Chapter Eight

Panthera Pardus

I cannot imagine that there has been as much confusion in early attempts at categorizing an animal as there appears to have been with the leopard! Body sizes, tail lengths and colouration have all been issued as “proof” of different types of these fascinating cats. In Guy Coheleach’s magnificent book ‘The Big Cats’, he mentions that in Imperial Rome, cheetahs at one time were known as ‘Panthera’ and leopards as ‘Pardus’ and were thought to be female and male respectively, of the same species! Clearly the Romans’ debaucherous parties and gargantuan consumption of the grape, dimmed their powers of observation. These folks even thought that a young male lion, still sporting his youth-spots, was a cross between a lion and old Pardus!

All reference books spend at least a page describing the leopard. “Short legs, spotted coat” etc, etc. Everyone reading this book will know what a leopard is so I can skip that part. But I can’t resist putting this down -from Richard D. Estes the Safari Companion – “The embodiment of feline beauty, power, and stealth”. My sentiments exactly!

Distribution

For the umpteenth time, I have to mention the leopard’s adaptability – his tolerance for an amazing variety of completely different terrains. Leopards are found throughout Asia Minor, India, South East Asia, north over theHimalayas, through Tibet, China and into Siberia. This carefully shaded map is interesting, but it’s just paper. Close your eyes and think again, about Tibet, about South East Asia, about Siberia. We are talking about towering, stark, snow-swept mountains – we are talking about thick dripping Cambodian jungles, bamboo-clicking Chinese wilderness – and the leopard is surviving today, in all of them, but without help, without a drastic change in how leopard populations are managed, the leopard will gradually disappear.

Like the other great cats, the leopard’s range has been drastically reduced by humans but not to the same degree as the lion, thanks to his versatility – his adaptability. The place where he has been dealt the biggest impact is in North Africa where he is just about extinct.

For many years Zimbabwe has enjoyed healthy leopard populations. These beautiful predators have survived throughout most of the country, from the towering misty peaks of the Nyanga Mountains in the eastern highlands, all the way to the flat dry thorn-land in the west on the Botswana border. But things have drastically changed in Zimbabwe in recent years. The leopard has been taken right to the brink of disaster, and drastic measures would be needed in order to halt its rapid slide into the endangered levels.

Social and Mating

Leopards are solitary creatures but there is still a loose association between leopard operating in the same areas. Females may well be related like a lion pride. Males should be unrelated as they move into and establish themselves in new areas. Although there is little frequent meeting and greeting between adult leopard, except during courtship and mating, there is no doubt that through scent marking and vocalisation, leopard keep in touch with each other, even if this is an opposing association. Basically, they only socialise with one another for the purposes of breeding and when a mother is caring for her cubs. They are territorial animals with large variations in the size of their home ranges. The size of these ranges is influenced and dictated by the scarcity or abundance of food and cover. These home ranges often overlap – I quote from Richard D. Estes – “Great differences in home range size, even in the same locale, demonstrated in Tsavo National Park, where ten radiocollared leopards that were tracked for three years lived in areas of 3.5 to 24 square miles. Their ranges overlapped by up to 70%; each leopard used only half its range at a time. Male ranges may overlap several female ranges. In Serengeti National Park an adult male and three females hunted the same three mile stretch of river, each independently”.

According to Guy Coheleach in “The Big Cats” – “females do not seem to defend a territory and thus may share overlapping ranges, while the males’ ranges do not overlap each other, suggesting that the males may be territorial”.

I have mentioned elsewhere that Graham and I carried out a detailed marking exercise on the 1:50 000 maps which we keep in both of our camps. This exercise lasted two years. Every time we identified a fresh leopard track, we marked it with a coloured pin on the map and marked down the information which was pertinent to that track. For example “21 June large male, going east”. “15 July, large female and one cub, crossing Simukwe from south to north”. After several months a definite pattern began to emerge, and after two seasons we had a pretty good idea as to the size of the home ranges of our cats.

Our information corresponded with what Coheleach had to say in that the males are definitely territorial. Our dominant male Matobo leopards held a definite home territory which they marked and defended, and this territory overlapped, or encompassed the territories of two, and sometimes three females.

Nearly every book I have read covering the leopards’ mating habits states that leopards mate and have cubs all year round. Estes – “Reproduction is unseasonal”. Coheleach – “Leopards do not breed in a particular season”. Our observations showed a different pattern. While I acknowledge that it is physically possible that Matobo leopards can come into oestrus, and breed at any time during the year, our cats definitely have a peak, or “more active” breeding season. It is a simple matter to detect when two leopards are mating. You see their spoor together on the dusty farm roads, riverbeds and game trails. We dread going up to an eaten bait and finding two sets of adult tracks – we are trying to take the male, and sexing leopard at a hundred yards is no easy thing. But when the cats are mating they are very active, covering a lot of ground, drawing new males in, and they are also very vocal at this time – which helps us decide where to place baits or look for tracks. Our Matobo leopards mate from May through July. Looking back over our records through the years, we note that we have had more successful leopard hunts in those months than at any other time during the year. Why would there be a peak in those months? My personal theory is as follows: The female conceives, let us say, in mid May, she is then pregnant for approximately ninety days. That means she gives birth about mid August. She nurses the cubs until they are about three months old when they are now big enough to start following her; they are big enough to start learning how to hunt. This puts the date at around the end of November. This is when life starts in the southern African bush. The rains come and the antelope drop their young. What better time to learn to hunt than when there are plenty of new babies around? Impala, duiker, kudu, all drop their young in November and December.

Nils Kure wrote a fascinating, complete study of leopards in the Mala Mala game reserve in South Africa called “Living with Leopards”. In this book, along with numerous outstanding photographs of leopards engaged in every one of life’s functions, he has a very detailed chapter on mating. He mentions that in all his observations he never saw a male initiate the act of mating, it was always the female. I found that fact interesting. Estes says that the female comes into oestrus for about seven days and this state will recur again after 25 to 58 days if the female does not conceive. Nils Kure’s observations at Mala Mala show that a mating pair are only together from 1 to 4 days. All of our observations at Marula suggested that mating cats usually spent about a week together.

I found one particular paragraph pertaining to mating leopards in Nils Kure’s book, particularly interesting. “It seems certain that a dominant male leopard controls the matings within his territory. In one instance, the Chellahanga female, who was with the Jakkalsdraai male at the time, left him in response to the Mlowathi males calling. She went far out of her territory and into that area where the Mlowathi male was making inroads on the Jakkalsdraai male’s territory”. So here we can see that a dominant male (the Mlowathi male) was able to call this “hot” female into his area.

The leopards gestation period is from 90 to 100 days and two cubs are usually born. I believe that in the Matobo, most of the time, both cubs will survive. This is due to an abundance of good safe cover, plenty of food, in the form of small antelope, monkeys and hyraxes all found in good numbers around the hills, and also, because of the absence of large numbers of other predators.

Sure, there are snakes, jackals and a few hyenas around, but there are no lions and large populations of hyena and wild dogs to threaten the cubs. We often come across a mother’s tracks followed by the smaller tracks of both her two growing cubs.

Leopards are weaned at about three months, but they still depend on their mother for food for more than a year. At about two years the mother will push the cubs out of her area if they have not already left of their own accord. They can now fend for themselves but they have to tread carefully and often wander long distances trying to find a new unoccupied home territory, but as mentioned previously, there appears to be a loose association between individuals, possibly even some tolerance of young males by their sire, during the break-away period.

The leopard is sexually mature at about 24 months old. The female can mate as soon as she is physically able, but the young male will usually have to wait until he has established his own territory, as a dominant male will kill him if he is found hanging around one of the receptive girlfriends.

The female leopard, barring a condition called ‘false oestrus’, will not come into season again until the second year. For example, if she fell pregnant in early May 2000, she will give birth in early August and will suckle her cubs until early November and then teaches them to hunt and look after themselves throughout 200l. By May 2002, she will be ready to fall pregnant once more.

Size of the Leopard

This is the part where most hunters perk up the interest level; and this is the subject that most of the “untruths” and exaggerations are woven around. But it works the other way too. A lot of reference books are too conservative in talking about leopard sizes. I think it can be summed up thus – most hunters’ accounts make the leopard bigger than it is, and most reference books make the leopard smaller than it is.

Tony De Almeida wrote a book called “Jaguar Hunting in the Mato Grosso and Bolivia”. Any hunter who loves to hunt the big cats should not be without this book. It is an exciting, accurate, no-frills account of hard hunting in rugged conditions.

Tony De Almeida hits the nail exactly on the head with these words – “The length of cats, measured in a straight line between pegs driven into the ground at the nose and the tip of the tail, is a subjective measurement, to say the least, since it is always taken by the shooter of the trophy himself, and, of course, once the animal is skinned, this measurement cannot be repeated. Actually, neither skull measurement nor length is the best indication of a cat’s actual size, although for reliable records, skull measurements must prevail. The best gauge of proportions of a cat is his weight. Here we run into trouble. Few guides or hunters carry scales into the field. Usually the weight of any animal is “estimated”. This euphemism signifying that no value at all can be attached to the figure given.

Years of talking to clients and hearing about the sizes and weights of animals they have shot have permitted us to classify them into two categories. In the first are those who make an honest attempt to correctly gauge the weights of their cats; they usually overestimate weights by 30 to 50 percent, depending on their previous experience in weighing animals. In the second category are those who are not concerned with a correct weight at all but who merely wish to impress their friends and the fellow members of the safari club back home; they overestimate weights by anything from a conservative 80 percent to as much as 200 percent. Most of these people, of course, realise  that they are talking rot but are forced into a vicious circle: Their estimations of weight are nothing more than a question of keeping up with Jones, whocame back from his African safari saying he shot a 350kg lion”.

Whilst I have never heard of a cat’s weight exaggerated by two hundred percent, I frequently hear exaggerations of around fifty percent. The euphoria and excitement that erupts when a nice leopard is taken, is understandable. When a nice male leopard is taken by an outfit that takes very few leopards, the event is cataclysmic. Couple that event with a few silvery-tongued loquacious PHs and voila! You have a 220-pound leopard!

When we bump into PHs from certain companies well known to us, it is standard procedure to be told by them at the Bulawayo airport that the safari has just produced a 200-pound cat. Graham and I look at each other immediately every time we hear these stories and usually he follows it up with some sarcastic comment like: “We need to move our operation from Marula to so and so’s area. The cats we’re shooting are just too small!”

Where do we start in tackling the truth of the leopard’s size?

