shooting light. After a few afternoons in the blind, nothing happened except no-shows, so we changed location. At the new spot, hunting at night with artificial light was permitted. I was very optimistic, but the outcome was even worse than the previous attempt.
It had started promisingly enough. In the blind, less than two hours after dark, we heard a cat feeding on the bait, crunching ribs and generally leaving no doubt even to my inexperienced ears that we had a leopard.. My PH, Dean Kendall, slowly turned up the spotlight, and there it stood, broadside, fetchingly illuminated in red. It glimpsed in our direction and slunk away before I could get my act together. Seeing a leopard in the wild for the first time does interesting things to one‘s composure!
But nothing strengthens one’s resolve like a little humiliation. So I booked another hunt with Dean, in the Dande safari area of Zimbabwe, where using lights was not permitted. It is mostly hilly woodland, and probably had been for millions of years, judging from the large grove of petrified wood that we saw – even entire tree trunks. Perhaps by now the area has become a place for fossil collectors.
Finding the right leopard track in the first place can take days or can happen within hours. One has to distinguish those of a cat from those of a hyena, tell how old the tracks are, or even to determine whether they are from a male or female. When a fresh track is found, generally size of spoor suggests gender, which can be confirmed when a cat is on the bait. You hang a trail camera or two and hope to get a shot of the cat’s rear end. We were lucky, and it did not take us long to find what my team of experts, after spirited debate (how I wished I could understand Shona and Ndebele!) deemed it the right cat.We still needed bait and I had a good time shooting for the larder, the cats and the camps. We found a suitably shaped tree, in the right place with an optimal distance between it and the blind with a clear shooting lane. Scent trails were laid around the area and clear paths were made to get in and out of the blind noiselessly in the dark – I found that pieces of toilet paper as a guide show up amazingly well by starlight.
My wife Nancy was with us, and as we rolled away, she casually asked, “That big tree branch we cut to clear the shooting lane, what kind of tree was that?”
” Oh, an ebony tree.”
” Stop! Turn around! I want a piece of that wood!” Slight amusement in the bakkie, but this was Africa, and what the lady wants, the lady gets. So we turned around, and our men hacked out a chunk of ebony, the black heartwood, using axes forged from leaf springs and kept sharp. It seemed no rural Matabele male goes out without his axe. Nice, economical swings each hit exactly in the same notch, no undue exertion, letting the steel do the work. I still have that chunk of wood. I drilled a row of half-inch holes in it, and it is now a display rack for decorative wine bottle stoppers.
Dean and I went into the blind around four o’ clock. It was still sweltering from the heat of the day. Two hours till sundown. No talking, no loud swatting of bugs, anxiously watching the sun drop lower and lower. And no sign of a cat. I confess that my tolerance of frustration was tested. But then things came together. The cat showed up while I could still get a decent sight picture and identify the cross hairs against its body. I squeezed the trigger, was blinded by the muzzle flash, and the next thing I knew was Dean slapping me on the back and saying (much more calmly than I felt) “Good shot, Peter”. We waited the proverbial cigarette time, and with our flash lights walked over to the bait site. There on the ground, lay my leopard. Dead.
Buoyed by my success using the classic method of hunting leopard, I decided to try something completely different, a hunt with hounds, something I had done in the North American West for cougar. (The main difference is that in America we may not use baits – everything depends on the tracking ability of your hounds.) I found a hound hunt in Namibia on a cattle ranch not far north of the Naukluft Mountains. That area seems to be a veritable breeding ground for leopards that invade the surrounding countryside. The cattle operation is limited by the nature of the terrain, which is largely flat in the east of the property, while to the west it becomes mountainous and rises to a high escarpment bordering the desert of the Namib. The cattle do not venture into the rough country, so there are no fences in the hunting area.
Mare van der Merwe, one of the owners, was my PH. Our houndsman, Glenn Mel, came all the way from the Eastern Cape, accompanied by a helper and about a dozen tough-looking, noisy, sinewy devils that, it turned out, just loved being cuddled and tried to lick your face if you would let them. On each outing, Glenn would select a dog team of perhaps six or so, and explained that the team had to include distinct specialists: trackers to pick up cold tracks, fast sight hounds to run the cat down once they had spotted it, and bruisers that would hold the cat at bay. I saw later that the trackers actually lost any interest in the cat after it had been brought to bay, preferring to wander around and check out all the interesting scents, while the sight hounds hung around but were content to loudly proclaim to the world that they had won the race.
The first step of the hunt was no different from a hunt over bait. We set up several bait sites, although it took time because the area was large and finding tracks was difficult. The ground was coarse gravel which does not show tracks well, unlike the fine powdery soil I had seen in Zimbabwe. Eventually some of our baits got hit, and then we found the fresh tracks of an encouragingly large cat. Not only that, but Mare said he knew the cat, as its right front paw showed an old scar, possibly the result from pulling out of a leg-hold trap. It was deep but perfectly healed. He said he had actually hunted it but had never been successful.
It was time to let loose the dogs of war, and they didn’t wait around. They started running as soon as they hit the ground, calling out joyfully. Because we expected a long pursuit we stocked up on bottled water, but we were still loading up backpacks when the sound changed and all hell broke out no more than half a mile away. Turned out the cat had gone to ground in a cavern formed by an old rock fall. The hounds were smart enough not to go into the opening – there was something snarling frightfully inside.
We approached at right angles to the cat’s line of sight from the cavern, or rather its line of attack, which promptly came. The cat hurtled through the throng of dogs, turned around, and shot back to its shelter before they could even react.
I had been warned that something like this might happen and had mounted a red dot sight on my rifle. Then I did something that is generally frowned upon. In order to save time the next time around I clicked my safety off. When the next charge came, the red dot was instantly on the cat’s shoulder, no dog was in my sight, I fired, then the cat was back in the cave. But it left a huge splatter of bright red blood on the rock face, and there was no further sound. The leopard, a large male that made the record book, is now a full-body mount in a jumping-up position, with his right front paw stretched out high showing his battle scar. I think I owed that to him. The full emotional impact came later, in replaying the whole drama in my mind.
After that I hunted more leopards, but I have never had the desire to do it again with hounds. I am glad for the experience, and I like dogs. But I think that a leopard does not deserve this humiliation. Call me a sentimental fool. All my subsequent leopard hunts were done in a modified classical method, that is, from a blind over bait, but using artificial illumination or light enhancement.
