Nov 30, 2017 | Hunting News, News
[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]Horns and Stripes
By Jeremy Cotton
This day finds me running at top speed down a two-track road in the middle of northern Namibia with no idea why. My legs fly to keep up with my PH and tracker. All of the commentary to this point has been in whispered Afrikaans, and, not knowing that language, I am in the dark. A couple of hundred metres pass and we careen to the right into the thick bush, still cruising at top speed. I have little experience with this hunting technique and find it unique to say the least. The thorn bushes tear at my arms and legs as I whizz past. Those cuts are going to sting in the shower tonight. Then we stop dead. The soft grey form of a kudu cow appears…
Maybe I should rewind this a little and explain a few things?
I am on my first African safari with my parents, Gary and Sandee Cotton, and my wife Cathy. So far we have been having the time of our lives, and several animals have been taken by my parents, including a super 94cm gemsbok and old warthog. Cathy has been trying to get a zebra, but so far they have eluded her. Most of my time has been spent trying to entice a leopard to my baits, but that is another story. I did manage an old 96cm gemsbok on Day 3, and a Damara dik-dik on Day Five. So, I have not been out of the game entirely. However, we are not cutting into my trophy fee budget very quickly and it is now Day Seven.
We are hunting at Westfalen Hunting Safaris in northern Namibia near the town of Outjo. John and Juliana Van der Westhuizen run the operation with their children, Hain, Juretha, three dachshunds and an undetermined number of cats. The camp is called Elephant Camp and is situated in an area where the desert elephant roams, hence the name. Camp, if you can call it that, is comfortable, and well-appointed with hot showers, and great accommodations. You become part of the family immediately, and want for nothing. A truly exceptional operation.
Since I have opted to try for leopard, my PH is Anton Esterhuizen, a long-time Namibian big-game PH. He guides the leopard hunters when one is in the Westfalen camp. If you get the chance to hunt with him, you’ll not be disappointed. He is very knowledgeable, and just fun to be around.
After six days of hard hunting, my parents have declared a day of rest. Since they are staying in for the morning, it frees up John to check the leopard baits then take my folks to see a local Himba village this afternoon. Since Cathy has not yet connected on her primary animal, Hain will take her out after the crafty zebra. They have dubbed themselves “team zebra”.
This gives me a day to concentrate on plains game. Specifically, we will try to find a kudu. Of course, you never know what a day may bring.
The day begins: After a great breakfast of eggs and bacon, Anton and I head north to an area where my folks had seen two big kudu bulls the previous day. Dad and Hain had stalked one, and got to within 30 metres, but the thick brush prevented a shot. We were hoping for a similar encounter with a different ending.
An hour later, we had picked up our tracker July, and Anton and I were still hunting through a hilly area looking for kudu and hartebeest. We are angling toward a large kopje to climb and glass the surrounding area. From the top we see a small band of kudu cows getting a bite to eat, but there are no bulls in sight. We move on, and after a couple hours of moving and glassing, we end up at a waterhole. A quick radio call, and July comes to pick us up.
We drive further into the mountains, and basically repeat the same walk. This time we come up with a klipspringer ewe and two giraffe. By now it is lunch time, so we head to a large waterhole nearby to eat lunch and see what visits.
On our drive to the waterhole, a good steenbok bolts from cover in front of the truck. I hastily snatch up my 9.3X64 Brenneke Mauser and bail out of the truck, circling around the back to get on the steenbok’s side of the road. Anton follows me then takes the lead as we sneak toward the last position of the steenbok ram. He pops his head up 30 metres in front of us under a large thorn bush, but otherwise remains still. The sticks appear in front of me and I snick off the safety as the Mauser is deployed onto them. A second later I squeeze off the shot and the steenbok ram evaporates in a cloud of dust. We advance and find blood, but no ram.
July joins us and takes the lead in finding my ram. As the search begins, we hear rustling behind us. I turn to see that the ram is up and trying to get moving. The rifle swings and fires as if on its own, finishing the tiny antelope. My first shot was a little low. The second passed through end to end. Luckily, the 250gr Nosler Accubonds didn’t do much damage to the cape and a full mount will be possible. Big calibers are hard on these little creatures. Steenbok are a delightful little antelope. Though their horns are simple, they are quite striking up close, with soft, long rust-brown fur and subtle facial markings. As fine a trophy as anyone could want.
After the photos are taken we pack up and continue on to the waterhole. The layout is a large earth berm running east to west parallel to a dry riverbed. The berm finally tapers, and the river enters the pan where the waterhole is. The waterhole extends along the other side of the earth berm from the riverbed. This is an area that holds water most of the year, so there is a lot of vegetation, and some fairly large trees line the river.
We drive up the riverbed to the earth berm, grab our lunches, my rifle, and make our way to the top of the berm. At the top, two chairs greet us behind a thorn bush blind under a large shady tree. In front of us is a pan of maybe 20 acres. There are 10 acres of water in the pan surrounded by dry mud bank that gives way to scrub mopane and thorn bush. A large group of gemsbok and springbok are in residence on the other side of the water.
I’m busy trying to get a good photo of the gemsbok when I hear July start to drive off, taking the steenbok ram to the skinner while we enjoy lunch. A second or two later, the vehicle abruptly stops with the engine off. Odd. A moment later, the heavy footfalls of someone running grow in our ears. July appears at the bottom of the berm and has a short frantic conversation with Anton. Anton turns to me. “Bring your rifle.” I have no clue what they have discussed as it was all in Afrikaans.