Let’s kick off with what some of the boffins say:

2004 Carnivore Preservation Trust 85 – 125 pounds

Estes – The Safari Companion 77 – 143 pounds

Coheleach – The Big Cats 55 – 100 pounds

Encyclopaedia Zimbabwe (Quest Publishing) 134 pounds

Meinertzhagen (1938, avg of 6 mature males – Kenya) 138 pounds

Pienaar (1969) 129 pounds

Generally, not very impressive. But when talking about leopards, we are generalising, lumping many different groups, or subspecies, into one box, and that I believe (hunters’ exaggerations aside), is what creates these big discrepancies.

In the Chunya Game Management Area in southwestern Tanzania, I took the complete quota of five animals in 1996. All five leopards were fully mature males in their prime, or just past their prime. The biggest of these cats we estimated at 130 pounds. The other four were all around the 110 to 125 pound mark. From nose to tip of tail, only one was close to 7 feet, the others were all about six-and-a-half feet in length. The tails of these animals averaged 31 inches. Why are they so small there? I do not know. I killed four magnificent lions, all huge bodied, in the same area that year, so it wasn’t as if wildlife there was stunted. The buffalo were also giants. But I do not want to inadvertently give the impression that all Tanzania leopards are small. Tanzania is a big country. I have seen photographs of huge cats taken off Mount Meru’s slopes, and from the Lake Burigi area on the western border with Rwanda.

I have read several writings on the Cape leopard which frequents the Groot Swartberge and Nuweveld Mountains at Africa’s southern tip, and these cats are also small, a “big” male not much more than 100 pounds.

Even in Zimbabwe, leopards vary greatly in size and when I make that statement, I am comparing cats of the same sex and similar age. I have found the leopard in the Zambezi Valley are smaller than most other populations in the country. In my opinion, based on 27 years of hunting them, and on personal research, the biggest leopards in Zimbabwe are found in the south eastern Lowveld, the Matobo Hills and a belt of country stretching from Turk Mine, north of Bulawayo, westwards, to the Gwaai river in the Khami district. I have read in several places that leopards found in northern Iran are supposed to be the largest subspecies in the world. In Tony De Almeida ‘s book he says “D. Laylin, engaged in a program for trapping leopards in Iran and transferring them from one region to another, told me that the largest male they caught, weighed Just over 176 pounds”. I don’t know how many cats D. Laylin trapped, but I can say without hesitation, that if this 176 pounder was top of the pile, then Panthera pardus Matobo is the King – they are a lot bigger than the supposed largest subspecies – the Iranian cat.

I quote further from Tony de Almeida’s book.

“T. Sanchez-Arino and W. Bigi (personal communication) during 1983-84 weighed twelve male Leopards from the Loliondo region of Tanzania. Their average weight was 136.4 pounds (62 kilos) and the largest leopard of the twelve – scaled 173.8 pounds (79 kilos). Sanchez-Arino said that this was the biggest leopard he had ever seen, out of the nearly 130 shot by him or his clients in different parts of Africa over thirty-five years.”

The summary of these findings reveals two facts. One, that the 220-pound leopards one regularly hears about at the airport are mostly the figment of active imaginations, and two, there appears to be more large leopard, over 150 pounds, found in the Matobo Range than anywhere else.

Graham’s father, Bill Robertson, kept records of many of the male leopards which succumbed to his counter measures of traps and poison over the years. He found that most of the mature males were in the 140 to 150 pound range. Very few broke that barrier. Of course he was not trophy hunting, so if his actions accounted for a dozen or so cattle killers over a three or four year period, maybe only a few of these would be large mature males.

There are always exceptions, just like there are short and tall people, but we have found that the average size of what we call a “good” or “big” male leopard in the Matobo Hills has the following measurements-

Tip of nose to end of tail – 86″

Length of tail – 36″

Circumference at base of tail – 9″

Circumference of cat around stomach – 37″

Circumference of cat around chest – 35″

Circumference of neck – 23″

Circumference of head behind ears – 23″

Circumference of head in front of ears – 24″

Height at shoulder – 26″

Circumference of forearm – 12″

Weight -150 to 160 pounds

I once took a cat with a tail of 42″. In 2006 I took a beautiful heavy Tysonheaded cat with an unusually short tail of 31″. Quite a big variation.

The heaviest cat I have ever weighed was 187 pounds and that cat had nothing in its stomach. I have taken two others which I kick myself for having not weighed – both of these I believe could have gone to two hundred or very close to it. The cat that Graham took with Dan Dickey, which became the Zimbabwe record, weighed 196 pounds with just a little meat in its stomach.

Just because I have never seen, or weighed a 200-pound leopard, does not mean that they are not out there. Thousands of leopards have been taken over the years and I have no doubt that several of them weighed over 200 pounds, but these monsters are not nearly as common as all the stories would have us believe.

When we first started taking big leopard in 1987, a 16″ skull was quite a big deal. In fact I took one around 17″ with a hunter named Gene Yap, which went into the record books at about number ten or so. Now, twenty years later, that leopard has been pushed way down the rankings. 16″ is no longer the big deal it was in the 1980’s.

To measure a cat’s skull you have to boil, clean and dry the skull. Once this is done, you seat the lower jaw in its correct place and lay the cleaned skull on a flat surface. Using callipers, you then measure the length of the skull, and then you add that measurement to the width of the skull. These two measurements added together make the magic number.

Since those early days in the eighties, I have taken nine leopard with skulls  that measured over 17″. These were monsters. But those measurements paled when levelled against Graham’s 18 ½” giant. Graham told me that the head on that leopard appeared too big for the cat’s body, and looking at the photos, I believe he is correct. Of course that leopard is a beauty in anyone’s language but the head does look slightly out of proportion to the body. Point here, is you could have a 180-pound leopard with a 17-inch skull, and you could have a 180-pound leopard with a 16-inch skull. What makes these, or any leopard,  bigger or smaller than their relatives?

Firstly, I believe there has to be a correct ratio of leopard to habitat. Too few leopard, and you will eventually have too much interbreeding, stunting growth. Too many leopard, and the food supply will not be sufficient to grow big healthy cats. Secondly, I believe that the abundance and quality of foodstuffs can influence growth, and also, the degree of ease or difficulty in acquiring that food must also count.

Colouration

The second Matobo leopard I took, with a hunter from the east coast named Jerry Lee, back in 1985, had markings which were unfamiliar to me. Admittedly, at that time I had not examined many leopard skins but when I thought about the dead leopards I had seen up at the Landreys’ concession in Matetsi and the full-mounts I had stared at in Coffin Grey’s Taxidermy in Bulawayo, I realised that these markings on Jerry Lee’s cat were different. How strange that the first big male I ever took in the Matobo, this one of Jerry Lee’s, had the most clear pronounced example of what we would later know as “mountain type” colouring!

But the excitement of taking leopards, the excitement and hustle and bustle of the growing of our business, far overshadowed any interest I may have had in any differences in colouration in the cats we were taking. It was only when we returned to the Matobo, when we set up our camp on AJ Bradnick’s ranch and began to enjoy regular success on our leopard hunts, that we began to notice these variations. I collected up all the good clear photographs of leopard that we had scattered about and had many of them enlarged, laid them out side by side, and the differences in types of markings were as clear as day.

Excitedly, I rushed out and collected all the reference books I could find on leopard. Surely we had a “new” subspecies here? Of course it turned out that scientists had noted, and had been pondering over the differences in leopard markings for hundreds of years. An English naturalist, R. I. Pocock, produced many fascinating studies on the world’s wild cats between 1907 and 1932, and I found several essays on colouration variation attributed to him.

This comes from Coheleach – “In the African leopards, Pocock has found a clear correspondence between the principal colour variations and the specific environment. The leopards of the savanna or veld are yellowish tawny brown, and the leopards of the tropical rain forests are darker and duskier. On the basis of the geographical distribution of these colour variations, as well as overall size, Pocock has recognised a large number of subspecies – 11 subspecies of Asiatic leopards and 17 subspecies of African leopards. Recent lists, however, generally recognise fewer subspecies, many of which are still unverified because of the lack of sufficient material to assess the variation”.

This comes from Catfolk Species Accounts: Leopard (Panthera pardus) (Sub-Saharan Africa) “Coat colour and patterning are broadly associated with habitat type. Pocock (1932) found the following trends in colouration for leopards in Africa:

Savanna leopards – rufous to ochraceous in colour;

Desert leopard – pale cream to yellow-brown in colour, with those from

cooler regions being more grey;

Rainforest leopard – dark, deep gold in colour;

High mountain leopards – even darker in colour than 3.

So having digested all this, it was obvious to me that the beautifully marked cats we were seeing in the Matobo Hills had their colouring and rosette patterns adapted by evolution to suit their surroundings. Darker shadows and thick cover in the hills – as opposed to more open dry yellow grasslands. I carried out further investigation, harassing taxidermists and other professional hunters so I could compare and photograph as many different leopards skins as possible.

Like zebra, if you look carefully at leopard skins, they are all different. In Zimbabwe alone we notice variations in both “ground colour” and “rosette pattern” but basically it seems there are two main types. We called them “savannah colouring” and “mountain type colouring”. Savannah skins are a pale yellow with smaller rosettes. The savannah rosettes are mostly “broken” or “open” rosettes. Each rosette is made up of three to five separate dots, sometimes touching one another, sometimes not. These rosettes on savannah skins are more numerous than the rosettes on mountain type skins.

Mountain type skins are more colourful, more striking, and they resemble jaguar colouring in many instances. The background on these cats is usually a richer gold colour, often becoming a darker rufous ochre on the back. The rosettes are fewer and bigger. Also, rosettes which are “closed” are more numerous on these mountain type leopard. By “closed”, I mean that they form a complete circle, or ring of black, and often the fur inside this ring is of a slightly darker hue than the overall “base” or background colour of the cat. Another noticeable feature of these beautiful pelts is that they have more big, solid black markings than savannah skins, mostly along the spine and base of tail area, and on the stomach.

I have only ever found this “mountain type” colouring in the Matobo hills. I have found “savannah” skins on leopard I have taken in the south eastern Lowveld, Chewore in the Zambezi Valley, Matetsi near Victoria Falls, Mberengwa, Shangani, the Kariba Basin, Beitbridge, Nyamandhlovu and Lonely Mine. Further afield I have taken these cats in Northern Masailand near Lake Natron, southern Masailand at Talamai, the Chunya area in south western Tanzania, and in the Selous Game Reserve. They are far more common than the “mountain type” skins.

Not all Matobo cats have this mountain colouring though. About one third of the leopard we take in our Matobo areas are “savannah” cats, the rest sport the beautiful gold and black of the “mountain” type.

I was recently on safari in the Magudu area south of Pongola in northern KwaZuluNatal, not far from the Swaziland border. On that safari I had the opportunity to see a huge male leopard in the wild at about ten yards! He was a beauty, with a big flappy dewlap hanging from his thick neck. This big boy also had a very light coloured coat with small savannah rosettes.