On one occasion when we checked in the morning, the bait was gone and there were lion tracks. If lions move in, the leopards will decamp. On another occasion, the local game authorities had decreed that, killing a female would carry a US$ 20,000 fine – not a risk to run. We had not been able to reliably determine the cat’s sex, and gave up. Another disappointing situation involved a cat that apparently did not like the location of the bait and paid only short visits. So we un-wired the bait so that the cat could take it somewhere else it preferred. Sure enough, the next morning the bait was gone. We followed tracks and found that a pack of hyenas had ambushed our cat, which had wisely dropped its meal and treed up.
Once we found huge tracks of a brute that patrolled the area but never took any of the baits. I decided that we go after that giant, but in spite of incredible performance by our trackers over two days, we never caught up with it. A problem for today’s hunters is that we tend to run out of time, unlike the legendary hunters of old who could afford weeks or even months.
My latest leopard kill, number four (which will probably be the last one), happened in early 2021 after my eightieth year. We were in a private game conservancy in KwaZulu-Natal. It is rare that South Africa issues leopard permits for export, but the owners of the conservancy has received a “destruction permit” based on the finding by an outside consultancy that the area’s plains-game population could not sustain the number of predators that were found there. So this was basically a cull hunt, though in the owner’s opinion on a far too limited scale.
With Pienaar “Pine” Breytenbach as my PH, I set out. What followed was a circus! Because of Covid-related travel complications I did not bring my own gun but borrowed one from Pine, which carried a thermal imaging device, as we expected all the action to happen at night. We went out diligently in the dark so 1 could practice. We also had a rifle with conventional telescopic sights for daytime work, so I never fired the “night” rifle in the daytime.
When we had a cat on bait and the blind set up, I went into the blind one late afternoon with the “night” rifle, while Pine moved our vehicle a mile or so down the road, to return on foot. But before he got back , with the sun still well above the horizon, our leopard showed up right beneath the bait tree, and calmly stepped forward to inspect the open area between him and my blind – just stood there as if enjoying the view. A thermal imaging device also works in daylight, but my practice shooting had been based on the premise that I would have to use it on1y in the dark. It is a complicated thing, and I did not know which button to push, lever to move, or dial to turn in order to make that thing work in daylight.
So I looked at the cat and it seemed to be looking at me, though of course I was concealed in the blind. I dearly wished I had our “day time” rifle, but that was gone with Pine; you do not wander around an area where the Big Five roam without being suitably armed. After a fairly long while, the cat turned and ambled back into the bush.
I thought I was done, but an hour or so later, now in complete darkness, the cat showed up again to get its meal at last. I had him broadside, picked the wrong reticle, shot and missed, and he calmly slinked down, the way cats do, from the branch down to the ground. But he stayed just long enough so I could change the reticle to the one I had used in our practice sessions, and shot again.
And that was the end of it. The hide was carefully prepared, and I believe that it was offered to the Zulu king as is the traditional local custom.
Like everyone else, I have known for decades that going into the field with unfamiliar equipment is a fool‘s errand, but sometimes the gods favor the fools,in this particular case if they are in their eighties.
It’s 31 May 2021, about 2.30 a.m. somewhere over the north Atlantic bound for Frankfurt, Germany on the first leg of my trip. I’m sitting here wide awake and can’t sleep. I started thinking about what had led me to this point in time, going back to the end of an incredible hunt with my youngest daughter in 2019.
I had made plans to return to Namibia in 2020. Travel arrangements were made through a trusted travel agency I’ve used before. Once again I would be flying through Doha on Qatar Airways. I contacted my PH at Elandpro Safaris and booked my hunting dates. Then it all came apart. The Covid-19 virus was unleashed upon the world. I was informed by my PH that Namibia was closing its borders to outside travelers. Airlines started shutting down routes. Shortly after this my travel agency notified me that Qatar Airways had cancelled my flight to Namibia. Refunds were issued, then the waiting began. In previous years I would go to Rhode Island to visit my daughters as they had fallen in love with that area and made it their home. Guess what? Due to restrictions I was also unable to visit them.
In early January of 2021, I received a call from my PH. The president of Namibia and the Health Ministry were talking about lifting the travel ban into Namibia. By late February this was confirmed. However, contacting my travel agency again presented some hurdles. Qatar Airways had suspended direct flights into Windhoek, Namibia. The travel agent suggested flying Lufthansa through Frankfurt as they had a flight into Namibia. I booked my hunt and instructed the agent to get my tickets. Also I had to take the Covid PCR test a minimum of five days prior to arriving in Namibia and with a negative test result. Finding a clinic which could provide results in that time span was a little tricky but finally accomplished. I would also have to take the rapid Covid test with negative results to re-enter the US. The hunt was back on! The only disappointment came as two friends who were supposed to go with me canceled. I would fly out 31 May and be back in Namibia on 2 June.
My flight arrived in Windhoek at 8:30 a.m. and it was a beautiful clear, crisp cool morning. I was met by my PH’s wife Makkie as Gerrit had business at the farm to attend to.
Collecting my checked luggage and clearing the gun room went without a hitch. We had a great ride to Grootfontein giving the chance to catch up on things since the last trip. Here we stopped at Janneman Breedt’s home. Janneman is Gerrit and Makkie’s son and has been my PH several times over the years. Makkie would stay there in Grootfontein to look after her new grandbaby while Janneman and I continued on to the ranch. We arrived early enough so that after unpacking we went to the range to check the zero on my rifle and be able to start hunting the next morning. The zero had shifted slightly, but several rounds later I had the rifle printing where I wanted it to. I’ve been on a kick of late, wanting to use classic African cartridges to hunt with. Last trip I carried a pre-64 Winchester M70 in .375 H&H. This trip I carried a Zastava M70 in 9.3X62. I did some cleaning up on the rifle. Added an ebony forend tip and grip cap, refinished the stock with a hand-rubbed oil finish, and glass-bedded the action. Then added a barrel band front sight with ivory bead and finished off with a Leupold 1.25-4X firedot scope. This rifle/caliber is fast becoming my favorite medium bore rifle.
A hunters rifle 9.3X62 Mauser
It’s light and friendly, snaps to the shoulder and gives 85% of what a .375 H&H delivers. Loaded with a handload using 250-gr Swift A-Frames I felt I was well appointed for the hunt. Sleep came early as I was bone-tired from the flight and the hunt would start early in the morning. Over breakfast we discussed what we would look for first. Janneman wanted me to take a really good eland bull. Plans were made and off to the bush we went. While driving along the two tracks it wasn’t long before we cut a set of fresh tracks of five bachelor bulls. This was worth pursuing. Well into the tracking, misfortune struck like a hammer. Going around an antbear hole the sand gave way under my boots and I hit the ground hard. Twisting to the side while falling to prevent my rifle from hitting the ground I managed to pull some muscles in my back. I didn’t think much about it at the time, but it would come back to haunt me. Because of the rains the thorn bush was extremely thick. We got close several times but never laid eyes on the eland. But that’s hunting. Nothing in the salt the first day, but a day well spent.