I follow them to the truck at a fast jog. Once at the truck, more conversation in Afrikaans ensues as they come up with a plan. I load the rifle, still unsure what has sparked this tense moment. Now we get serious and bolt down the road at a run. I unsling my rifle to turn it around to point behind us. Running with a loaded rifle doesn’t seem like a good idea to me.
And so I am running at top speed down a two-track road in the middle of northern Namibia with no idea why.
A further 150 metres, and we cut to the left into the brush for 50 metres more. Finally July freezes. I can just see a kudu cow off to our left about 75 metres away in a small opening. She is oblivious to our presence and keeps walking. More kudu file past the opening, but they are all cows and calves. I count 13 of them.
We back out slowly and cut back toward the road. Slightly further, and we get back up to speed. The scenario is finally starting to sink into my brain. When July started to leave he ran smack into the kudu herd as they were coming in to water. They bolted, but apparently not too far. Anton and July figure that the kudu aren’t spooked and we are trying get in front of them. Trouble is, they walk fast. Much faster than I walk, and if we don’t run to outpace them we’ll never cut them off.
We swing wide and scurry another 300 metres before slowing to a walk and turning left again toward where the kudu should be. Then 20 metres further, and July halts. Anton throws up the sticks.
“Shoot quick,” he whispers. I do as I am bid and throw the rifle to my shoulder and onto the sticks. A bull kudu fills the scope quartering hard away, head twisted looking back at us. My crosshair passes the shoulder, settles at the back of the ribs, and I send a 250gr Nosler Accubond on its way. The impact is audible, and the bull lunges forward vanishing into the bush. We bolt forward at a dead run to where he once stood.
We find him standing under a big mopane tree. The sticks are up and I have the rifle trained on him, though he is clearly done for. A second later, he topples. He is still, and I feel the nerves finally catching up with me. We stand there for several minutes catching our breath and staring at the kudu bull. No words are spoken, no handshakes. Just silence and calm for probably a good minute. Anton finally breaks the peace and asks me if I understand what I have just taken. It takes me a second to comprehend his question.
Anton is referring to Namibia undergoing several rabies outbreaks in the last 10 years. Those outbreaks seem to be particularly hard on the old bulls. No one knows why, but those seem to be the animals most often found dead from an outbreak. My bull is quite old and we judge him at 10 years. That means he has survived at least two outbreaks. Quite a feat when nature can be a cruel host. To take a bull this old, given the history, is something a bit more special.
His long horns are thick and worn from time. The tips have been polished to the color of fine ivory. The curl is wide, and he just makes two turns. The horns are covered in mud and I peel it off to get a better look at their astonishing beauty. Both of my hands won’t go all the way around the horn bases. The ridges up the horns are well defined, and have chips in them from years of fighting for the right to breed.
I feel a small sense of sadness that I had slain such and old warrior; a fighter that survived the worst. I also feel the elation of success. For a few minutes, I try to soak in every detail of the face, ears, hooves, tail, and stripes. I count seven stripes on one side, eight on the other. I am surprised at how short the hair is, and how sparse it is. His neck is still swollen from the rut. It is simply massive, as are the ears.
I’ll only get one first kudu. So, I take my time and hope that maybe future years will not dull the memory. Maybe I can make the memory last in sharp detail forever.
Photos are taken, and we load him up for the journey to the skinner. July has picked up our lunch from where we left it at the waterhole. It is now about 2.30 p.m. and time to head to the main house to drop off my kudu and steenbok. And finally eat some lunch.
After lunch, it is about mid-afternoon. Time to get in one more hunt before night time settles and ruins our fun. We head to a flat plains area where there are a lot of springbok and hartebeest. On the way we glimpse a cheetah in the tall grass. Very neat. However, that also means that the springbok will be scattered and not in their usual haunts. Cheetah are hard on the springbok. Some warthog appear under a tree. A good boar has love on his mind with a smallish sow. We are intruding on their plans, and they scurry off into the grass. We try to make a stalk, but the long grass shelters them from our sight. Back to the truck, and we are off.
A short drive further on we pull up to the base of a large kopje. We climb to an outcrop on the side to glass the flats beyond. Small groups of hartebeest cows and two groups of springbok are grazing. Then a single hartebeest steps out in front of us. He is something special. We admire him for several minutes, but can’t come up with a good way to stalk him. No matter, he isn’t that far out. We judge it at 250 metres and I am confident at that range. July bails off the rocks to retrieve my rifle. I really like that guy!
Rested on my hat over a rock, I take my time to ensure a clean kill. The bull is slightly quartering away and feeding to the right. I aim at the top third of his body, just behind the shoulder. Anton whispers, “Wait for him to raise his head. It would be a shame to put a bullet through his horn.” The bull turns a little more broadside, and I have my opportunity. The shot rings in our ears, and a fraction of a second later we hear the impact. It is solid. The bull takes two unsteady steps forward, and tips over. His tail is the only thing that moves, then he is still. A later check with my rangefinder puts the range at 239 metres.
He is a magnificent bull. Old and heavy. The bases are polished smooth from his many years. The tips sweep back parallel to each other and are very long. I wanted a hartebeest, but had put him lower on my priority list. I now see that was a mistake. He has a beauty that is made more unique by his ungainly appearance. The long face blends into the horn bases. And the body color is like no other animal that I have seen. A truly magnificent trophy, and I can already see him as a pedestal mount in my living room. I make a note to see if my wife agrees with that idea.
We drop off my hartebeest with the skinner and head back to Elephant Camp.
Cathy is waiting for us along the drive. She holds up a spent cartridge from her 7X57 Mauser, and parades it back and forth in front of our vehicle. She had connected with her zebra. She recounts the tale, and I can see that she had a wonderful hunt. She is very excited.