This would be incomplete if I did not mention the black leopard. In “The Panthers and Ounces of Asia” Pocock 1930 – he states “The frequency with which the black variety of leopard occurs is quite different in Africa and Asia. The black form is common in southern India and frequent in Java and the southern parts of Malaysia. In contrast, it is infrequent in Africa, except in the Ethiopian highlands, where most individuals are melanistic”.

I once had the opportunity to see a melanistic leopard. It was in an enclosure in the Chipangali Wildlife Orphanage outside Bulawayo. This animal I think, had come from Ethiopia. It was beautiful and when it stood in the sunlight, we could see the rosette pattern underneath its black coat. Very unusual. I have only heard of one sighting of a wild black leopard in Zimbabwe and that was in the late 1980s in Chewore. One of the professional hunters there reported seeing a fairly small black leopard cross the road in the evening, in front of their Land Cruiser.

Populations and Home Ranges

The following factors all seem to influence the size of a leopard’s home range- availability of food, availability of good cover, persecution by man, and abundance of large predators, e.g. lion. But, the most important factor seems to be the leopard’s territorial requirements – which is not influenced so much by the food base, but by the number of females a male can cover. Our own private study was initiated for several reasons. With every year that passed, after the end of the Rhodesian war, commercial interest and participation in hunting safaris grew. When the economic meltdown became a new factor from about 1998 onward, many people including some farmers, had to shut down their businesses, they were simply not viable any longer. Many of these people then entered the safari industry. This growth in the industry led to the “opening up” of new areas, and this, coupled with the advent of hound hunting resulted in a surge of successful leopard hunts in the Matobo range. Several of us were concerned that too many leopard were being taken out of the district. The first hurdle in trying to find an answer was to try to establish how many leopard actually lived in this area.

I read everything I could get my hands on which covered leopard home ranges. But most studies I found had been carried out in the plains of East Africa – in very different country to the Matobo hills. Theodore Bailey carried out a very detailed study in the Kruger National Park in South Africa, and in that study (The African Leopard, 1993) he said – “the home ranges of adult male leopards varied between 16.4 and 96.1 sq kilometres and were much larger than adult females. Unlike females, adult males moved rapidly from one end of their range to the other in predictable patterns”.

Graham grew up on Garth Farm and I had hunted it for many years, so between us our knowledge of his twelve thousand acres was intimate. We already had a good idea of how many leopard lived on the farm but we decided to go ahead with the map marking project anyway.

Very quickly, we ran into problems. Unfortunately leopards don’t utilise our fences and maps to demarcate their home ranges! They use urine and a series of grunting calls, so inevitably, our cats’ areas encompassed other peoples’ properties as well. Obtaining permission to go onto these neighbouring properties was not difficult but our hunting operations did not take us onto these other farms regularly, so our information on leopard movements there was sketchy. However, we managed to convert our information into home range diagrams which we believed were fairly accurate.

Another problem was the identification of spoor. Different types of ground structures portray the same leopard track differently. Loose sand and mud cause the leopard’s foot to splay open, thereby exaggerating its size, so if one hunter saw a certain male’s track in loose sand in a dry riverbed, it would look different to the same leopard’s track seen by another hunter on a dry hard road. Furthermore, I might see a mature male track in a certain place, and later, at camp, ask Graham if he knows anything about that male. He may answer – “No, I didn’t see that male track, but I saw a female track near that place yesterday”.

So now we would be unsure, we wouldn’t know if the track we saw had been made by the same leopard, or by two different cats. To overcome this problem of track identification we decided to measure the tracks as accurately as possible. This worked perfectly. It not only helped us decide if we had seen the tracks of the same leopard but it became a way of “gauging” the size of a leopard and this helped us to decide whether to bait him, or if he had eaten a bait, whether we should sit for him or not. More of this measuring technique shortly.

After two years we were able to conclude the following information on Graham’s twelve thousand acres.

• A big dominant male had a home area of about twelve thousand acres, two thirds of which fell on Graham’s property.
• Another male, slightly smaller, had a home range to the west of Graham’s property and one third of that home range merged onto Graham’s ranch.
• The big male’s area covered the territories of three females.
• Two of the females were large and mature whilst the third appeared to be a younger animal.
• One of the big females had a cub which occasionally followed her.
• The females’ territories were about 3.5 thousand acres in extent. A few times a year, maybe three or four times, a giant male came right across the eastern half of the ranch in front of the camp to the Mangwe Pass and then would disappear again. We named him ‘Smiths Block’ after the ranch to the east of us where he appeared to have his home. Every year one, and sometimes two, unknown males would come onto the property for a few days. I felt certain that these incursions were the result of females coming into heat. In 2004 I took one of these trespassers very near to camp, and he was a beauty. This leopard is the one mentioned in “Last Day Plus One.”
• We further concluded that in any seven days throughout the year, we could find the fresh tracks of five different leopards on Graham’s twelve thousand acres. Usually three female tracks and two male tracks. Even with this information it was impossible to extrapolate our findings to the leopard population in the district. Some areas, like private ranch land, where the farmers were resident and active in anti-poaching activities, we classed as “good” game and leopard areas. Other areas where poaching was a problem but good cover was evident and some small game still existed, we called “possible” areas, and then there were areas like sparsely populated communal lands where resident game had been poached out. These areas occasionally had transient leopards through them, and we branded these “poor” areas.

We lacked the time, drive, funding and co-operation to mount any more detailed studies on the leopard populations of western Matobo, but we’d made a start.

About twelve miles north of Garth Farm, towards Marula, is a ranch called Stone Hills. This was once an overgrazed cattle farm which was lovingly turned into a top game sanctuary by Richard and Bookey Peek. Richard has a degree in zoology and he served with the Rhodesian Department of Parks and Wildlife for fourteen years. He has also been the owner of the biggest taxidermy business in the country as well as the curator of mammals in the National Museum, so he is an authority on wildlife and wildlife management. Bookey is an accomplished travel writer and author and qualified lawyer who focused her energies and talents into learning about nature and developing Stone Hills into a veritable Eden.

Richard was interested and also concerned about the quota allocations and leopard populations in the district so Graham and I met with him. In his “take charge” fashion Richard drew up a plan for all of us in the district to submit various information covering leopard taken by our clients, like dates, sizes etc. I dug out all the information we had, right up to the end of 2001 and Richard entered all this on a huge map of the area. The land takeover programme accelerated in 2002. Suddenly everybody had far bigger concerns than the leopard population – like – “will my family have a home tomorrow?”

So unfortunately our whole programme went on hold. In a conservative bit of a “thumb suck” we laid guesses about our western Matobo leopard densities as follows.

Good areas – 12 000 acres would hold one dominant male. Three resident females. One cub. One “visiting male”.

Possible areas – 24 000 acres would hold one dominant male. Three resident females. One cub. One “visiting male”.

Poor areas – 60 000 to l 00 000 acres would hold one dominant male.

Three resident females. One cub. One “visiting male”.

Leopard Tracks

In order to differentiate between different leopards in our areas, we decided to measure their tracks. Graham, myself and the trackers agreed that we would not measure tracks found in mud or loose sand as these would give false, bigger measurements. Whenever possible we tried to follow or backtrack until we found spoor made in fine dust on a hard surface. Not too difficult on the network of game trails, footpaths and dirt roads on our areas. We made three measurements in inches, or eighths, and even sixteenths, of an inch. The first was from the top of the track, down longitudinally, to the bottom of the pad or “heel”. The second was the width, laterally across the widest part of the track – about the middle. The third was also a lateral measurement, this time the width of the heel, or pad at the bottom, or base of the track. We measured only a front foot track. The front feet of a predator, just like those of most other animals, are larger than the back feet. The leopard’s back feet are not only smaller than the front feet but are slightly more elongated, elliptical, than the ‘square’ looking track of the front foot, especially in females.

We found that big male leopards had tracks which measured about 4″ in length, 4″ in width and had a base measurement of 2″ to square a total of 10″. Of course leopards, like people, vary, and some left tracks for example – 4 2⁄8″, 4″, and 2 3⁄8″, for a total of 10 5⁄8″. We would be able to measure and recognize that track because of these small differences.

The biggest track I have ever seen squared 12 ¼”. I saw these on the main Mangwe-Thornville road twenty miles south of the Mangwe Pass near a big koppie called Ejime (African pronunciation of the name Jim) of course we  named this cat Big Jim but we never came to grips with him. We saw histracks for about five months and then no more. He must have died a natural death of snakebite, old age, or fighting. I would have loved to have seen that leopard. The whole project became very interesting when we started measuring the tracks of all the trophy cats that came back to camp. We would take the leopard’s foot before rigor mortis set in and push it down gently onto a hard, lightly-dusted surface. After a couple of seasons of doing this, the following were the conclusions we came to:

No cat whose front foot squared under 9 ½ inches , ever made what we called “big” – or “good” (140 – 150 pounds).

We would hunt a cat whose track measured 9 ¾ inches or more.

Some giant leopards – ‘supercats’ had feet that were, surprisingly, small for their size but these tracks were never less than 10 inches square.

Even though the above was true, we never found that a small leopard carried big feet, (10 inches square and over). In other words, a good size 10 inches track, in our experience, never ever produced an inferior cat, but an average track, of 9 ¾ inches to 10 inches, occasionally produced a giant leopard.

A big male Matobo leopard, when “strolling”, has a measurement of 37 inches between one front right track and the next front right track. The measurement between his right front track and left front track was 18 inches. The measurement between the front right track to the second front left track, is 59 inches.

When “strolling” or walking slowly, a leopard’s tracks are ‘evenly spread’ – all four foot tracks are almost equidistant from one another. When the cat picks up his pace – ‘on a mission’ we call it – then the back foot tracks lay on top of, or very close to, the front track. When a leopard breaks into a run his tracks will again become well spread out, equidistant, but obviously now there will be deeper rougher markings in the ground.

Like lions, big old male leopard often “scuff’ their front feet when walking, leaving a brushed mark in front of their track. Whether they do this only when they are tired, or when they are past a certain age or weight, I do not know.

Females do not do this. Really big old males both in lion and leopard also seem to grow a lot more “spare” hair on the tops of their front feet, and this thick hair is what makes the scuff marks.

The Leopard’s Call

The most commonly used description of the leopard’s call is “like sawing a piece of wood”. If you stood a big piece of plywood, about four feet by four feet in size, on its edge and you began to saw the top edge at right angles with a regular wood saw, you would indeed produce a sound very similar to that made by a leopard.

Like lions, tigers, and jaguars, leopards are classified as one of the ‘roaring’ cats because of their ability to push out this sawing noise. It is a primal, hair raising sensation if you are ever close to a calling leopard. The closer you are, the more deep and guttural, and boar-like, the sawing grunt sounds. It seems to emanate from a deep hollow chest, much bigger than that owned by the leopard.