Well-appointed hunting vehicles
The next morning dawned cool and brisk – and brother Murphy raised his ugly head. The fall the previous day made itself known in a big way. Bending over or twisting my torso let me know really quick that I was in no shape to be stalking through the bush. Gerrit gave me a local something to ease the pain. It was decided that I would sit in a blind over a waterhole that attracted a variety of game.
Young kudu bull and cow
Within a half hour or so we had plenty of game coming into the waterhole – impala, blue wildebeest, a fine but young kudu bull and several cows. A band of mongoose was a treat to watch as they moved through the area. As much as I admired that kudu bull he needed another year or two to fully mature. He’ll make a future hunter a fine prize one day. Then things got interesting. For some reason I really like hunting impala. Not only do they have some of the best venison (in my opinion) but I really like the horns. A very nice ram came in for a drink. He was a solitary ram, no youngsters following in his wake. He was as nice as, or slightly better than the last impala I had taken on a previous trip. The decision was made to take him and finally I had game in the salt.
The 9.3X62 with a Swift A-Frame is probably overkill for impala. But, like the .375 H&H it’s a well-balanced cartridge and has a flat enough trajectory to be very versatile on a wide range of game. Returning to the ranch house that evening we were treated to a great supper. Afterwards, sitting outside by the fire having a sundowner, I reflected that days like this was why I keep coming back time after time to hunt in Namibia.
The lapa where meals are served
Up the next morning and over breakfast Janneman asked me how my back was feeling. I thought I might be up for some stalking, and said, “I’m up for it.” Strange as it may seem, especially with the large numbers available, I’ve never been able to connect with a good springbok. My luck was soon to change. About mid-morning while glassing an open savannah area we spotted a lone ram off in the distance. The wind was in our favor so we ducked back into the bush to make a wide circle in order to cut the distance. Coming out to the edge we found we were within 120 yards of the ram. Getting on the sticks while Janneman looked him over, he finally told me that it was a very nice ram and to take him if I wanted him. My back was still sore, but as the crosshairs settled on his shoulder the shot broke and I finally had my springbok. I couldn’t have been happier. His horns are a little further apart than normal but with very heavy bases. I was most pleased.
Nice springbok ram
Going in for lunch, Janneman asked if I still wanted to try for a waterbuck. He said he had spotted a couple of rather nice bulls in a field only a kilometer from the ranch. I’ve always wanted a waterbuck, so yes; I was game to give it a go. He told me they were very wary and only came out to the edges of the field right at dusk. Plans were made and now the waiting till the right hour to make our stalk began. This gave me the opportunity to enjoy a cup of coffee sitting in the shade of a tree while a cool breeze blew around me. The time finally arrived to begin our hunt. Binoculars on, rifle ready, I grinned at Janneman and said, “Let’s do this.” Because of the close proximity of the field to the ranch, we wouldn’t be going out in the truck. We started down the two-track and when several hundred yards out we slowly made our way into the brush surrounding the field. Easing up to the edge we started glassing. We spotted three cows and a calf to our front and a young bull to the left front. We ducked back into the brush and made a circle to the right. Slowly easing back to the edge we spotted a very good bull facing to our left approximately 140 yards out. Janneman set up the sticks.
“Hit the point of the shoulder,” he whispered to me. I slightly pulled the shot, hitting five inches back and just below the spine, we found later. The shot knocked him down but in an instant he was back up! The second shot as he spun away hit him in front of the hip and ranged forward into the offside shoulder. He went about 80 yards before going down.
Janneman and myself after a grand hunt
I finally had an animal I have dreamed of taking. Waterbuck are very stocky and heavy built antelope. I believe they are as tough as a zebra to put down. This was a prize and hunt I shall cherish for all time. As this was a low-key trip, with these three animals in the salt, my hunting came to an end. This would give me time to visit with the family and get my gear sorted at leisure before heading home in a couple of days.
The conditions this trip were amazingly different from my trip in 2019. Because of the drought back then, everything was burnt brown, hardly any grass or browse on the brush, and sand blowing everywhere. This trip was just the opposite. Grass was three to five feet high, the brush was green and thick. As an example, while tracking those eland early in the hunt, we bumped a kudu at less than 40 yards but never laid eyes on him. All we heard was his bark and crashing brush as he went away.
Pete Underwood making a shot through the brush
Ah, but the rest of the conditions were outstanding. We had three mornings with temps down to 31 F and mid-day getting up to the low 80s. Perfect! The evenings spent around the fire having sundowners were special indeed. What better times to be had with people who have become more than friends and more like family? Now if only I could stay long enough to learn how to speak Afrikaans, ha ha! The next morning farewells were said. And the worst part of the trip started – heading down the road toward home.
Traveling during Covid did pose some minor irritants. Having to take the PCR test before leaving home, then the rapid test to go home. This cut my hunting by one day as we had to drive back to Windhoek to take the test then get the results the next morning before catching my flight home. The upside was that with the time we had, Gerrit gave me a tour of the city, from very nice coffee shops to sporting goods stores which cater to hunters and fishermen. Rather than stay at a hotel that last night, Gerrit’s daughter and son-in-law who live in Grootfontein invited us to stay at their home. A fine meal was grilled over a bed of coals and a grand time was had by all.
The next morning, we headed to the airport. I thanked Gerrit for an outstanding time and as always for the hospitality of his house. As I watched him drive away I sat down on a bench to look around me… All the various people from other lands, the local area, the raw beauty of this country. I’ve always wondered why more people don’t come to Africa. You will not duplicate the sights and sounds of Africa anywhere else in the world. The culture and the varied peoples are a wonder in itself. And I can assure you, if you can spend a week to 10 days at a very popular theme park in Florida then you can afford to travel to Africa.
I am already dreaming and planning of my next trip to Namibia in 2023. I don’t know yet what I’ll hunt the next time. But then again, that’s part of the fun isn’t it? Maybe another warthog? Maybe that eland bull Janneman was talking about. Whatever it may be, it will be another grand trip.
With the sun setting slowing on this year’s African season which, by all accounts, has been just what we needed, attention moves to the trophies.
How is the processing and mounting getting along? Then, it’s getting them shipped back home. Though some hunters will be fortunate to have their trophies already back home, the majority are “in the system” and should be ready to be shipped within 12 months or so of the hunt.
At AHG Trophy Shipping, our operation has one objective: To save YOU money. The reason – so you can hunt more! Shipping is a grudge purchase, and if you can save just $500, well that is another animal to hunt.