I hold out my hand to give her something and drop three spent cartridges into her hand.
“You got your kudu?”
“Yes.”
She looks puzzled. “It took three shots?”
“No.”
“You got three animals?” she asks, this time with an edge of excitement.
“Yes.”
But we really had four animals, my three, and Cathy’s zebra – apart from those of the previous days. We may not have a day blessed with such success again. A day ripe with hope that ended in triumph and above all, memories. And one that turned out to be quite an expensive day!
Jeremy Cotton was born and raised in Montana, USA and is 37 years of age. His family has held up the tradition of hunting for several generations and passed it to him at a young age. Jeremy has hunted much of the USA from eastern turkey to western elk and deer. He currently resides in Indiana and works as an engineer in the steel industry. His wife Cathy graciously allows him to maintain his hunting habit and occasionally comes along to oversee the activities. This trip was their first to Africa, and will not be their last. The friendships made will be renewed in the future.[/vc_column_text][/vc_column][/vc_row][vc_row][vc_column][vc_gallery type=”image_grid” images=”12697,12698,12699,12700,12701,12702″][/vc_column][/vc_row]
Nov 26, 2017 | Hunting Stories, News
A Grey Ghost in the Erongo Mountains
By Bruce Parker
You’ll see a far-off fire, a tiny flicker in the darkness, and, if your heart is right, you’ll know there are men sitting there, dressed against the cold, and planning tomorrow. They have come to find the legendary Grey Ghost of Africa, the antelope that consumes more fireside time and engages more hunters in wistful and proud discourse than any other in Southern Africa.
A farmer had once spoken of a special place far to the west, saying he’d never journeyed there himself, but years ago while still a youngster, a trader had passed by and left the horns. When pressed for details of their origin, he’d waved his arm towards the west and mumbled softly. For years the horns had been the sole reason, he said, that visitors called at his remote home, simply to see them, touch them and stare wistfully into the empty gravel plains that stretched further than even the horizon. The directions were never written, simply contained in a sentence that he’d learnt as a youngster, when all his waking time was devoted to how he would find the place where that kudu had once lived.
To find the mountains, he’d said, “You must walk the gravel plains to the west until the summer storms point you to the great mountains, and there you’ll find a land too beautiful to paint.” But from where do you start, he’d been asked, answering, “Well, my farm’s near Otjimbingwe, where the two rivers meet.”
Out on the plains, the night cold grew heavier and colder. In camp, under the yellow lights, the smell of the desert dust and coffee mixed with the shadows of men busy preparing for tomorrow. In a few hours, the gravel and pebbled surface would shimmer in the heat, and the dust devils would dance amongst the stunted acacia, and life would creep away and hide. And in camp, nothing would move as the land heated beyond use and began draining even the sky of colour.
The night before, the first of the summer’s storms had swept the peaks, flooding the valleys and ravines with a brown boiling turbulence that fuelled the dust-dry rivers. Amazingly, thirty-six hours later that wild water had already surrendered to the desert sand.
Arriving a day after the first heavy rains of the summer could be a disaster. Even Hendrik wore a worried look and had been seen having long animated discussions with our skinner Driet, but in the end we decided not to cancel.
In the early dawn and against the yellowing horizon, the sweeping and blackened arrowheads of rock seemed to fill the desert. Whatever the men were doing in the camp and whenever they walked from one spot to another, they kept glancing at the granite massif that seemed to glower at the world.
“It’s time,” said Chris. “We must leave now if we’re to be hard against the rock at first light and take the best track. The runoff from the storm should be past, so we’ll have the best chance at picking up the spoor we’re going for.”
Our pre-hunt chat in Windhoek had brought focus to the idea of going for the cisterns in the Erongo. Our strategy assumed that for aeons, rain water had tumbled, loaded with rock, carving and channelling the great granite domes, and in that rush of water, the secret cisterns were filled to overflowing. These reservoirs could not be far from the great run-off channels that burst from the mountains. The sand and rock-strewn washes had to be our way in, and the same applied to the wildlife. We reasoned we would go for height and watch the kudu arrive at the few springs that were still active.
“It’s easy,” Alan said, “We must just follow the insects, the bees or the butterflies, because they drink every day.”
“That’s right Alan,” said Chris, “and there’s a lot of rock there and not much topsoil to complicate the climb. Hendrik, my Herero tracker, is one of the few men who can follow over hard rock. And I must tell you guys, way to the south in the Khomas Hochland, Hendrik and I found kudu on steep bare rock, climbing like European sheep.”
“Tell us,” said Alan.
“We were following kudu tracks up a ravine, when the path was closed by a sloping rock. We could see scratch marks on the rock itself and followed. It was difficult, but after some five minutes we dropped down onto a small sand-filled cleft, blocked by yet another fall of rock. The tracks avoided the rockfall and went up the rock face again. In the next cleft standing on rock were eight kudu next to a spring filled with clear water, and doves were fluttering around trying to find a perch among a million butterflies. The amazing thing was that the kudu could not rush off, but stepped onto the rock and carefully climbed away and out of there.”
We left camp and drove towards the towering mountains, scattering a covey of Hartlaub’s francolin that ran, but did not take to the wing.
“Too cold to fly,” mumbled Alan, his face hidden by a balaclava.
On the top of the first embankment Chris engaged low range and the land cruiser went down at a steep angle, levelled off in what looked like deep mud, and crossed without a problem. In the riverbed itself the air was even colder than on the gravel plains above.