Very little has been written about the leopard’s call. Some believe that the call may be a way of “spacing” their areas – letting other cats know that “this area is spoken for”. After all, these cats probably do not want to risk danger and mishap by fighting all the time. It makes sense that they regularly advertise their presence so they can avoid conflict with one another.

It also seems pretty obvious that, like most other wildlife, they have different calls to attract mates and to express irritation or anger. I have never heard a leopard call on his way in to the bait. I have, however, heard them calling – sometimes continuously – as they walk away from a bait once they have discovered our presence.

In our areas in the western Matobo, the leopards are more vocal in what we believe are the “mating months” of May, June and July and we hear them regularly from our mountain camp during that period.

The call is usually a series of these sawing grunts, numbering between twelve and sixteen ‘saws’, counting the “push” and the “pull” of the saw as two calls. The two strokes have a different tone, the indrawn breath being slightly less loud than the deeper “out” breath.

After reading Tony de Almeida’s Jaguar hunting book for the umpteenth time, I decided to try to call a leopard. In the Mato Grosso the hunters use a hollowed-out gourd called a cabaca to imitate the jaguar’s call. This gourd has two holes cut into it, one larger than the other. The caller blows into the smaller hole and the call is emitted from the larger one. I saw another apparatus in Mexico, also used to call Jaguars. This too was a gourd. It was about the size of a soccer ball with a circle cut out about eight inches in diameter. All the seeds and pith had been cleaned out through this hole. The hole was covered tightly with stretched, shaved goat skin, secured over the hole with tiny wooden pegs. The caller turns the gourd so that the skin is facing the ground. Out of the centre of the skin hangs a cord of plaited horse hair about sixteen inches long. This horse hair rope is liberally covered with resin. The caller grabs the gourd’s “handle” in one hand, and then holds the horse hair rope between the thumb and forefinger of the other hand, and squeezing this rope gently, he pulls his fingers quickly and firmly down, to the end of the rope. A jaguar-like grunt is emitted.

Jaguars can be called in with these devices. De Almeida wrote a whole fascinating chapter in his book about calling these beautiful beasts and it is exciting stuff.

Leopards and Jaguars are similar in so many ways. Surely I could do the same with our Matobo cats?

I found two large gourds in a curio shop at Victoria Falls and I carefully cut a ten inch diameter hole into one of them and cleaned it out. The tone of my voice is suitable for imitating the leopards call. I have coerced lions into answering me in the still pre-dawn. This can be done by imitating their lowing call into a five gallon bucket suspended from a low branch, with about two inches of water in the bottom of the bucket. This contraption creates a kind of resonating effect and produces a tone that travels for miles. I grunted experimentally into the gourd. To me it sounded perfect. I walked about five hundred yards away from camp and called again. The trackers said it sounded exactly like a leopard!

I decided to test the call whilst hunting leopard with Dan Greene. Just as the sun went down one evening Dan and I climbed a small koppie next to a bait that we had placed in the notorious spot on the Chavakadze river. We knew that a giant cat operated here but he had not been to his watering spot in a while. Maybe we could solicit a response from him if he was in that neck of the woods.

I called intermittently for about an hour. It sounded perfect. But there was no response except the impertinent questioning bark of a juvenile baboon a couple of hundred yards away. We packed up and drove back to camp. The following day at the end of our tiring bait run, we checked the Chavakadze bait. The bait was shredded! And there, in the soft wet sand of the Chavakadze were the huge tracks of my old adversary.

Had the gourd called him in? Was he on his way here anyway? There is no way of knowing. Dan and I sat that night but that crafty old campaigner never showed himself.

In the Pantanal and the Mato Grosso the jaguar hunters use dogs to bay the jaguar. A few jaguar were shot by Tony De Almeida’s clients after they had been called right up to the hunters, but usually the gourd was used to solicit an answer from the cats so the hunters knew where to unleash the dogs in the morning.

I tried several more times to cajole an answer from a leopard but did not succeed. Busy checking baits and reacting to eaten baits, I never really have a lot of opportunity to pursue this possibility. We are very successful with the baits, so there is no real reason to continue with the calling, except for my own interest.

All our African staff and some PH’s tell me that they can tell what sex a cat is by listening to its call, but I do not believe it. We have listened to a deep gruff grunting during the night and carefully pin-pointed its direction, and then in the morning have found the tracks of a female.

Maybe, with practice, someone could become skilled enough to differentiate between male and female calls, but in my opinion they would have to listen to a lot of calls and they would have to be able to positively identify the caller each time. Just about impossible.

Prior to experimenting with the gourd, I found a fairly poor recording of a leopard grunting. I taped this call to repeat continuously every ten minutes on a cassette tape. AJ had lost two calves to a leopard about a mile west of the prominent Dombolefu Hill, but we were not in the area at the time so I promised to try for that cat when we returned. When I packed the equipment for the next safari down at the Ingwezi, I included the leopard cassette and a player.

We placed the cassette player on top of a small koppie late in the evening and camouflaged it with some leafy bushes. Next we placed four baits in a semi circle around the koppie, all linked by a blood trail. We turned the player on, switched the cassette to play continuously and drove back to camp. We figured on getting a good two or three hours out of the battery at least.

I felt there was a good chance that if a leopard was within hearing distance he would come and investigate a call that he was unfamiliar with, and hopefully he would find one of our baits.

When we arrived back at the koppie the next morning, we saw fresh leopard tracks! These were on the road about two hundred yards from the caller. We found no tracks near the cassette player and none of the baits had been touched. Peter was sceptical that the caller had worked but I was convinced. Surely it was too much of a coincidence that these tracks turned up on this road the very night that we tried the call? I believe that the cat had come to investigate the new leopard, but was just too careful, too circumspect to come any closer. Maybe he was not a big dominant male and was scared to take a bait with another male calling so close by. Maybe at close range, to the leopard’s perfect hearing, the tape was just not convincing enough.

I have heard three reports which I believe are reliable, where hunters have called in a leopard with a predator call. A leopard is a super predator and an opportunist, and eats rabbits and small antelope – why would he not come to the bleating sounds of his prey in distress?

I have tried this several times but have not met with success. When calling in our areas with a rabbit call at night, we have found that jackal, genet and occasionally a pole cat, will come quickly and aggressively to the call. Cape wild cats, serval and caracals will come within about a hundred to two hundred yards, and then sit there, usually in cover. They are more careful. Maybe this is the same with leopards.

Of course, first of all you have to have a leopard within hearing range of the call, so it’s quite likely that on occasions when we have called, we have not actually been within range of a cat in the first place.

A few years ago Graham and I put the metal frames and mattresses in a tree so that a friend of ours from the States, John Strobel, could sit for a caracal. The caracal had been using a dirt road about half a mile south of the camp quite regularly. We positioned John about a hundred yards north of the road, on the edge of which we had secured a dead guinea fowl. The following morning we left camp early to go and see how John had fared. Half a mile west, downwind of where we had left John, I got out of the vehicle to open a gate. I noticed the fresh tracks of a female leopard following the road. We drove on. Two hundred yards further, we noticed that the tracks were now splayed, running. We thought no more of it and drove on to the tree hide. John had seen no caracal, or anything else during the night. We were loading the blankets and mattresses he was throwing down to us when he mentioned that he had blown his rabbit call for about half an hour at around five o’clock that morning. Immediately my mind went back to the splayed leopard track. Peter and I walked west, back along the road until we found where the cat had turned off the road. Peter followed the spoor. It stopped running and continued in a “walk mode” to a point where Peter indicated that the leopard had crouched down, facing the tree hide! John had called in a leopard without even knowing it!

Full Moon

As the moon becomes full, so leopard activity on and around baits slumps. Why?

Like ballistics, this one is for campfire debate. Of course there are plenty of theories. But theories are just opinions. But make no error, bait activity decreases when the moon is full. That is a fact, not an opinion. I have taken several leopard during full moon, and I know a few other professional hunters who have done the same. But these few incidents were definitely exceptions to the rule.

During the week building up to the full moon, not only are the baits not hit, but leopard tracks are simply not encountered as often as they are during the rest of the month.

We have puzzled long and hard over this one. Where do the cats go? Why do they walk all over the dry riverbeds, roads and pathways for three weeks, then suddenly vanish for one? I have heard several theories, but I believe that the real reason is probably a blend, or mixture of all of them.

Plainsgame animals increase their nocturnal activity during the full moon. Most wildlife books, including R.D. Estes, tells us this, and most hunters will know about the poor game viewing days when animals are lying down in daylight hours because they have been up all night feeding. Not only plains game animals are up and about during the bright moon. Even rock dassies, which are normally totally diurnal animals, are out of their protective cracks and crevices during full moon. And in the Matobo, leopard hunt dassies. So maybe the leopard tracks are not evident all over the savannah because their owners are amongst the koppies during the full moon. Maybe leopard are more successful at hunting antelope at night, when they are grazing, than when they are lying down in the open, alert, ready for attack. Perhaps they try harder to catch fresh game during this time of easier hunting and therefore ignore the smell of our baits.

Another thing that I’m certain comes into play with our Matobo cats ‒ and in fact any leopard that lives in an area where he is persecuted by man, is the feeling of exposure. Farm leopard are about 99% nocturnal. They have become this way because of human activity. Maybe, when the moon is full this feeling of exposure persists.

Several times I have been forced to sit in a blind next to a fortress koppie – our set-up has been dictated by a cattle killer who has dragged the calf into cover up against, or inside one of these horrible places. When this has happened during the full moon we have noticed something interesting. Imagine a range of fortress koppies, about a mile long and a thousand feet high, running north-south. A calf has been killed on the east side of these hills and dragged up and eaten at the base. Your blind is a hundred and twenty yards north of this calf, also on the east side. The wind is coming gently from the southeast. Except for the worrying fact that the leopard is probably lying up in the rocks watching you, it’s not a bad set up.

It is full moon. So the big orangeness of it climbs out of the horizon at about six thirty – leopard time, just as the sun has disappeared. But no cat comes. Within an hour the heavy moon is no longer orange, it is yellow, then it is white. At 10pm you can read your book, and you can see the face of your watch. It is very, very bright. Still no one comes to claim their dinner.

If you have not done this before, you give up and climb into your blankets, before long you are snoring nicely. No leopard will come. But we have done this before. Late, between 10pm and midnight, the moon sinks west behind the range. The heavy black shadow you’ve been waiting for sweeps over the bait, blind and the bush. It is bright as day on the west side of the range and it will remain so all night. But on your side, on the east, it is black. And the big, careful calf killer comes in.

This has happened to us several times. To me, it’s proof. The leopard has waited for darkness to hide him before he comes into the kill. Why? It can only be because he feels exposed in the bright moonlight.