I was born in Edmonton, Alberta Canada in 1945. I guess that makes me a city kid, but we were never far from the country. Although Edmonton is home to almost 1.5 million people today, it was only 100,000 when I was growing up. When walking out the back door we were soon in the woods with a lot of small wetlands. Birds and small mammals were abundant. Many of my relatives were on the farm. My family spent a lot of time outdoors, hunting, fishing and camping. We were always learning new outdoor skills.
I have a Master’s degree in physical geography. My career of 40 years was committed to parks, land use planning and conservation – things I loved. I often joke that I never did get a job. In 2010, I reconnected with Carole, a friend from university days and we soon married. Carole, a true city girl had never participated in any of the outdoor activities that were part of my life. She was keen to try them all and learnt to shoot, and once we decided to visit Africa, she was committed to getting a zebra. Our shared love of Africa has resulted in five visits so far!
My first African animal was a good oryx in Grootfontein, Namibia, 2012
My fascination with Africa started when I was a child. I broke my collarbone when I was five and was taken to “Doc Cameron” who practiced from his house. His walls were adorned with spears, shields and other memorabilia from his time in Africa. I couldn’t take my eyes off the pig with the big teeth. In 2011, Carole and I had a chance to join a tour through Namibia prior to the World Veterinary Congress that my brother was attending in Cape Town. I fell in love with the landscapes that were new to me. Alberta’s landscapes are young, the result of glacial action. The province was covered in ice until 10,000 years ago. In Namibia I was seeing ancient landscapes, the result of the action of wind and water over millions of years. I was experiencing landscapes that I had studied in geomorphology at university but had never seen. Watching and photographing wildlife in Etosha National Park, I was hooked. On our four subsequent trips we hunted different areas in part for the different landscapes. We added a tour of the Garden Route in South Africa and visited the diamond mine and Boer Museum near Kimberly. How can I forget walking with the lions on my 70th birthday? A houseboat on the Chobe River in Botswana and Tiger fishing the Zambezi River were fabulous experiences. Victoria Falls was awe-inspiring. My love of Africa includes the scents – The Kalahari Bushveld, the smell of flowers after rain, the aroma of Sand Camwood. If the early morning smells of the camel-thorn dotted savannah grasslands near Kimberly could be bottled they would put the final touches on any trophy room!
I think hunting was in my blood. Dad and my uncles were hunters. In the days before television, storytelling was an important part of socializing. As a kid I would listen, enthralled by the hunting stories of my elders. I wandered the fields with Dad or sat in the duck blind before I started school. I was allowed to skip school for a few days when I was about seven. What a thrill to sleep in a wall tent in winter with the wood stove for heat. Though horses were no longer used on the farm, one of the uncles kept a team for the annual winter hunt. I vividly remember riding in the sleigh behind the trotting horses with the bells jingling. After that I was hooked and could not get enough.
In Africa, we hunted Namibia near Grootfontein in 2012. In South Africa, we hunted several properties near East London as well as the Queenstown area in 2015. In 2016, we hunted near Kimberly as well as north of Port Elizabeth. In 2020 we again hunted the Karoo, north of Port Elizabeth.
This is my caracal with the roundsmen, East London, 2015
In New Zealand we hunted chamois in the Lake Hawea area north of Queenstown and Himalayan tahr at Rata Peak, west of Christchurch. In the U.S. it was pronghorn in eastern Wyoming.
In Canada I have hunted extensively in my home province of Alberta over the past 60 years. Extended horse trips in the roadless areas of the Rocky Mountains were especially enjoyable, and we hunted mountain goat in the rugged coastal mountains of northern British Columbia near the Alaskan border. Our quest for caribou took us to the fringe of the tundra in the Ungava Peninsula of northern Quebec, while Great Bear Lake on the Arctic Circle in Northwest Territory was our destination for musk ox.
I had my favourite weapons, but on my African hunts I used the rifles that the outfitters provided. I shot .300 Winchester, 7 mm Remington Magnum, .300 Remington Ultra Magnum, .300 H & H and .375 H & H. All were bolt action and mounted with good scopes. I particularly liked the pre ’64 Winchester in .300 H & H, a bit heavy to carry but very steady on the sticks. In Canada I am old school. I only own one rifle, a Remington Pump action in .30-06 Springfield. I had a 4X Weaver scope for most of my life. A few years back I traded it for a Bushnell 3 -9 variable. I won’t say I traded up, as the Weaver was an excellent scope, but as I get older the higher power is occasionally helpful on longer shots. I currently shoot Hornady Superformance 150-grain SST bullets. With the higher velocity there is little need to correct for elevation under 300 yards.
My favourite African animal to hunt without hesitation is kudu. Following Joseph, a Bushman tracker, across the old sand dunes of the wooded Kalahari Bushveld in Northern Namibia was an experience like no other. Finding the track of a large bull, Joseph would unravel the trail even when it crossed paths with a herd of other animals. It was amazing. The “Grey Ghost” is a truly elusive animal; at times, Joseph would have us sneaking slowly, at other times almost running to try and head off a bull that we had not yet sighted. We occasionally saw horn tips, though seldom got a good look, but after days of getting close, and not connecting, what a thrill to finally outsmart one.
Eastern Cape kudu near Queenstown, 2015
I couldn’t choose any particular trophy as my favorite – all rekindle memories of experiences, landscapes and adventures with the people I hunted with. In terms of my African trophies, the Eastern Cape kudu with its beautiful markings and long flowing mane is perhaps the most impressive on the wall. The musk ox from the Arctic Circle is a magnificent animal and I am still partial to the Rocky Mountain bighorn that I had mounted over 50 years ago.
Fortunately I don’t think I have had a close brush with death while hunting; danger perhaps. There were some tense moments when I shot my Cape buffalo. I got two good shots into a bull before he got into a herd of about 30 animals. They moved only a short distance and stood facing us. Several of the Dagga Boys had blood on their noses from rubbing on the wounded bull. As we got closer, looking for a final shot, the herd continued to stare us down; they had no intention of moving. At about 100 yards it seemed like a bad idea to get closer in the hopes of getting them to move. I was well aware that we were a long way from the trees. There wasn’t even a shrub big enough to try hiding behind. I got an open lane and finished the bull off. The others stood their ground. They did not move for the 20 minutes we waited while someone went for the bakkie and drove in their direction. I had three PHs backing me up and was not worried; perhaps I should have been. I have no idea what would have happened if the wounded bull or the others decided to charge as I have often read they do. Perhaps ignorance is bliss.