“Here’s good enough,” said Chris, bringing the cruiser to a stop near an overhang.
“It’s freezing,” said Alan, as we geared up, fingers clumsy and thickened by the cold. Around us, the grey tinted jungle of rock seemed more gloomy and indistinct in the slow drift of icy air from the heights above.
At a gesture from Chris, our half-frozen, zombie-like group shuffled after him and from the volume of fresh track, our theorising seemed to be paying off.
A half-mile further, we knew we had the way into the mountains. Crossing our path was a veritable kudu highway with the tracks of Africa’s most stately antelope everywhere. Some were deeply pressed and showing skid marks in the drying mud, while others were already losing their shape to the sun’s stealing warmth. This made for real focus, and checking the route they’d taken, it wasn’t long before we found the acacia thicket that hid their way into the mountains.
Ahead a huge rock fall and then the mountaineering part of our stalk began. As tricky as it now looked, this was what we’d talked about – surprising the kudu from high above. Along with height, came good glassing and shooting opportunities, providing we neither skylined ourselves nor rolled loose rock down the granite domes into the thickets and acacia below.
“The kudu will be standing, waiting for the sun’s warmth before they start feeding,” whispered Chris. “Keep low, or crawl, but don’t show yourself. If we skyline once, it’s all over.” Just then the distant bark of a chacma baboon echoed briefly, but was not repeated. Chris winced and shook his head, showing by crossing his throat that being seen by the troop would also kill the hunt.
We started at the foot of a jumble of balanced rock, against the dome flank and this gave us access to a rock-strewn ridge and up we went. Later, from a cave-like overhang, we had our first glimpse of the ravine floor below. Balancing rocks and a few rounded boulders ringed with acacia and thorn bush made the area appear impenetrable. Where was the open sand path with the game park view with kudu browsing everywhere? Alan looked concerned; it was after all his plan.
Protected by the deep shade, we started to glass, each trying a separate quadrant. Then, as if our eyes could suddenly see, kudu cows appeared scattered along the far wall of the ravine below us. Now, we peeled the thorn and spindly leaves from every acacia stand, searching for the bull, but, hard as we glassed, there wasn’t one.
Critically aware that a single loose stone could clatter hundreds of feet and bounce into the browse below and alert our quarry, we carefully resumed the stalk, feeling our way along the boulder-strewn path.
For another half hour, we continued our climb. At this height, we could see an infinity of boulders and ridges that began with a spiky hedge of green acacia and strange clusters of small boulder kopjes and loose round stones that lay scattered on sheets of flat reddish granite. Dead ahead was a drop-off, and then we began to catch glimpses of the ravine’s far side, a good quarter mile away. Taking off our packs and securing the rifles, we squirmed into position on our stomachs, elbows losing skin to the rough granite.
The view was breathtaking. Below was an oasis carpeted with yellow flowers and a mix of stunted euphorbia and acacia. Huge granite boulders lay scattered about, giving shade and form to this hidden paradise. As a busy group of rosy-faced lovebirds called, we spotted a pool at the base of the huge granite dome almost opposite us.
Suddenly there was a sharp intake of breath from Alan. “Man, I’ve got 59 maybe 60 inches, symmetrical with white tips and heavy bases. At 4 o’clock,” he whispered.
A kudu was behind a thicket of young acacia, his greyish-fawn coat blending with the branches so well that his horns were the only giveaway as they shook the branches above his head. Then he stepped back, holding his head low and took a few steps into the open, his tufted neck fringe almost on the ground. His rump twitched, sending a crowd of flies into the air, only to have them settle again in seconds. We lay transfixed, stretched out on the cool rock, wondering at his perfection. Not the biggest set of horns ever recorded, but a magnificent representation of what the greater kudu was all about. I knew we should savor this moment, for alive he was so much more than a horn measurement.
Then lifting his head suddenly, he stared hard down the ravine, his huge white-fringed ears flicking back and forth. Clearly, he sensed something. Not us surely, as we were at least 400 feet away and above him. Then I thought ‘acoustics’ – what if the distance wasn’t protection at all and the rocks were amplifying our whisperings?
I lowered my head and wriggled backwards, and found and unzipped my rifle bag, palming the zipper to silence it. Barely breathing, I pulled my .300 Win Mag half out the bag and slowly worked the bolt, loaded four 200gr rounds, and closed the action with a round in the breech, safety on. Taking a breath I looked up and saw Chris frowning and urging me to hurry.
Then the coarse, unmistakable bark – I knew I was going to lose him. I squirmed back and nervously exposed the barrel as Chris whispered in my ear.
“You may still have a chance. He thinks the problem is downhill and has moved into the brush where he was when we first saw him.” In seconds my scope was working back and forth probing the thicket. Nothing. Chris saw my nervousness.
“Slow down, you have kudu eyes now and we must just wait as he’s in a thicket island and must come out sometime.”
Then a touch on my arm: “I see him, he’s moved again, now half way back in the upper section, still looking down the ravine,” said Alan.
I kept the scope at 6x and started probing the area again. A white strip of something, then his rump twitched, and I had him. Moving the scope over his chest and neck, desperately looking for a clear shot, served only to raise the tension that gripped us all. Lowering the rifle, I looked at Chris and shook my head, whispering that the shot was a ‘no go’, as there were any number of small twigs and an inch thick-branch in the way.
“Chris, we must wait,” I said.
And wait we did. The minutes crawled by and then the first touch of the midday wind. A black eagle drifted over the jumble of rock below us. Alan and Chris glanced at me in turn, clearly urging the shot and wondering why I was holding off. I released the safety. The kudu was standing in much the same spot, but now I found some subtle shift in his position had opened a small window midway up his neck.