Once the moon has reached full, it will rise above the eastern horizon about an hour later every day, and it is waning, becoming smaller each time it comes up. If we have hunters whose safari is not dictated by time off work, or other influencing factors, we advise them to try to arrive three or four days after the full moon, this ensures that their fourteen-day safari will enjoy pitch black nights and, theoretically, lots of leopard activity.

Another thing which seems to influence leopard activity in the Matobo hills is cold “guti” weather. When the guti rolls in, especially in the colder winter months, leopard activity increases. I can only guess at the reasons. Maybe the cats need the activity of the hunt, or the meat itself, to generate warmth in their bodies – maybe it is warmer than curling up into a ball way up in the rocks. Graham always expects bad news from the cattle herders immediately after or during guti weather as this is usually when calves disappear. Not only does this low murky drizzle prompt the leopards into activity, it seems  to embolden them into taking cattle during the daylight (albeit dim daylight) hours.

A Few Interesting Notes

Leopard and lion have ‘floating bones’. These bones (there are two of them) are situated on either side of the centre of the brisket, a couple of inches inside the flesh, – where the ‘collarbones’ would be if a cat had collarbones – and that’s exactly what they are. “Floating” bones are relic clavicles. Most walking mammals of reasonable size have lost the connection from the shoulder apparatus to sternum; therefore the use of the clavicle has fallen away and in many ‘advanced’ species is all but gone completely. Different carnivores show differing stages of this ‘left over’. In cats there is something more substantial although completely non functional. The added flexibility of not having a clavicle connection to the sternum allows for greater reach in fast moving animals and also a wider stretch and grasp needed for cats.

Mammals that have retained the clavicle are primates, some insectivores, bats and monotremes (platypus & echidna). Certainly for bats and primates one can see the use in retaining a brace for the flying and brachiating (swinging from limbs) locomotion. Next time you eat a roast chicken, grab the ‘wishbone’. If you cut this wishbone down the centre, where it joins, the two pieces will look a bit like a cat’s floating bones. I have seen some beautiful ladys’ jewellery fashioned out of these floating bones and the hunter should make a point of asking his guide to have themcleaned up and delivered to him.The unusual bones are also considered by hunters as lucky charms – a very good reason to make sure you keep them!

Like dogs, cats have five claws on the front feet, and four on the back feet. But that’s where similarities end. Dogs’ claws do not ‘retract’ – they are permanently on show, permanently in use – gripping the ground when running, scratching themselves, and so on – and because they are permanently in use, they are quite blunt. Grab Fluffy off the TV and give his tummy a hard tickle. You’ll see a very different set of claws. These are not running aids or flea scratchers. They are weapons. Cat’s claws are always sharp. They have to be – their main functions are snagging desperate fleeing prey, fighting, and climbing trees with more than double their own weight held firmly in the mouth.

The inside claw, which is higher up the front leg than the other four claws, is known as the “dew” claw. This claw is the biggest knife in the cat’s arsenal; it is a good third bigger than the rest of the claws, and in a big leopard, or a lion, that’s plenty big. These claws can be removed from the skin of the leopard trophy without damaging it in any way, and like the floating bones, they can be fashioned into unusual, beautiful jewellery.

By Ken Moody

Now that you’ve decided to hunt this menacing beast [the cape buffalo], let’s discuss what you’ll need to do the deed. There are scores of calibers and types of rifles one can use to cleanly dispatch a Cape Buffalo; single shots, bolt actions, double rifles, even lever actions can be utilized with calibers galore to satisfy the requirement of delivering adequate killing power, but unless you’re set on using grandpa’s old iron sighted Mauser, I’d suggest we look at the best client options. For me, I prefer to see a client arrive in camp with a well-used, bolt action rifle carrying a 1×4 power scope in a caliber that he/she can shoot accurately. While I believe a buffalo caliber should begin with a 4, the most common caliber used for buffalo hunting is the .375 H&H Magnum. In capable hands, the .375 can do the job and double as a good caliber for various plains game species as well. Its big brother, the .416 (Rigby or Remington), is what I’d consider the best client option when buffalo is the primary game to be hunted. Thousands of buffalo have been dropped with these two rounds and thousands more will be dispatched with ammo bearing a .375 or .416 headstamp.

Other calibers are certainly worthy of mention when it comes to hunting buff. The .404 Jeffrey is an old standard that still works and if you need your jawline re-aligned, the .505 Gibbs will help in that regard. For the client determined to hunt with the larger bores, a .458 Winchester Magnum is a good choice for close work, but if you can handle the recoil, the ultimate big bore bolt action caliber for hunting buffalo is, in my opinion, the .458 Lott. This caliber was designed specifically for buffalo hunting and remains atop the field of big bore stoppers in bolt action. Let’s discuss this caliber in a little more detail.

One cannot explain the genesis of the .458 Lott without first delving into its controversial predecessor, the .458 Winchester Magnum. Introduced to the hunting world in 1956 as a less expensive but equally powerful alternative to its high dollar double rifle brethren, the .458 WM in bolt action quickly gained worldwide acceptance and became the standard African dangerous game rifle/caliber combination. Now, professional hunters, game wardens, and the like could go a field with affordable solutions for nasty situations. In the early 1970s, however, problems with powder clumping and erratic powder burning began to surface due to the compressed ball powder being utilized by Winchester. To remedy the problem, Winchester simply reduced the pressure of the powder column, which, in turn, slowed the velocity of the caliber to around 1950 feet per second, a full 200 feet per second slower than the original design specs. Enter the .458 Lott.

After suffering injury during a 1959 Cape Buffalo hunt in Mozambique while using a .458 WM, Jack Lott surmised that something better must be made available. Beginning with standard .375 H & H Magnum brass, Lott married that existing brass with a .458 bullet, resized at the base to fit the .375 casing. Through the process of fireforming, the .458 Lott was born. Not only did Lott build a .458 that met the original performance intent of the Winchester Magnum, this new shoulder cannon exceeded it. Capable of firing 500 grain bullets at 2300 feet per second (at safe pressure levels), and yielding nearly 6000 pounds of energy, this new wildcat cartridge surpassed not only the old .458 WM but the .450 Nitro Express as well. When loaded with a 600-grain projectile, the Lott still speeds past the WM loaded with a 500 grainer in that it can attain a velocity of 2150 feet per second. All this extra performance does come at a price, however.

The felt recoil of the .458 Lott is substantial and easily more damaging than that of the WM.

If you are small in stature and lack the bulk to accept this punishing round, then I’d suggest a less aggressive caliber that you can shoot more accurately. It’s far more important to place your shots in the right spot than to flinch at anticipated recoil and miss the mark. Many an over-gunned client has suffered the consequences of poor shooting at dangerous animals. Once found only within the purview of the handloader, the cartridge became so popular over the years that now many factory-loaded options are available. Quality offerings from Federal, Hornady, Barnes, Nosler, Swift, etc. are available for those who do not wish to delve into the tedious, albeit rewarding, task of handloading. Find out what your rifle likes and feed it that! Just make sure it’s topped with superb, quality bullets. When hunting dangerous game, the two most important aspects to success are where you hit it and what you hit it with. The rest is just recovery. If you can handle it and shoot it accurately, then there’s no better cartridge for dispatching the big nasties than the .458 Lott. It’s not a long-range cartridge so your work will be close, but close is the goal and when things go bad, and sometimes they will, you’ll be confident knowing that you’ve armed yourself with the solution provided you can do your part. While the Lott is king, don’t be swayed against the Win Mag version as advances in powder have solved the old clumping issues and the newer .458 Winchester is now a sufficient buffalo caliber.

If your heart is set on hunting buffalo in the classis sense, with a double rifle, look at a caliber suited to the job and one that is not too clumsy in the bush. For client use, the perfect double rifle caliber is one of the .450/400s. These rifles are normally nimble in the hand, a pleasure to shoot, and devastating on buffalo provided good shot placement is realized. I’ve owned a .450/400 3” and loved shooting it, the mild recoil a bonus for long sessions on the range. Other classic double calibers include the .470 Nitro Express, the .500 Nitro, and the big hammer itself, the .600 Nitro Express. All these big bores will certainly make mince out of a buffalo, but double rifles are expensive and must be regulated to ensure both barrels strike in proximity to one another. While hunting with a double is something to romanticize about, one certainly isn’t required for client use. A good bolt action will work just fine. For the professional, however, a double rifle is a near necessity when facing a buffalo charge. There isn’t much time to cycle a bolt when Nyati comes calling.

Just as important as caliber is bullet type and weight. I have never advocated for a client to bring or use solids for hunting buffalo. Solids are for elephant, rhino, hippo, and backup work, not as a primary bullet type for client use on buffalo. They can over penetrate and can cause two or more buffalo to be struck with one shot. No, leave the solids to the professionals that are there to stop a charging buffalo, not the client who has little to no experience in such circumstances. A client should use softs on buffalo and my favorite is the Swift A Frame, a bullet simply designed to work. The A Frame delivers the goods, and equally as good, is the Barnes X or TSX. Rounding out the field are Trophy Bonded Bear Claws, Nosler Partitions, Accubonds, and even the Hornady DGX, which is tremendously better than previous Hornady offerings. The bullet is the most important aspect of the hunter’s arsenal and only quality, proven bullet designs will consistently bag a Cape Buffalo whose only reason for living at times is to torment and harass safari operators. Don’t skimp on bullets. Buy and use A Frames or other acceptable options and practice with them extensively.

Once you’ve settled on your rifle/ammo arsenal, go to the range and practice. Buffalo hunting is normally done in thick bush, so practice shooting from your knees, in the prone position, and from shooting sticks. Every professional in Africa has a pair of well-used shooting sticks and it is from these that you’ll most likely be shooting. While most are a tripod configuration, some professionals carry a bipod version with two long sticks that are separated and extended to cradle the client’s rifle. Practice with sticks so that when they’re dropped, you can mount them effortlessly. The time to bungle it up is not in the presence of your quarry. Save the screw ups for the range and practice until you can perform when needed. Also, you’ll not be entering into any long-range competitions while hunting, so practice at bush ranges. 50 to 100 yards is your likely firing distance, so become proficient at these so that you can mount the sticks, acquire your target, and get your shot off in an acceptable amount of time. Most opportunities are lost due to slow reaction times by the client or worse yet, cold triggers from a client who becomes a bit paralyzed when confronting a buffalo. Work these things out on the range and become an instinctive shooter so that when the time comes, you can do the job effectively.

And what about the client who doesn’t want to use a firearm to hunt the old dugga boy? Yes, believe it or not, there are many hunters who pursue Black Death with nothing more than a stick, string, broadhead, and good intentions. For the archery buff, pun intended, equipment choices can become a matter of life and death. Buffalo don’t like to be shot with arrows, so one must be sure to go afield with the proper rig to kill the beast.