I would suggest potential hunters not to be deterred by areas with high fences. The properties are large and the fences never come into play. There is usually far more habitat to hunt than in the unfenced areas that are typically hunted in Canada. Consider using the taxidermist recommended by your outfitter. Even with the cost of shipping, they are competitive with prices in Canada and you get your trophies much sooner. I have used three different taxidermists in Africa. Their work compares favourably with the taxidermist I use in Alberta who has “World Champion” behind his name.
My advice to any first-time hunter is to be flexible. On your first safari pick a hunting package with a variety of animals where the company is prepared to trade for others. You may well change your list when you see some of the animals. Pick a longer trip rather than a short one. There is always a lot more to do around the lodge than hunt. Make it a family affair and don’t forget the side trips; Africa is a diverse and wonderful place. Adding a few extra days helps to defer the cost of the long flight. Pack light. With daily laundry you don’t need many changes of clothes.
And last, but not least – try not to leave your African adventures until you retire, like I did. You will want many years for return trips.
Company Name: Krugertaxidermy t/a Marakalalo (Pty) Ltd.
Contact: (Owner/Manage) Kruger Human
Physical Address: 21 Stormavenue, Bainsvlei, Bloemfontein, Free State Province, South Africa
Tel Office: +27 (0) 649382563 Mobile: +27 (0)834478132
Contact Email: kruger@krugertaxidermy.com Website: www.krugertaxidermy.com
Tell us a little about your operation. How it started & why you got into the industry.
Kruger Human is part of the fifth generation of the Human family in South Africa. His great- grandparents moved into the Kalahari region of South Africa after the Anglo-Boer war.
They settled in this thirsty, semi-desert area that is today known as the Kagalagadi Transfrontier Park between South Africa, Namibia and Botswana. They farmed with limited livestock and lived off the land, hunting wild game and birds. Their small farmhouse built with limestone and thatched grass, is today a museum in the heart of the Park.
Kruger grew up in a hunting and fishing environment and inherited his love for wild fauna and flora from this rich family legacy. As a child he hunted small animals and birds, and shot his first antelope at the age of six. Today he has 50 years of experience in hunting and fishing adventures. He has been involved in in wildlife management and conservation projects for 35 years, including 20 years as a Professional Hunter and Hunting Outfitter that includes a license in Botswana.
His artistic talent and passion for wildlife started the hobby of taxidermy in 1997.Krugertaxidermy is today a business, but Kruger still prefers to call it his wildlife art a hobby and does not want the business side to dictate his passion for wildlife art. With his vast knowledge of the Southern Africa fauna and flora, his wildlife and hunting adventures took him to Kenya, Zimbabwe, Namibia and Botswana.
Kruger still hunts and fishes Africa’s wilderness areas, and he studies and conserves wildlife. His passion for hunting, fishing and conservation projects gives him a high level of knowledge of animals and birds to compliment his current full time profession as a taxidermist.
How many years have you been in the business?
Kruger started taxidermy art as a hobby in 1997. From 1999 to 2003, Kruger received training from one of the top taxidermists in the United States of America – Bill Mason, owner of Mason’s Taxidermy in West Virginia, USA. Bill made sure that Kruger received invaluable training in the finer points of the art of taxidermy
What are your favorite mounts & why?
I don’t necessarily have favorite animals as each is unique. However, the degree of difficulty to mount cats and small mammals to perfection is rewarding. Big cats like lion and leopard, and small cats like caracal and serval really test a taxidermist’s skill and talent. Kudu and eland are also favorites, and off course pachyderms.
Action mounts are difficult and if you are not careful you can mess up the expressions. One of my favorite displays is this picture of a Cheetah chasing four Springbucks.It also excites me when I mount the ibex, wild sheep and antlered species of the world. It gives me a good idea of my position in the industry in comparison with top taxidermists of the world.
What are your specialty areas that you have in the business?
I sculpt or make my own forms and I am sure that is the specialty area of the business. Especially my cat mounts. Changing forms and styles all the time. I do however have taxidermy friends and we share manikins, but I make changes as to have my own ‘signature’ on the mounts.
I guess the fact that I receive trophies from hunters from all over the world is an indication that I am on par with some of the best. I don’t think many SA taxidermists receive trophies from all countries in Africa, Canada, Spain, Turkey, Alaska, USA, Krygystan, Azarbajan, Tajikistan, Greenland, to name a few. This makes the company unique as I do not specialize in African animals only, I can mount any species.
Current processes offered
Pick up & collect trophies? Trophy collection around SA and Import from any country
Maximum distance offered to collect trophies? We have a network of people and collect anywhere in SA
Own tanning facilities? Marakalalo only tan the skins/capes we use in the mount process, flat skins are send to a commercial professional company
Do you buy in forms or sculpt your own or both? 90 % of my forms have been sculpted/built by myself and every time we alter a form into a specific pose ordered by a client, I make a mold to save time for future mounts.
Delivery time (approximate):
Dip and Pack: 3-4 months European mounts: 4 months Shoulder mounts: 8-10 months Full mounts: 10 – 12 months
General Comments
I put my hand on each taxidermy piece, whether I personally mount it or if it is mounted by one of my taxidermists. Marakalalo is definitely not a speed service and the policy is that we would rather be three months late than sned out work of sub-standard quality.
Vultures are an ecologically vital group of birds that face a range of threats in many areas where they occur. Populations of many species are under pressure, and some species are facing extinction. The ‘IVAD’ has grown from awareness days run by the Endangered Wildlife Trust in South Africa and the Hawk Conservancy Trust in England, who decided to work together and expand the initiative into an international event.
It is now recognised that a co-ordinated IVAD will publicise the conservation of vultures to a wider audience, and highlight the important work being carried out by the world’s vulture conservationists. On the first Saturday in September, the aim is for each participating organisation to carry out their own activities that highlight vulture conservation and awareness. A website provides a central place for all participants to outline these activities and see the extent of vulture conservation across the world. Additionally, it is a valuable resource for vulture workers to learn about the activities of their colleagues and to develop new collaborations or exchange information. Learn more at https://www.vultureday.org/
Vultures have been placed under severe threat in recent years, particularly due to poisoning. Globally, 75% of all vultures are threatened with extinction, according to the IUCN Red List. During the 1990s, vulture populations in South Asia declined by 99% over a single decade due to poisoning by diclofenac, a Non-steroidal Anti-inflammatory Drug (NSAID) used to treat cattle. In 2006, veterinary use of diclofenac was banned by governments across India, Nepal and Pakistan and more recently in Bangladesh, Iran and Cambodia. However, it is still in use in parts of Europe and Africa, although there are alternative non-toxic drugs available such as meloxicam.