Steadying the cross hairs I took up first pressure and continued squeezing. The rifle jumped hard, but my eye stayed pretty much with the shot. Dust flew from his neck just as I lost the picture.
“He’s down! In his tracks,” said Chris with a shout. Our joy and excitement rang in those rocks, and everybody was talking at once. While we hurried to assemble the gear, Chris called Hendrik and gave him the good news, and then our long climb down to the gravel plains began.
Our greater kudu measured 62¾ and 62¼ inches.
Recovery took until early evening and left us standing at the truck, with aching backs and thighs, bloody, exhausted but proud, and with singing spirits.
None of us will ever forget that hunt, and one of the many memories that will remain with us was the ride back to camp. Leaning into the cooling desert air we rode that cruiser like warriors, arrow-straight across the vast gravel plain with the massif behind us, its peaks glowing gold. The great spiral horns rose high above the tailgate, perhaps his last salute to the home that had nurtured him for so long.
Our skinner Driet worked late into the night, with us constantly visiting to not only follow his progress, but to gaze again at the kudu. Hendrik joined most of our little expeditions, and he seemed as pleased as any man could be. We understood that he counted this magnificent kudu as his victory, too. And in the firelight we recognized in his work, a proud man in a very ancient Africa, practicing a very ancient craft.
Back at our fire we sat in silence and thought of what had been done and what had not been said, and while staring into the fire as all men do, we heard the strange call of a nightjar. It came closer and called again, its evocative notes finding no echo in the silence of the plains, but in our hearts it did, and in the silence that followed we wondered if it also spoke for the great mountain and what the message might be.
Bruce Parker has filmed for Craig Boddington and contributed to “Tracks Across Africa” in a life spanning the corporate world and the African bush. His hunting stories percolate through 40 years of hunting Africa.
Nov 23, 2017 | Hunting News, News
Double or Nothing Elephant
By Bill Head, Byron Hart, Rob Blake
River view of two Botswana bulls, in Namibia!
We were motionless, adrenalin running, hearts pounding, standing by our elephants after all that excitement and shooting, trying to take in what had just happened, not wanting the experience to go away. The years of preparation and planning had resulted in a chaotic but incredible 12-second sequence. How did I get myself into this danger, when all I wanted was to participate in an international conservation event?
I hoped the memory would not fade. Well, it did, and surprisingly each of us remember that day very differently. Because I am a campfire cowboy where it’s sometimes compulsory to exaggerate, I offer my version last, after the African and the former Californian.
The facts according to the PH: I was asked to guide a safari with Jamy Traut, October 2013. Jamy’s two hunting clients had booked a double elephant hunt in the Zambezi Region (formerly Caprivi) of Namibia. Texans, Rob and Bill, lifelong friends and hunting buddies, having hunted most places together, decided to come to Africa to hunt their first elephant.
Jamy’s Kasika concession is directly across the river from Kasane in Botswana, a popular tourist destination for Victoria Falls where folks like us are incorrectly considered poachers. The confluence of the Zambezi and Chobe rivers, with lots of surface water, back waters, channels and swamps, is an area known as the Eastern Floodplains.
The two hunters alternated every day, one hunting party cruising the rivers and channels by boat, the other driving around looking for the big grey pachyderms. We walked among and between them in the tall reeds. The idea on those first days was to accustom hunters to being near elephants and “practice” shot placement at every opportunity. It became apparent that there was a primary group of 18 elephant bulls that preferred the riverside tourist area by day (directly in full view of the numerous tourist safari lodges on the Botswana side), and only moved to the game-management area by night. There were two interesting bulls in this group, always close to each other. We could only approach this group to about 100 yards by truck, but to within about 15 yards by boat, along with many tourist-laden boats. We drifted the boat past them repeatedly, scoping out two nice bulls. Rob and I were quietly discussing shot placement on the various angles of all the bulls standing there, while keeping rifles and hunting paraphernalia out of sight; not an easy task in a tiny five-seater boat towered over by double-decker ferries.
Glassing buffalo among the elephants from behind the only tree for miles.
One evening, we saw the group of bulls moving back towards the hunting area, but the two biggest bulls were not there. Eventually they appeared about 200 yards behind the rest, but we could only just see them through the reeds. It was going to be tight – light was fading, the boundary still a few hundred yards off, the other 16 bulls in between us, no cover… Eventually Martha, Rob’s wife, called a halt saying she was not comfortable with the situation, meaning walking up on elephants near dark in tall grass was a poor idea to her.
Discussing with Jamy’s group, a plan was formulated: 04.00 up; 04.20 coffee; 04.45 depart camp for the Chobe River and the boat. We docked the boat on the edge of the two zones as day was breaking, climbed up the bank and saw the group about a mile away, slowly heading back to the river. We walked in together, hunters, PHs, trackers, game scouts and Jamy’s PH apprentice Kabousie. Again there were only 16 bulls – the two biggest could not be seen. Closer yet at 200 yards, suddenly we saw them both, sleeping on the ground with only a grey mass and one tusk protruding above the grass. The morning sun was on the horizon. The two stood up to follow the group when we were only 25 yards from them. Rob, having drawn the longest straw was first, and he and I moved in to about 18 yards when his bull saw us and turned face-on. Rob’s .458 Lott barked; the bull dropped on the spot with a perfect frontal brain shot, landing on his haunches in an upright position. We’d discussed about immediately reloading and putting a second one into the chest of the elephant as back-up. But this was not going to work, because from our position we could only see a giant head immediately in front of us followed by a massive grey body protruding out behind. Thankfully so – had we done this, Bill’s elephant would have been long gone.