Gone are the days of needing 100-pound bows and Herculean strength to draw it. Today, any good conventional compound bow drawing 70+ pounds can adequately kill a Cape Buffalo. Obviously, the greater poundage the better, but today’s bows are so much more efficient than those we used ‘back in the day’ that a 70 pound bow can do it. It’s the arrow that now matters and it must be of proper spine and weight. I highly recommend that the total arrow weight be no less than 950 grains and that the end of the arrow be collared to provide strength to that failure prone area where the broadhead screws into the arrow. Broadhead construction is crucial and cannot be anything other than a solid steel, two blade design. A Cape Buffalo is not the animal to try a stunt with, so leave the gimmicky heads at home and use trusted, proven heads like the original German Kinetics, Iron Will Buffalo Head, Grizzly Stik Heads, VPAs, etc.

A bow hunt for buffalo is already a dangerous proposition, so come prepared with the right gear. As with a rifle, practice, practice, practice. Draw and hold your bow for extended periods. Draw from your knees. Draw and move with your bow into a shooting position. Practice hitting a grapefruit sized target from 40 yards and closer until it’s second nature. Leave nothing to chance so that when opportunity is given, you’ll do your part. And don’t forget to pray, a lot!

I was raised in downtown Denver, Colorado, with loving, fairly normal parents, who were a bit flummoxed with my preoccupation with all things animal. After college, I never lived anywhere that wasn’t out in the countryside, surrounded by wild lands and creatures. As far back as I can remember, tales, books and TV shows of Africa, its wild spaces and exotic species, featured large in all of my thoughts and dreams. When I graduated with a degree in zoology, my parents rewarded me with a trip, anywhere I wanted to go. Of course, I said AFRICA! Once there, roaming the Serengeti and observing the amazing animals I had spent all my life admiring, I felt like I was home.

I became a full-time artist, and while my career took me down the path of duck stamps and over 150 print editions of North American wildlife, my heart remained in Africa. It was ten years after that first trip until I returned, and I have come back almost every year since then, 25 trips so far. Hunting became a part of these journeys and introduced me to a large group of people who shared my love and admiration for Africa and her wildlife. I visit national parks and conservation areas on every trip, gathering the photographic reference I need for inspiration…these photos are from my latest trip to Kenya, South Africa, and Botswana. Look for these images reflected in my artwork to come!

cynthieart@gmail.com

www.fisherart.com

By Zeke

Vibrant reds, oranges, and yellows. The black silhouettes of the acacia trees and giraffes. Perfect Lion King sunsets. One of the best experiences of my life was on my first trip to South Africa.

It all started a few years ago, when my dad suddenly became obsessed with cape buffalo. A few months of research, a connection with Dave Freeburn of Dave Freeburn Safaris and all of a sudden, there was a trip to Africa on the calendar for June of 2025. It didn’t even seem real to me when he told me. And then – he invited me! As long as I took care of half of the trophy fee of any animal(s) I hunted, he would take care of the rest. I decided to try for a gemsbok, with red hartebeest as first alternate. Uncle Mike and his son (Gabe) and step-son (Ethan) would also be coming.

As we settled into “camp” (using the term loosely; our accommodations were amazing), we spent some time to ensure we all passed the rifles test. Our hired rifle for plains game was a nice Berretta BRX1 straight-pull in .308 Win., shooting Sako 180gr Arrow tip II bullets. It was set up with a Sako suppressor and a Vortex 3×15 scope. Other than the straight-pull action, the rifle was very similar to what we were all used to with our rifles back home. After the Berretta test, Dad took on the test for the 500 Nitro. Dave was extremely generous and allowed Dad to hire his custom Verney Carron 500 Nitro for the buffalo hunt which was paired with Norma 570 grain solids and softs. Dad has always loved side by side shotguns for bird hunting back home and he fell in love with the gun instantly.

We woke up at 6:30 the next morning to eggs and bacon and packed our gear into the land cruiser. I could feel the cold crisp of the morning air in my face as we rode around checking the trail cameras and the water pans for signs of buffalo. We found some relatively fresh sign early on, but didn’t locate any tracks that made sense to follow just yet. There were some great animals on the trail cameras, though, and everyone was starting to get excited about what the coming days would bring.

As we were checking the last of the cameras in the afternoon, we saw some zebra pop out of the bush. Dave took Gabe to stalk them, but the stallion only provided a frontal shot at a bit farther than Gabe was comfortable taking. A bit later, we spotted a blesbok, which Ethan elected to try for. Ethan executed a great shot at the end of a nice stalk and got us on the board to wrap up our first day.

The next morning, as we were looking for fresh buffalo tracks and replacing trail cameras we came across a herd of red hartebeest. We tried three or four times, but there were a lot of animals in the herd and I just couldn’t get settled for a shot. This was my first try and turned out to be a good warmup on how to follow Dave on a stalk, but I was still a bit disappointed.

On the way to the next water pan – I couldn’t believe my luck to see gemsbok!!! I was determined to make up for not having success on the hartebeest, and off we went for a stalk. I could hear my heartbeat pounding as I anticipated making the shot. Dave set me up on the sticks and I awaited his instructions. While I was settling in on the herd, Dave spotted one off to the side so I shifted the gun and fired. I reloaded the rifle as I saw the herd running away. Dave caught a glimpse of it and saw it was not a fatal hit. After some failed attempts at tracking the wounded gemsbok we went to a nearby water hole hoping it would come in to drink, but we only saw a few warthogs.

With a few hours of daylight left, we tried to locate some buffalo that were spotted a few kilometers away. While searching, we were treated to our first sighting of giraffes of the trip. It felt so cool to see creatures with legs taller than me in the wild. And then on our way back to camp, we saw our first buffalo. It was a herd of young bulls, so we just watched in amazement at the sheer size of them.

By the time we got back to camp, I was feeling pretty low, and to be honest, I wasn’t sure I wanted to keep hunting. This was such a horrible way to start the trip. But Dad talked to me, and so did Dave, and after that we had some of Ethan’s blesbok for dinner. I went to bed after our wonderful dinner to try to sleep it off and I vowed to let the next day start fresh. 

For the next day, Uncle Mike declared that this was the day we needed to get Dad his buffalo and that “he had a plan”. “His” plan was for us to sit at the water hole that the buffalo were hitting in the day time (the “Secret Pan”) and just wait for one. We’d actually been talking about this plan the whole prior day, though, so there really wasn’t any debate. With the plan sorted, off we went to the Secret Pan. We set up with a breeze in our faces and waited. Not very long into our sit, however, both the wind shifted and the silence was broken (Uncle Mike sneezed). Even the birds went quiet… everyone seemed at once to silently acknowledge that we were busted.

As we looked around the waterhole, we saw some fresh leopard tracks. By the way of the tracks, Dave suspected that the leopard was on the way into water and either heard or smelled us as we were sitting there. Thinking about that was both scary and exciting, as we’d seen a nice tom on one of the trail cameras the first day, and it reminded me of hunting among cougars back home.

After what seemed like a forever but wasn’t very long at all, we spotted Dave walking towards us. We collected our things and followed Dave to Dad and the buffalo, half in disbelief of what just happened in front of us.

It was huge! After we got him into position Dave took some fantastic pictures, ensuring to get all of the right angles. When we got to the skinning shed, Dave measured the buffalo’s outside spread and he was roughly 45 ½ inches wide. Dad’s jaw about hit the ground when he heard the number – it was quite a bull.

With the buffalo in the salt and four more days to target plains game, we transitioned to a newly-renovated camp that Dave was excited about.

In no time at all upon our arrival, we spotted a herd of zebra. Dave took Gabe on a stalk and not long after we lost sight of them – POP!! A few zebra ran off but they kept looking back… After a few minutes, we heard a whistle signaling success. When we finally got the zebra out of the bush, two black rhinos came out of the bush in front of us at about 150m. It was so cool to see them on the ground and without a fence!!

After a short break at camp, we headed out to hunt some more. It wasn’t long before we located a group of impala rams. Dad told me to take one to help me recover from the rough day I had on Day 2, so we tried a stalk on the impala. Admittedly, I was nervous… I got set up and POP! I reloaded the rifle and got ready to follow-up, but there was no sign of a hit. Confused, I looked around desperately in search of an answer. In discussing it with Dad, we figured out that I had rested the barrel on the sticks, likely making my shot bounce the rifle high.

Frustrated, I resolved that I would get things sorted on the next opportunity. We found another herd of impala quickly and were able to try again, while my resolve was fresh. We stalked in as quiet as possible and I set up on the sticks. This time, I made sure the rifle was set correctly and that I was stable. I found the shoulder. I squeezed the trigger. POP!! WHOP!! I heard the bullet hit the ram. It ran off, but it was clear he was injured.

Doubt crept in instantly, though, and I started to think the worst had happened again… but as it ran behind a bush and didn’t come out, I started to allow myself to hope. As we approached, there he was, on the ground taking his final breath. He expired before I could finish him. I knelt over him and said a short prayer in appreciation. He was an average-sized impala, but he was old, and I am so very proud of him. I’ll be forever grateful to him for his role in helping me to overcome my initial adversity. 

After lunch we headed back out, and Dad confirmed to me that we were still looking for a redemption gemsbok, in addition to a blue wildebeest for each Uncle Mike and Dad. Not far from camp, something was spotted off in the distance. After some time I realized it was a lone gemsbok. I couldn’t believe it!! So, off we went to try a stalk on it. We moved into the bush and would peek out from the edges to keep an eye on it. As we were stalking, I felt ready and nervous at the same time. When we got close enough, we set up on the sticks, just barely poking out of the edge of the brush. The old gemsbok caught sight of us, but wasn’t very alarmed. After the past couple of days of ups and downs, I tried really hard to take my time to settle in. I found the shoulder. I squeezed the trigger. POP! WHOP!!! The shot felt really good! It sounded really good! The gemsbok wheeled and ran into the bush. I was hoping it was a good hit… praying it was a good hit, but this time, the doubt didn’t creep in… I was confident. We walked to the point where it ran into the bush and then Dave, Dad, and the game scout (Bussman) went in to track it, due to the density of the bush.

Not even a minute after they disappeared into the bush, we heard Dave calling us over. And as I stepped around a bush, I saw it there. My gemsbok. I was overwhelmed with joy that I had done it – I had successfully taken a gemsbok. I knelt down next to it and said a prayer. It is hard to put into words how happy I was to be able to accomplish my goal, especially considering what had happened earlier that trip. It was such a feeling of both joy and relief.