The first birds to be ringed (banded) on the African continent were Cape Vultures Gyps coprotheres. In August 1948 a group of enthusiasts climbed the cliffs of the Kransberg breeding colony near Thabazimbi in the Limpopo Province of South Africa, and ringed a number of Cape Vulture nestlings. One was later found dead near Bulawayo in Zimbabwe. The Witwatersrand Bird Club continued ringing Cape Vultures in the Magaliesberg mountain range, and as a student at Witwatersrand University, I joined the WBC ringing activities in 1963 and 1964 in the Magaliesberg and in Botswana.
In 1972 I met Peter Mundy, who was on his way from Nigeria to then Rhodesia, where he was to start a Master’s programme on ‘The Comparative Biology of Southern African Vultures’. In 1973 Peter co-ordinated a ringing exercise in the Magaliesberg, when we marked individual nestlings with unique colour ring combinations for the first time. His research continued for many years and Peter was ultimately awarded a Doctorate for his extensive studies of vultures in the field, in Zimbabwe and South Africa.
Cape Vulture chick
Fast-forward to 2021 and vultures are in dire trouble all around the world, most of them now on the endangered list. They have been decimated by humans and our intolerance and indifference to the creatures that share our planet. Toxins of one kind or another have wreaked havoc on vulture populations, while changes in land-use, electrocution and collisions with powerlines have added to the threats facing vultures.
The only book dealing with the vultures of a continent
The plight of these harmless and useful birds is now highlighted on IVAD, and I was invited to visit the Nyoka Ridge Vulture ‘restaurant’ for a recognition of the occasion. This vulture feeding site is an initiative of the local Rotarians, the local chapter of BirdLife and WESSA (Wildlife and Environment Society of South Africa). A shady lookout post has been constructed here, while a photographic hide is being built in a shipping container and will be installed later this year. The Magaliesberg Biosphere Reserve was recognised by UNESCO in 2015, giving the core area international status as a special place. However, vultures fly far and wide, away from the protection of the biosphere reserve.
Peter Mundy and I made a nostalgic trip out to Nyoka Ridge on 4 September. A column of wheeling vultures greeted our arrival, but showed no interest in the repast of dead livestock that had been laid out for them and disappeared from view. We chatted to the many people who had come out for the morning, hoping to see the great birds descend to the food.
Dr Peter Mundy (left) and Dr John Ledger at the Nyoka Ridge Vulture Restaurant on 4 September 2021
Alas, as midday approached their human patience wore thin, and an exodus ensued until only three observers remained. At 1:30pm the Cape Vultures started dropping out of the sky, and we were treated to the magnificent spectacle of around 100 or more birds circling, landing, feeding and fighting as they have done since time immemorial. What a wonderful sight!
It is 58 years since I first ringed vultures in the Magaliesberg and 49 since Peter and I met and became vulture soul-mates. We are both gratified and moved that there is a new generation of vulture custodians who care about these great birds, and are trying to ensure their survival in a world where humans and their trappings of civilisation, prosperity and greed are inexorably encroaching on the space that vultures need to survive.
Hunters can play an important part in vulture conservation by using non-lead ammunition to hunt animals that might later be consumed by vultures.
Dr John Ledger is a past Director of the Endangered Wildlife Trust, now a consultant, writer and teacher on the environment, energy and wildlife; he is a columnist for the African Hunting Gazette. He lives in Johannesburg, South Africa. John.Ledger@wol.co.za
Q:Tell us about your family, how they originally got to Africa.
A: My great-great grandfather came to South Africa around 1850. He was a doctor, and he married an Afrikaans Boer woman. My great-grandfather also married an Afrikaans Boer woman and they fought against the English during the Boer war. Their family farm was destroyed in the scorched earth policy at the time, and the family spent some time in one of the concentration camps. After the Boer war they emigrated to Rhodesia, now Zimbabwe, and worked for a company that was in the beef business. My grandfather was born in Bulawayo in 1912, and was educated in Rhodesia. He met my grandmother who had emigrated to Rhodesia from Scotland as a radiographer. My grandfather was a carpenter by trade which held him in good stead in later years when he started his own farming venture. He joined the Rhodesian Royal Air Force for the duration of the Second World War. On returning to Rhodesia he bought a farm at Balla Balla, approximately 70km south of Bulawayo on the Beit Bridge road, and did beef cattle and limited cropping under irrigation.
My father was one of four children – three boys and one girl. He was a twin, the youngest. He had a great upbringing on the farm where the hunting of plains game and game bird was freely available. On leaving school in 1965 he joined the Department of National Parks and Wild Life Management as a Cadet Ranger, and was fortunate enough to be transferred to Mabalahuta in the Gona-re-zhou National Park where he worked under Richard Harland who was an experienced elephant hunter.
Richard taught him the basics of elephant hunting. Added to this the Sergeant Game Scout was a man named Machavana who himself was very experienced with elephants. My father worked for the Department of National Parks and Wild life for nine years and gained a tremendous amount of experience in all aspects of big-game hunting, namely elephant, buffalo, lion, and leopard. There was a tremendous amount of control work to be done in those days.
Today this is not the case, as safari hunting has placed a big value on all these animals which are now hunted by safari operators with their perspective clients. So whereas in the past a farmer would destroy a lion that was eating his cattle, these days the farmer would sell the lion to a safari operator. While stationed at the Main Camp of Hwange National Park he met and married my mother, Bertie, who had come to visit her aunt in Bulawayo. Bertie came from Holland, but as a child, till she was 16 years old, lived in Indonesia and New Guinea where her father was an administrator for the then Dutch Colony. This I am sure prepared her for the bush life that they have lived since then.
Q: When and where were you born?
A: I was born in Bulawayo in 1975.
Q:How did you get into hunting – what was it that influenced you?
A: It was growing up on the farm in Mbalabala, and on the various hunting camps where my parents operated, and just generally having a passion for wildlife and wide-open spaces influenced my career decision.
Q:With whom did you train, apprentice and learn from?
A: I mainly learnt from my father Barrie Duckworth and company PHs Pete Fick and Hilton Nichols.
Q:What was the most important thing you learned during those early years?
A: Hard work ethic, honesty and that your word is your word. Obviously growing up hunting I learnt a lot about the bush and wildlife long before I started my apprenticeship.
Q:The early years of professional hunting – where were they?
A: I did pretty much all of my apprenticeship in Chewore South in the Zambezi Valley, Matetsi River Ranch near Victoria Falls, and the Save Valley Conservancy in the South Eastern Lowveld of Zimbabwe.
Q:What was next?