While this whole five-second episode took place, Jamy and Bill moved about 20 yards to the right, catching the attention of their bull who was alerted by the shot. It took a few steps towards them. The other 16 younger bulls moving 40 yards off to the right were in full flight. Only Bill’s bull remained and confronted the hunters. The .470 NE spoke, the shot just missing the brain. The bull shook his head, spun round and headed towards his fallen comrade. Jamy’s double jammed on its second shot, so he put in some insurance. The bull held up just behind the other, turning back to face the hunters. Bill pulled the second barrel, and the elephant went down, right behind the first. It could not have worked out better! We all stood in silence, absorbing what had just happened, then as the adrenalin drained, joy, and absolute excitement followed for hours on end. One cannot begin to describe that moment.
It just so happened that the bull that Rob hunted, had shorter, thicker tusks that had been favored by Bill. The longer-tusked elephant had been favored by Martha and was supposed to be Rob’s. It didn’t really matter who shot whichever bull – two lifelong friends had hunted their first elephant together, and had hunted two elephant friends. A special moment.
“I wanted that one!”
He shot my bull? The plan changed with the first shot.
Rob visualizes the “Poli Poli Bulls”
“Stand up and confront your bull!” my PH whispers at dawn on the Caprivi flood plain, after a knee-shredding 300 yard crawl. We are downwind of 18 elephant bulls. Bill and his PH lie just eastward hoping for a chance at an old askari bull.
My vision narrows with each step forward. At 15 yards the old bull senses me, shuffles to face me with raised head, outstretched trunk, and flared ears. We look into each other’s eyes… “Take him!” I don’t hear the shot. Instead, the ground rumbles as my bull drops straight down and the herd stampedes toward the Chobe River.
“Are you reloaded? Don’t shoot! Lie down!” The askari bull now faces us to check on his fallen companion, instead of stampeding with the rest of the herd. My hunting partner runs forward and takes a shot. His bull whirls to rejoin his fallen companion, and is now focused on us. “When he comes, WE WILL SHOOT!” My PH is agitated, his rifle shouldered. We exhale as Bill’s next shot drops the bull. The African sun brings a bittersweet morning as we sit with the two bulls, sharing their last sunrise.
Often I think about sharing that sunrise with our two bulls. I also remember the following morning when our Game Guard, took my hand and gave heartfelt thanks for the meat which fed his village. I then asked him what elephant tasted like. With a puzzled look he replied, “Like elephant.” At which point Jamy burst into laughter – after all what answer should I have expected! Martha still has her heart set on some long, symmetrical ivory.
Rob’s view at the shots, a bit close.
“Cowboy. Practice Counts!”
I was not looking for elephant when we booked at the DSC Annual meeting, but Rob was. When Jamy mentioned the cost of a conservation bull, my wife immediately signed me up. Acquiring a single trigger .470 NE double cost me my Jeep Wrangler. I practiced shooting weekly. I walked to the back of my place, threw up sticks, and took two shots over open sights, scaring the heck out of my neighbours. I ended up not having time for sticks.
Stalking the same herd, Rob preferred one elephant, but Martha another. The elephants decided for us. The PH’s plan worked, as the elephants were close to a mile from the river. Important to the hunt, both elephants and lodges were concealed by morning river fog. We marched single file for a while, when Jamy turned and asked, “Can you crawl?” The crawl turned into a belly scoot. The sword grass was wet and brutal.
Farm raider the day before. Note the red Coke can [filled with rocks] used to make noise and “scare” the elephant.
As we crawled among the herd, the two large bulls were lying down while younger bulls around us were watching, but not alarmed. However, I was! A day earlier we had come upon a dead croc in these same weeds wearing a deep elephant foot print in the middle of its back. The younger bulls began moving, some heading towards the river. The big boys rose. We had to act, or would have nothing if they made it to that exclusion zone.
I rationalized that Rob would shoot, the rest would take off and I would spend more days to get an elephant. Those days turned into seconds. Rob and Byron stood up at the same instant as Jamy and I. Time stood still. Rob shot, no sticks. His bull was hot-breath-close, facing him with that “Who are you?” look. The bull dropped from the Lott, hindquarters down, front following like Boddington’s DVD. There were elephants 360, making unbelievable noise.
The second older bull objected and came right at Jamy and me. Ears flared, trumpeting, head up, then low. I was so focused on facing him that I shot just as he raised his head again, maybe 15 yards. The Hornaday solid penetrated that top fold of the trunk, passing millimetres above his brain. I held to shoot again, the Euro double failed. That was not in the DVD. I recocked. Nothing! Reloading, thinking at least I have a single shot, I pulled again as the huge elephant passed oh so closely by me, turning away from us, swinging his head. The second hit him behind his left ear, travelled across that massive skull and bedded above his right eye. The rifle clicked to the second barrel. Jamy shot simultaneously to the starboard of me. Now I am deaf. I thought Jamy was shooting at one of the other bulls near us. The perturbed bull went around the downed elephant, and paused. He looked down then at Rob and Byron, who were in motion with their rifles, and stared red-eyed at me. I shot as he stepped around the body, ears back, no trumpeting. The 500-grain bullet took him in the left side brain. He fell sideways on top of his companion, then rolled down next to him.