With a third animal on the day, we thanked Bussman and put the rifles away. For the rest of the afternoon, we were treated to viewing multiple groups of elephants and giraffes, as well as a few white rhino (including a calf estimated to be 10-14 days old). Such an amazing day.

Uncle Mike was up next and all eyes were looking for wildebeest now. Fairly early in the morning, we saw a nice bull and off Dave and Uncle Mike went. A few moments after they rounded a tree, POP! WHOP!! Success! He was a nice, old bull.

After Uncle Mike’s wildebeest, only Dad was still hunting. Over the course of the trip, Dave’s passion for finding exceptional impala and warthogs rubbed off on Dad, and we finished up the hunt looking for both while in search of a wildebeest to beat Uncle Mike’s. Dad connected on a great impala later that day, but was unlucky on warthog. That night, over dinner, we heard a leopard territorial call coming from the water hole behind camp which was really cool.

For the final day, Dad pulled me aside and told me we should spend some time looking for my wounded gemsbok, to make sure we gave it a final effort to find it. We looked and looked, but ultimately, we weren’t able to turn it up. We returned to camp with a few hours of daylight left, and Dave and Dad went back out on a last hunt, on which Dad was able to connect on a dandy blue wildebeest. A great end to a great hunt.

The next day, we left for home. I was sad to leave, but since Dad was already talking about a return trip, I let myself hope I’d be back and was able to leave with a smile, excited to return someday.

Chapter Seven

A Koppie Called Kevin

Via a South African operator, we received an enquiry from a hunter from North Dakota named Ralph Kieley. Ralph mentioned that he had been on nine safaris for leopard and not even seen one. Once we had met Ralph it seemed that he had been on the safaris mentioned, but the main focus had not been leopard on all of them. However, it was clear that he’d been in the wrong areas or else had damned bad luck. Ralph wanted to hunt in 2001 but I was almost totally committed to prior bookings that season. We decided to contact a friend who hunts freelance and who had run several successful hunts for us in the past. I had met Kevin du Boil when he was working for Big Five Safaris, a big game operation in Chewore north safari area in the Zambezi Valley. Kevin had good big game experience under his belt but I was not sure that he had the necessary guile and leopard experience to outwit our Matobo private land leopards.

I had about a week between safaris and decided to accept Ralph’s booking, hire Kevin, but accompany the first part of the hunt. I did not want Ralph to have failed leopard safari number 10, especially since we had been recommended to him as the place to get a cat. I was confident we’d have the leopard wrapped up in short order and I organised George and Bee to take care of a careful pre-baiting plan.

One week flew by without a single hit. I could not believe it. It was just one of those dry spells where the cats were somewhere else. I’m sure Ralph was as sceptical as hell. Two professional hunters, pre-baiting, numerous baits out, and nothing happening. Just like the last time. It must be said though, that it was obvious Ralph had safari experience. He put us under no pressure at all with sarcastic comments and whining complaints. He remained in stoical good humour as the days went by checking baits, hunting for new tracks and calling surrounding farmers for news of any kills. We had one young male start feeding on day six but he was not a shooter.

My own safari was only days away, when on day nine we found a large female had fed on a bait down on the Project. When I asked Ralph if he was prepared to sit for the female since things were looking a little desperate, he answered “No problem – I’m not going back again without a leopard!” After checking the feed and heading back toward camp to collect all the gear for a night out, we saw fresh male leopard tracks on the road, about a mile down the road heading east away from the bait area. I was bitter. This big boy had missed our bait so narrowly. I stopped the jeep and we had a war council with Ralph, Kevin, the trackers and myself. I wanted to track the male’s spoor as far as we could, then flood the area where we lost the track with fresh bait, leave the big female feeding, and hope the male found one of our baits. But time was against us, not only because I had to leave, but also because of the limited time remaining that day to either get all the new baits organised for the male, or back to camp, assemble all our equipment, and set up for the female before dark .We went for the bird in the hand and decided to leave the male. I had a careful look at the track and we measured it. It squared ten. He was obviously a good mature cat and I was irritated and reluctant to let him go.

We returned to the bait at about 3pm and made up our beds, carried out last minute adjustments to the hide camouflage and attached my warning line. It was a drizzly grey overcast day, and we were not looking forward to a possible thickening of the drizzle and a wet night. I put up a frame of sticks over our blind and covered it with leaves and grass to try to keep off the inevitable rain. The plan was for Kevin, George, Peter, Bee and Kevin’s tracker to take the jeep out along the road for about a mile to the east, not far from where we had seen the male track that morning. There was an open rock dwala there and the men could bed down without sand and dust. We were finished with final preparations by 5pm and we settled in for the night. Kevin and the staff rumbled off in the Land Cruiser and slowly the bush sounds hesitantly returned.

As we sat in the blind, we faced east. Imagine three giant whales all swimming away from you to the east. Imagine the two right hand whales being 70 yards apart and the third one to the left, about 130 yards away. Our bait was in a fig tree at the tail of the right hand whale. This particular koppie actually did look a lot like a big whale – as it rose away from us at the tail into a huge domed head to the east. Our hide was about 90 yards away against a leadwood tree which had donkey-berry and other debris as well as some fallen branches at its side. Otherwise we were in an open vlei. Not ideal for camouflage but it was the only spot we liked because of the approach of the cat from the left, or north, and the wind direction from the south east. When we originally hung this bait we had to clear an avenue through some overhanging limbs and other brush for about 25 yards from the bait tree toward the blind in order to see the bait clearly. The leopard, when it fed, would be standing on two horizontal branches and reaching up over its head to feed. The scratches and small pieces of meat and hair left by the female indicated that she had fed in this position.

At about 6pm the drizzle thickened. I was worried that all the moisture would mist Ralph’s scope up so we draped a green cloth over it. Ralph was using a .300 Win Mag made by Magnum Research, which was loaded this night with 180 grain Barnes X bullets. Ralph was quiet in the blind, which was surprising as he is above average in size. I was confident that the big female would come in. Shortly after 7pm the dassies grated out their alarm call and about ten minutes later the warning stick bent like a big catfish taking bait. The stick relaxed, then began to jerk backwards and forwards repeatedly.

She was feeding with gusto. I motioned Ralph into position and when he was comfortable behind the scope, I turned on the light. The now light drizzle was easily visible in the beam but the leopard was not. I was taken aback. We were silent, the wind was good and the blind was a good distance off. What had gone wrong? Ralph could obviously see no leopard in the scope either and was a little confused. I asked him to leave the rifle and aim the spotlight while I looked through my binoculars.

Suddenly, like a snake, the leopard’s tail hung down. The damned thing had climbed on top of the meat, not underneath it! I saw the green-white flash of its eyes as the tail flicked this way and that right where the leopard’s torso should have been! There was no shot as the cat was hidden by the foliage I had left untrimmed at the top of our shooting “tunnel”. I had enough experience to know that a cat may not eat a bait from the same position it had eaten from before, but the flimsy position above the meat had certainly not seemed a possibility to the trackers and I that morning. It was frustrating; there was nothing we could do except sit and watch and hope the cat changed position and offered a killing shot. A few minutes later she flowed down the main trunk and was gone. “What now?” Asked Ralph. I told him that we were warm and comfortable and at this stage, not yet wet, we should stay put. There was always that slim chance that she’d be back. We got back under our blankets and settled in for the night. From so many nights of sleeping out in pursuit of the big cats, I seldom slip into a proper heavy sleep. The slightest noise will wake me and every time I change position, I will sit up and watch the warning stick for a few minutes.

That night the ‘guti’ or heavy winter drizzle increased around midnight then it eased off completely. Shortly after the drizzle ended I must have resigned myself to trying to catch a few good hours of rest before the new day because I don’t remember waking again until just after three-thirty, when violent thrashing of my warning stick woke Ralph and I. She was back! And biting the meat with a fury!

I quickly took the rag off the scope on Ralph’s rifle and cleaned the fogged glass with cotton wool. Ralph moved up behind the rifle and I opened the ‘window’ I’d made for the light. Please, let her be standing in the right spot! I hit the light and even without the binoculars, saw the leopard standing beautifully, exactly where it was supposed to be.

I whispered to Ralph “Shoot, its the leopard” – No shot. Four seconds, five seconds, six seconds … “Shoot Ralph, it’s standing perfectly, side on, head up in the meat. Hit her behind or in the shoulder!” No shot. Just as I was about to ask what the problem was, the rifle cracked and the leopard fell immediately, straight onto my warning wire, snapping it as it hit the ground. There it spun in a fury, growling all the while, then it bounded away towards some rocks and a big fig tree at the tail of whale No.3.

“What took you so long Ralph? How did you feel about the shot?” I asked.

“Couldn’t see clearly,” he answered, “scope still seemed a bit foggy.” We chatted excitedly for a few minutes and it seemed to me that Ralph was not absolutely sure of where he’d hit the leopard. A lightly nicked leopard, and sometimes a leopard shot cleanly sideways through the lungs without hitting bone, will make its way quickly and carefully out of the tree and leave with a controlled leap. A leopard hammered in the shoulder bones or near or in the spine will drop like a sack of meat.

Ours dropped that way, but as I said, it roared and spun around on the ground madly then disappeared. My guess was close to the spine causing temporary paralysis. I’d seen this horrible shot many times on safaris on dangerous game and on all kinds of plains game. The animal drops as if poleaxed. Everyone shouts and shakes hands and there’s joy all round. Then the animal gets up, leaves at speed, dropping very little blood, and an increasingly fruitless follow-up ensues. The sun gets hot, the client gets angry and there is no more laughing and clapping.

However, we were both excited, and I said nothing about my worries. We had not seen the blood yet and all could be well. I fired a shot over where the team had bedded down and they arrived shortly thereafter. Peter and I kitted up for follow up. We moved the Land Cruiser as close to the bait as possible, connected the spotlight and looked carefully where the leopard had fallen. There were a few drops of blood but certainly no lung blood. We decided to make a fire and keep warm for the last forty minutes of the night.

We were champing at the bit to get going but it didn’t make sense to put ourselves in jeopardy since it would be light soon. As soon as we could see clearly, Peter took up the splayed running tracks. I was immediately behind him with the .460 off safe and my 9mm Glock, cocked, and tucked into my belt. Butterflies rose in my stomach as I looked up into the rocks. Into the thorns we go. The tracks led directly to the large fig tree growing against whale No.3’s tail. Koppies two and three were strewn with boulders from basketball size to vehicle size. Plenty of places for a wounded cat to hide. As we reached the fig tree, smears of blood were visible where the cat had gone up the granite into the boulders heading for the head of the whale. The most dangerous part of a follow up on a wounded leopard is when the blood is lost and the day gets warmer, and everyone starts to do their own thing. Nobody covers anyone else. Rifles and shotguns go onto the shoulder or into a one-hand carry. This is when the problems occur.