A: On leaving National Parks in 1974 we decided to go farming on our home farm at Balla Balla. Our internal war was on and I felt that my aging parents needed support on the farm. However, I soon was missing big-game hunting, and when my former boss in National Parks who had also left the Department and had now started his own Safari company, phoned me and asked if I would do some pro-hunting for him, I jumped at the opportunity. Due to several factors I eventually left A B&M safaris and went on my own in 1978. We called ourselves Hunters Safaris. I was then joined by Roger Whittall and we formed our own safari company in 1982 which we called Zinyela Hunters Safaris (Pvt) Ltd. In 1998 we dissolved Zinyela Hunters Safaris and each formed our respective companies. Roger’s became Roger Whittall Safaris and mine became Mokore Safaris. These are the companies by which we still operate today. Obviously, growing up on the family farm and on all the hunting camps where my parents operated, my brother Neil and I grew up loving wildlife, hunting and the bush. We both went straight into the business as soon as I finished University and Neil finished Blackfordby Agricultural College.
Q:What were some of the more embarrassing, fun and interesting experiences?
A: My first few hunts as a qualified PH where I had to lead the charge had plenty “learning” experiences. The poor clients ended up getting walked a lot harder to try and get an animal as my inexperience (even after a three-year apprenticeship under some of the best PHs out there) lead to me passing up an animal or not getting the client in the right position, etc. It was sometimes embarrassing but always fun for the most part. There were a few difficult sections with clients where my inexperience allowed them to “bully” me, but I soon learnt how to deal with all these things, making safari even more fun, not only for our guests but also for myself.
Q:Any specific client experiences that stood out?
A: My first leopard hunt was in the save valley conservancy. I had set up a bait on the banks of a small stream on our Angus ranch. Tracks told us (before the advent of trail cameras) that we had a tom and female hit. In the blind early because of overcast weather and at 4:30 p.m. we saw movement by the bait. Soon we had two leopard cavorting and playing around in the river sand, one male and a female. You would have thought that being in daylight I would have seen that although the male was bigger than the female it was not an old cat. I am not sure if it was because I was shaking so much that could hardly hold my binos, or was just too excited to have a male in front of us that I instructed the client to take him. All that remains to be said is that the cat was not of the required age. Valuable lesson learnt!
Q: Any other valuable lesson?
A: The second valuable lesson I learnt was when i was conducting anti-poaching patrols on the same ranch.
A large job in the early years consisted of ridding these areas of huge numbers of snares that were remaining from the cattle days, as well as fighting the ever-present new poaching gangs. As an apprentice working on the property, I spent many hours patrolling with the game scouts. Due to the very low numbers of dangerous game back then, we normally just patrolled with shotguns loaded with either birdshot or buckshot…for shooting dogs and as an intimidation factor when confronting poachers.
On the day in question I was patrolling along the Chinchindwe River on our newly acquired Angus Ranch. We had been patrolling for maybe an hour, when we came across a snareline of about 30 wire snares along the edge of a mopane forest and an open area. We spread out searching for other snares and removing the ones we found. Whilst untying a snare, I heard a sound in a small Ilala palm thicket behind me in the middle of the open area. I asked the scout nearest to me if he had heard anything. He hadn’t, and so we just carried on removing snares. I heard the sound again and alerted the scout to this fact.
He was immediately convinced that it was the owners of the snares hiding in the thicket, and wanted to rush in and arrest them as the first guy to lay a hand on a poacher arrested got the biggest bonus! I cautioned him to hold back a bit as there were tracks of a buffalo herd that had passed near the snareline, and that this could be a snared buffalo. Taking the bird shot out of the Benelli shotgun I was carrying, I replaced it with slug, buckshot, slug, buckshot in that combination.
Once done and now better armed, I suggested that we proceed into the thicket and see if it was indeed the poachers. The ever-eager scout forged ahead with the snares he had removed over his right shoulder. We hadn’t gone but a few meters into the thicket when he hurriedly started trying to back out past me, but the snares on his shoulder were catching on the palm thorns. Trying to step to the side to see past him, I questioned him, “Chi, chi?” (“What, what?”). By then he was free from the thorns and made himself scarce. I then saw what was troubling him coming at me at full pace: An angry buffalo bull!
My first shot with a Rottweill slug at about eight paces, hit it in the right eye but had absolutely no effect on the bull! By the time I could pull the trigger a second time he had already dropped his head to toss me, so I shot him into the top of his skull with a charge of buckshot. Fortunately, this killed him outright and I was able to jump aside allowing his body to fall past me. I quickly put two 9mm bullets into the back of his head with the handgun I had as insurance, but these were unnecessary as the shotgun had killed him.
My biggest concern then was to try and explain to my father how I had killed one of his precious buffalo that the Conservancy was trying to breed up. Of course, when I got him on the radio his only concern was our safety. I was extremely lucky that this was a soft-bossed bull, as I think if he had had a hard boss the buckshot would not have penetrated and I probably wouldn’t be here writing this story. In hindsight, I appreciate the follies of youth. I would NEVER go into such a situation again now if I had only a shotgun with me. The Lord sometimes protects the dumb!
That being said, thus far in my career, the two closest incidents with trouble from dangerous game I have managed to sort out using a shotgun. The other was a leopard.
Q:Anything you leant about what not to do?
A: Don’t go into thickets where there are wounded buffalo, only with a shotgun!
Q:Which countries/areas have you hunted since then?
A: I have only hunted Zimbabwe and Mozambique. We started operating in Mozambique in 2001 when the Zimbabwean government embarked on their fast-track land reform policy and started acquiring all our properties. We lost three properties in late 2000/early 2001 and so decided to look in neighboring countries for work.
Q: What were some of the interesting things that happened there?
A: Developing the beautiful areas we have in both Zimbabwe (Mokore and Angus in the save valley conservancy) and Mozambique (coutada 9) have been some of the most interesting and exciting experiences I have had. Save valley was, when my parents first bought these properties, under cattle ranching. Because of this and the terrible drought in 1992, there was minimal game in the area. Taking down all the cattle fences, putting in water holes, and bringing in huge numbers of game was very exciting. As a young apprentice this was a time of hard work but a lot of valuable lessons from some of the best game managers in the world. Working with the likes of Clem Coetzee, my dad Barrie, Roger Whittal, Clive Stockhill and others was a great experience for me.
Q:Tell us more about the Mozambique experience.