Reloading, I jumped on top of “my” elephant, jamming barrels into his ear. Jamy was yelling at me, “Don’t shoot, he’s dead.” We stopped everything, frozen. Me on top of #2, Rob and Byron guns pointed three yards towards the business end of either. Jamy had positioned us in the exit path of the herd. His shot was not at the others, but into the hip of my bull to change its thinking about retreat to the river. I had expected we would take two eventually, but not at once within seconds! This was a hunt like no other – double or nothing.
We took conservation bulls that had “escaped” Botswana national parks. Elephants have become a problem raiding local farmers and fishermen in Namibia. Food is limited in the parks, causing hundreds of animals to cross the croc-infested Chobe to avoid starvation. The Namibian CITES permit allowed us to take the ivory. Rob returned to the Caprivi last year for his second elephant on permit.
Me, I can still see those 12 seconds with my eyes open.
Jamy, Bill, Rob, Byron, and Kabousie – the picture about 10 minutes after we started breathing again. Note the weed on top of Rob’s elephant, left there by the falling companion.
BIO:
Rob and I have been hunting actively over 35 years, as committed conservationists, scientists, and rancher/farmers. I started as a teenager with a 22. and my second rifle was a .270. Years ago we decided to take the money spent on a deer lease in the Frio Canyon and tr
Nov 20, 2017 | Hunting News, News
By Gary Underhill
It was the spring of 2000, and we were on our first safari with Ken and Lynda Morris, owners of Byseewah Safaris. We were hunting with Willie and Naftal and had been pursuing a nice blesbok ram that kept disappearing into the bush. In an effort to relocate him, we had climbed an old, inactive termite mound. Glenda was looking through her binoculars and was unaware that she was straddling a Horned Adder. Irritated by her presence, the snake was coiled and ready for action! Thanks to Naftal’s interference, both went their separate ways unharmed. Later on, after considerable effort, Glenda made a great shot and took a beautiful blesbok.
In 2002, Naftal was involved in a car accident that resulted in the high amputation of his left arm. The amputation was such that wearing a prosthetic device is not possible. One can only imagine what the loss of his arm meant to a young man with a family, working in the hunting industry of Namibia.
In 2003, Glenda and I were back at Byseewah. As you might imagine, Naftal’s self-confidence was not in great shape at this point. I wanted to do a little hunting, and in discussing the days’ arrangements, Ken asked me to request Naftal to be our guide, and to do so in front of the rest of the staff. Since I was planning on that anyway, it was no problem. My request was to be made in front of the staff to show that, even with the loss of his arm, Naftal had value in the eyes of the client.
It was good to spend time in the bush with Naftal. We were away from the rest of the staff and light conversation was the order of the day. His sharp eyes spotted a gold-medal steenbok which now resides in our trophy room.
We have two boys who are avid archery hunters. In 2004 we took a family trip to South Africa and both boys and their wives had hunted plains game with a rifle. In 2007 we all headed to Byseewah for some archery hunting. Hunting gemsbok with rifle is difficult enough, but archery – you must be kidding me! Ken allows no shooting at waterholes, so if you hunt at Byseewah, it is all spot and stalk.
The only way to sneak up on a gemsbok at Byseewah is to wait until they go deep into the gabba-bush, Cataphractes alexandri. So each day Tom, Patrick, Naftal and Moses (another guide) went off into the bush. With the help of Naftal and Moses both boys each took two trophy gemsbok, as well as other plains game. And with that, Naftal guided the second generation of Underhills.
As part of their inheritance, our grandchildren get a month in Africa with Grama and Grampa when they turn twelve or thirteen. In 2009, our first grandchild, Katie, went on her trip. Since then, Abbie, JB, Jillian, Amanda and Patrick have all spent time in Africa. This last March, Bradley – our last grandchild – had his trip. And as usual, Naftal did a great job guiding us. I stayed back and watched as Naftal communicated with my grandson. Naftal has a gift in working with young hunters. His quiet, patient, deliberate manner of guiding them instils confidence and helps the shooter make a good shot.
Anyone who has spent time in Africa knows that there are people there who become like family to you. This has been the case with Naftal. Glenda and I feel that he has become part of our family.
Naftal has now guided three generations of Underhills and he has been an inspiration to all of us. He showed up at Byseewah 28 years ago when he was fourteen. He was hungry and looking for food. He spoke only his village language and had had only six months of formal education. When Ken asked if he could work for his food, he responded, “Yes”, and has been there ever since.
Naftal is now one of Byseewah’s top employees. He is a licensed professional guide in Namibia. Through his exposure to international clients, he speaks five different languages. He has his own computer and kindle and is comfortable with both. His reading and computer skills are largely self-taught.
Byseewah is an amazing place, located one hour south of Etosha National Park at an elevation of 4600 feet. It is sixty-two miles around the perimeter, so you can imagine the required maintenance to keep it tip-top shape. When Naftal is not hunting, he is involved in maintenance.
His wife took off after his accident, so he has raised his three children as a single parent. His oldest daughter, Evangelina, (19) is now enrolled at the University of Windhoek, and the two younger ones, Smedley, (14) and Herolina (12) are doing well in their studies.
As I reflect upon what Naftal has accomplished, in spite of the hurdles placed in his path, I must conclude that I have very little to complain about. The opportunities presented to us here in America are endless and I hope none of us are guilty of the sin of ingratitude.
Gary and Glenda Underhill retired from health care in 2014 and live in Enterprise Oregon. They continue to pursue their passion for Africa.