However, we were 100 percent focused and had blood. Kevin for some reason did not have his rifle and was carrying Ralph’s scoped .300. He was following behind me and George behind him. Ralph and the others remained at the bait. Peter was low down scouring for blood on the rocks. I was over him and very slightly to one side looking into the cracks and rocks expecting the charge. It was not looking good. There was very little blood and the cat seemed to have plenty of power and all limbs working to climb the places he was climbing.

Light droplets and the odd smear now led down off the head of the whale down the left (north) side and angled up the right side of the middle whale. Here we found a place where the cat had rested. The blood was a little thicker, and amounted to about a tablespoon full. Unfortunately, as so often happens in a situation like this, the cat licked the wound until the blood stopped dripping. We were now up onto the head of the middle whale with no blood at all. We carefully tried a few avenues where we thought the leopard would have gone. When those failed we broke into two groups. Kevin, Bee and Kevin’s tracker stayed up in the boulders on top moving eastwards along the ridge. Peter, George and myself followed various paths through the low bushes and rocks down the left hand, or north side. We all moved very slowly, almost inch by inch. It was now about eight o’clock and warming rapidly. I felt that the cat had been hit solidly because of the way it had fallen from the tree. But there was not enough blood to indicate any major artery or organ damage. There were no bone slivers indicating a fractured limb. My guess was high, and behind the shoulder – above the heart and lungs but under the spine. My second guess would be guts – but there did not appear to be an exit wound and no watery stomach blood or gut content.

Almost at the bottom of the middle whale on the left side, Peter found another smear. We beckoned Kevin and his group down, and we sent for Ralph so he could still be part of the hunt – albeit in a safe place. Once again it was Peter and myself leading. I asked the others to all remain in one spot with Ralph. The drops of blood indicated a line to the north, from whale number two, aiming at whale number one about 130 yards away. Between us and the next hill was a fairly open meadow with thick green grass about knee high. Closer to us, at the base of the middle hill, a narrow thicket of Dichrostachys grew along the rocky edge of the vlei – or meadow. Once again the blood disappeared. We literally got down on our hands and knees and went over every blade of grass. Nothing. This went on for another hour or so as we carefully combed through the thicket, returning all the time to the last blood smear. I heard a Natal francolin burst noisily out of koppie number one and decided to go and check it out. It may have been spooked by our leopard. Kevin remained, covering the trackers and I went through the small meadow, rifle at the ready, to where I’d heard the francolin. This is when you are at the highest risk. You’re alone, trying to spot blood at your feet, and you are unable to cover the prime danger area of four or five yards out, let alone to either side of you.

My heart was racing and my adrenaline surged. This hill was much thicker with vegetation and more like the typical koppies in our area. But I found nothing. No blood, no tracks. This was becoming futile. Without blood, we could not close with the cat. I contemplated sending George with the truck to Graham’s house to see if the phone was working, and if it was, to see if Tristan and his dogs were available. Lots of ifs. I walked back across the meadow to the last blood. Again we all got down and swept forward, both to the north and toward the meadow. A successful conclusion was looking unlikely. I had to make a decision – we could not just potter around for the rest of the day. I felt that the cat had licked its wound clean and gone up into the thickly wooded koppie across the meadow. I decided that all of us except Ralph and Bee – who would stay with him -should go across to the koppie and give it a thorough going over. If that failed we should start trying to get hold of some dogs.

Off we set once more, all of us across the grassy meadow to the hill. We were just organising ourselves for a sweep up into the rocks when Bee called us from where he and Ralph had remained. He had found a laying-down position and he said there was a good amount of blood. He was not far from where we had left the last sign, but further west by about four yards – the opposite direction to where we had been looking. I shuddered. Here was Bee and the client, unarmed, and they’d stumbled onto the cat’s last laying down spot. I yelled at them not to move and we all turned out of the koppie’s base back toward the meadow. At this stage Kevin, Peter and Kevin’s tracker were about 20 yards away from George and I, to the east, or left. They were partially hidden from me by scrubby Malalangwe bushes. We were all slowly walking south back towards Bee. Suddenly that guttural burping charging cat belch – like a giant burp inside a 50 gallon drum! A yell from Peter at the same time! The roaring continued! I sprinted a few paces in order to see what the hell was happening – Kevin was yelling blue murder!

I now saw Kevin on his back flailing to keep an enraged leopard off his face! Kevin’s tracker was standing directly behind the leopard exactly in my line of fire – I screamed at him to get down – I had my .460 up ready to go. I could blast the cat easily without hitting Kevin as I was only about four yards from them at this time.

It was now that I saw that we had no wounded female on our hands. This was a giant male leopard! His huge tail was up and thrashing and I saw his balls clearly in that split second. As I screamed at Kevin’s tracker, the giant head came up and the leopard looked straight at me. He leaped off Kevin towards the cover of the hill to my left. Who knows what made him stop. Maybe the pain of his wound or just the fury of battle inside him, but he pulled up short, spun around and came at me. As leopard charges go, it was not a difficult charge to face. The ground between he and I was open and I was ready and could see him clearly. I don’t remember aiming but the .460 roared and the leopard was clubbed to a stop immediately. He never even twitched. He was about six paces from me. The bullet entered his chest just high of centre, and came out the back of his left thigh near the tail. I yelled to find out who was hurt. Peter stood up and Kevin got up slowly nursing his right hand. Ralph and Bee came over while we shredded a shirt and cleaned Kevin’s wounds. I bound his band up tightly to stop the bleeding and made a sling to hold his arm up. On reconstructing the last ten seconds, it turned out that the leopard had been lying all the time in the green grass at the edge of the meadow! I had walked past him three times!

When we had all turned to go back to investigate Bee’s discovery, Peter had walked straight into the cat. As he saw it and yelled “Nansi” (there!) – he hit the ground. My staff had learned this as I hammered it into them over and over -when the shooting starts, they must be out of the way, flat on the ground. As Peter hit the ground, the enraged animal had streaked out of the grass, landed on Peter’s back and sprung at Kevin leaving Peter with two shallow scratches.

Kevin was in pain now with some deep bites to the hand and fingers and various claw scratches on his arm and abdomen. As it turned out later, his finger ligaments were quite badly damaged and he received a good number of stitches – and many painful visits to his doctor. He was lucky, in this instance, that we were all together as I feel the cat would have mauled him longer than the few seconds it allocated him this time. The yelling at Kevin’s tracker had probably pressured the enraged cat into leaving Kevin and going for cover.

We all went over to look at the giant leopard. It was a beast of a male and I kick myself for not having had a good spring scale in the truck at the time. It was definitely one of the heaviest cats I have ever seen. He was in prime, beautiful condition with a few fight marks on his neck and head. He had magnificent mountain-type markings, especially along his spine. It was just pure luck that we had not been offered a shot at the female. If we had, we would never have seen this beautiful animal. This male was the one whose tracks we’d seen the previous day. They returned down the same road, skirted where the boys had slept, followed the southern-most whale, and walked straight into the bait in the early hours of the morning! The female’s tracks went north from the bait towards a pool in the Ingwezi riverbed. This big female was taken two seasons later in the same spot, and she was a beauty. The big male had been hit just above the left hip and through the kidneys into the guts, and then into the right back leg. It must have had its back legs at extraordinary angles on the branches as it sought to tear the bait down. The internal damage had ensured that he didn’t get far. Although the external bleeding was minimal, there was considerable bleeding inside and had we not found him, I think he would have expired that day.

Ralph was happy that we had recovered his cat, but obviously was concerned over Kevin’s wounds. We gutted the cat as it was now quite hot and it was a good hour and a half back to the mountain camp. When we got there we cleaned up Kevin’s wounds with hydrogen peroxide and hot water, followed by a powerful disinfectant and then dispatched him to Bulawayo for proper medical attention.

We took many beautiful pictures of Ralph’s cat before skinning him out. His skull later measured over 17 inches, which put him right up near the top of the record books. Another giant Matobo male had walked his last mile and Ralph finally had his leopard. From that day on, all our hunters and staff, when referring to the three whale hills or giving directions nearby, would say, “lapa – Kevin” (there at Kevin). It seemed a good name for a koppie, and the name has stuck.

By Richard Sowry. Edited by John Ledger

In the riverine forest of Pafuri there is not a single top canopy tree that is not scarred by elephant. Most of these trees are in the process of dying, and the rest are barely coping. The only species of top canopy tree they do not touch are the Sausage Trees, and they are few and far between anyway.

Elephant have also cleaned out the understory creepers and scrub. I have been birding seriously since the early 1990s, and in the late 90s spent a lot of time birding in the Pafuri area. The dawn chorus of bird song during mid-summer in the 90s used to be deafening, it was so loud. Today it is not. You still hear the same species, but there is a representation of only a few individual birds, and it is very far from deafening.

I would like to share some FACTS relating to the issue. Firstly, FACTS differ from BEST AVAILABLE KNOWLEDGE. Best available knowledge is what we find in scientific papers and the like, and it should be continually changing as we learn more. But FACTS remain.

Simply put, Wildlife Management is the ‘simulation of what’s missing yet essential for healthy ecosystem functioning’. To rationalise what’s missing in modern day KNP is easier to assess from the perspective of rather what’s changed, since a time when we believe the system was sustainable. So, for argument’s sake and covering all bases, let’s go back 300 years. There are basically two major issues that have changed in the KNP:

1. The animals can no longer freely migrate and follow rainfall and food gradients – this in short results in selective and continual feeding without interruption.

2. Since 1995 the elephant and the hippo of the KNP no longer have a natural predator. For many thousands of years, and before colonial times, the only African predator of elephant and hippo of any significant consequence has been man.

The effect of a predator is that it reduces the population of the prey species and, very importantly, it also changes the behaviour of the prey species. The prey aggregate (herd) and they move in response to predation. No naturally behaving prey species lives and feeds in the same place where its predator lives.

The situation in the KNP at present is unnatural, to say the least. Our elephant population is unnaturally high, and they are behaving unnaturally. Man used to live along the major river systems, and as a result the riverine vegetation was protected from elephant. Today elephant move up and down a river during the day, feeding at will. Historically they would have probably drunk at night and during the day moved inland, away from the river where man lived. They are the largest represented biomass of mammal in the park and they eat approximately 95% of all plant species, so the consequences of them no longer having a natural predator are huge.

It is interesting to note that when I showed Ron Thomson the Pafuri Riverine in 2021, which he had never visited before, he remarked that “This reminds me of the Chobe River when I visited it in the 1960s”. We all know what the Chobe Riverine and associated biodiversity in Botswana looks like to today…

If we do not manage elephant, the riverine forest of Pafuri and the associated biodiversity will not exist in 15 years. Simply, our refusal to fulfil our natural role is not fair on other biodiversity.