A: Our Mozambique concession was wild and huge when we first went in with very few roads and water. Game was severely depleted after 24 years of civil war and the poaching thereafter. Going in and opening up this area was very exciting and form some of my best memories of my entire career. Just taking a pack and walking off into the bush for a week to ten day patrol in an area where you have never been, where you do not know what is over the next hill is very exciting and pushes you on every day to go further in and discover new places. The excitement of getting water from the first boreholes we put in, the first dams built, new roads opened and camps built. Every project is exciting, often difficult but very gratifying. To be able to do this together with my parents, brother, wife and sister-in-law as part of the team has been a blessing.
Q:If you could return to any time or place in Africa, where would it be?
A: Chewore south in the early days. I still love every trip to the save, sengwa and coutada 9. I have been lucky to hunt in great areas. Unfortunately, being so busy close to home has kept me from exploring the rest of Africa so I am sure there are plenty other wild and beautiful places I have missed. I would love to see some of the other countries with big concessions like Zambia, Tanzania, Ethiopia and Uganda. However, I still feel that by having been involved in the resurrection of most of our current areas they are a lot dearer to me.
Q:Which is your favorite trophy animal to hunt? And why?
A: I used to love hunting elephant bulls in big areas when there was a chance to find a big trophy bull. Now this desire has waned as there are very few big wild areas with huge bulls left. Now my favorites are buffalo (especially old dagga boys) and eland. These three are my favorites, as to hunt them is usually physical and a lot of time spent out on tracks. When following in the tracks of these animals they lead you to beautiful springs, pans and also some hellishly horrible thick thorn! Always interesting places though. Also, when on these hunts ones sees and hears all the other aspects and creatures of the bush. This is very different to hunting plains game on smaller areas and mostly spot and stalk from the vehicle.
Q:What is the best trophy animal one of your clients ever took?
A: Probably a 93 lb elephant with John in Ngamo/Sikumi area. There have been many, many great ones though with great memories. Some of them not the biggest measurement wise, but just old and tough.
Q:Tell us about two of your most memorable hunts, without naming names.
A: when I was an apprentice we did a mini-cull in the Dande communal area. Culling is never a pleasant job, but as a first-year apprentice this was extremely exciting. The fact that it was very hot and we ran out of water was probably the most lasting memory! I was sent with Magocha (father’s head tracker and hunting legend) to fetch the vehicle, and was hard pressed to keep up even though I was young and very fit. The heat and thirst were tough. Eventually we found a mostly dried-up pan with some small puddles of water in the places where elephant had sunk into the mud. I sucked some through my cap as a filter. Not tasty, but moisture!
On my first lion hunt in Mozambique, there were only a few nomadic lion in the area when we first started there. Now there are plenty, but back then it was extremely challenging to locate and hunt them. I was on a late-season hunt with my very good friend Dan. We had a big male hit our bait, but he was very leery and we couldn’t get him to come in when we were in the blind. All my strategies that I tried, failed. Eventually, we tracked/followed his calls very early in the morning after spending all night waiting by the bait in the blind. He led us to the base of a small kopje and i had a feeling he was up on it. I called, “roared” to him using my cupped hands. We heard a grunt and he appeared about 60 yards away on top of the rise. The early morning sun was shining from behind him and his mane was flared. What a magnificent sight. Unfortunately, the shot was blocked for Dan by a small bush. The lion started trotting down the slope diagonally past us. When he was about 40 yards from us I grunted, and this stopped him. A good shot from Dan and it was over. What a hunt. This lion only had one full paw left. Three had been damaged by poachers gin traps.
Q: Tell us about any disaster of a client and what you had to deal with.
A: one of my worst (thankfully only a couple that I have had to experience) clients was an Englishman hunting with me out of mkanga camp in dande area. He was a whiner, and whined about everything. Just an unpleasant person and impossible to please. Unfortunately, I was young and allowed him to “bully” me. Now it would be different.
Q:What are your recommendations on guns, ammo, or equipment for the first-time hunter to Africa?
A: For a first time hunter for plains game I recommend any of the .300 calibers. Trophy bonded bear claw and swift a-frames are probably my favorite expanding bullets. For buffalo hunters i recommend the .375 h&h. This caliber is fantastic and has stood the test of time, and can be used on anything from an elephant to a grysbok. Accurate out to 250 yards if the need arises, and you can find ammunition almost in any hunting camp. If a client comes with one of these, I recommend a mixture of solids and softs. Usually the first shot a soft and the rest of the magazine solids.
Q:Which guns and ammo are you using to back-up on dangerous or wounded game and tell us why?
A: I started my career using a .458 lott and now use a .505 gibbs. I would use my .458 more than I do currently but have had stock issues. I am confident in any situation with either of these two weapons. Both are accurate and hard-hitting. I only use solid ammunition (usually woodleigh) except for following leopard. I then use a soft point.
Q:What was your closest brush with death? If more than one – go for it and explain!
A: The buffalo with a shotgun explained above was one. The next closest was a leopard charge that ended up pretty close. I have had numerous close encounters with bad driving and blow-outs on the way to our areas that scare me more than most things!
Q: How has the hunting industry changed in your opinion over the past number of years?
A: It’s way more fast-paced, and many clients now are more interested in their phones than just sitting back and enjoying the bush. One of my pet hates is people looking at their phones when around the camp fire or at the dinner table. Unfortunately, this is the modern way!
Q: If you should suggest one thing to your hunting clients to improve their safari experience, with you, or with anyone else for that matter – what would it be?
A: Prepare, prepare, prepare. Shoot as much as you can and from as many different positions as you can. Get fit, and if you have time try read up on the various animals you may pursue, the country you are going to, and its customs and traditions. Go and relax. Hunt opportunistically and do not stress about the tape measure. Take plenty pictures, keep a daily diary and ask plenty questions.
Q:What can the industry do to contribute to the long-term conservation of Africa’s wildlife?
A: Try and educate the ignorant people overseas who keep trying to shut down hunting. They need to understand that hunters are not the enemy. In fact, they are the ones saving millions of hectares of habitat from being destroyed, and are continually fighting poachers.
Q:What would be your ideal safari if you have one last safari?
A: it would be a multiple buffalo and plains-game safari for 21 days in any of our current areas.
By submitting this form, you are consenting to receive marketing emails from: AHG. You can revoke your consent to receive emails at any time by using the SafeUnsubscribe® link, found at the bottom of every email. Emails are serviced by Constant Contact
Despite his bulk, the bull did not show that he had been hit; on the contrary, he spun around and crashed through the brush following the thundering sounds of his partner as if nothing had happened. The crashing continued for a short while and then all was quiet. Dust rose up from the bush and slowly drifted towards us, slowly dissipating
With a more than 40” spread and massive worn bosses, the tips were all but gone showing his age – a bull with character. He bore the scars from hyena and lion as well as from a poacher’s spear.