For more information about Byseewah, visit their website at Byseewah Safaris or contact Ken and Lynda Morris at byseewah@iway.na
Nov 17, 2017 | Hunting News, News
By Zig Mackintosh
An interesting article was recently posted on the Kenyan-based African Wildlife Foundation’s (AWF) website entitled: “Trophy hunting not an option to finance conservation in Africa.” The article makes reference to the recent, legal safari hunting of a male lion in Zimbabwe in the Ngamo-Sikumi State Forestry block. This hunting concession borders the Hwange National Park, is 420 000 acres in extent and gets one lion on quota a year. Briefly here’s what happened on the hunt, according to the Zimbabwean Professional Hunters Association’s press release:
- 14 kilometres outside of Hwange National Park, tracks of a big male lion were picked up and followed by the professional hunter and client.
- After tracking for seven kilometres the lion was spotted and the hunters were able to get a good look at it before it disappeared into the long grass. They noted that it had a GPS collar.
- The park researchers were contacted. They told the hunters that they knew of the lion and that its age was around 6½ years, well within the legal hunting age.
- The lion had been ousted from its pride by a coalition, and was now extensively traveling outside the park. It had no dependent cubs. The hunters were told that it was the correct lion to harvest. It is not illegal to shoot a collared lion in Zimbabwe as the collaring of a lion is for research alone and not protection, as is the case for elephant.
- After the lion had been shot the collar was returned to the researchers along with mane hair and blood and tissue samples.
So no news here, nothing controversial, except that the lion was “Xanda” who we all (now) know is “Cecil the Lion’s” son. The Cecil saga was a fantastic money-spinner for the animal rights groups, so never to let a crisis go to waste, time to cash in again.
In the AWF article, Kaddu Sebunya, AWF President trots out the usual anti’s drivel about banning sport-hunting and any trade in wildlife products and that other non-consumptive means be put in place to replace the revenue earned from hunting. He contends that Africa must not rely on the killing of “rare” species to finance conservation, and calls on the conservation community, institutions, and governments to increase investment in alternative financing to support programs such as relocation, eco-tourism development, and securing space for these species to thrive.
But then he contradicts himself in saying that the presence of lions signifies a healthy ecosystem with prey species and symbolizes conservation success. This is a pretty good description of Hwange National Park and surrounds where the lion population is just about at carrying capacity. In closing he goes on to say that as an Africa-based organization (whose headquarters are in Washington DC) they have a deep appreciation of the cultural and economic value that lions and other rare and iconic species play in a modern Africa. They expect that their interpretation of how to realize an economic value be taken as gospel, everyone else be damned.
The one thing that you can’t help but notice on the website is the donate button with a cute little heart sign. This is the only motive for the AWF’s concern for “Xanda”. Their Facebook following stands at around 1.2 million, a substantial pool in which to trawl for funding. In the comments section below the article’s posting there is the normal hate speech towards hunters, how trophy hunting is fueling poaching, how they would like to hunt down the hunters, etc. The name and address of the professional hunter is also publicized, resulting in his wife receiving death threats. Social media is notorious for its lack of decorum, it is easy to insult and threaten from behind a keyboard, but one would have thought that the AWF would insist on a level of decency on their Facebook page to maintain some level of professionalism. Could it be that it is much easier to raise money when your subjects are all frothing at the mouth?
Kaddu Sebunya’s call to ban safari hunting is reckless, and he probably knows it. He also knows that donations alone could never support the wilderness areas that are presently supported through safari hunting. This is irrelevant to him and the AWF. Raising money for the foundation is the goal. The real problem is that this no longer shocks us. We have become impervious; no-one is holding the anti-hunters accountable for their dangerous shenanigans.
It is perhaps ironic that the AWF, formally know as the African Wildlife Leadership Foundation, was founded by hunters. One wonders what Russell Train, Nick Arundel, Kermit Roosevelt, James Bugg and Maurice Stans, all members of the Washington Safari Club, would have made of the Cecil and Xanda debacle.
Nov 15, 2017 | Hunting News, News
Leica’s Flagship Magnus Riflescopes Now Available In Non-illuminated Verson
Leica has launched three non-illuminated versions of its highly successful range of Magnus riflescopes: Magnus 1.5–10×42, Magnus 1.8–12×50, and Magnus 2.4–16×56. This new line is priced at a lower entry point than the illuminated version, making it one of the best value European premium riflescopes on the market.
Magnus non-illuminated riflescopes boast proven optical and mechanical systems as well as innovative features, such as turret scale zeroing without tools. Excellent light transmission of approximately 92% and extraordinarily high contrast enables dependable sighting under even the most challenging light conditions. Magnus non-illuminated riflescopes are extremely reliable and versatile companions, and provide razor-sharp and crystal-clear resolution, thanks to their legendary Leica optical performance.
The Leica Magnus non-illuminated models join four illuminated models in the Magnus line, ranging from the safari-ready Magnus 1-6.3x24i to the powerful 2.4-16x56i.
For more information, visit www.leica-sportoptics.com
Nov 10, 2017 | News, WingShooting
[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]Taking Wing in Namibia
By Ken Bailey
They come out of the sun as though they’ve stolen the playbook of the Red Baron, so it’s not until the last moment that we see them.
By then it’s almost too late and, having obviously seen us, they’re already twisting skyward as I shoulder my gun. I manage to get off two shots, but it’s a desperation effort, and I don’t cut a single feather before the flight of a dozen sandgrouse disappears into the horizon. But they’ll be back, I know. They keep to their schedule with the precision of a Swiss watch, and I’ll be waiting for them, better concealed, when they return the next morning. In the meantime I’ll go chase guineafowl and francolin. Such is the bird hunting in Namibia – if you miss one bus, there’s always another only minutes away.
To many, the appeal of an African safari is the combination of abundance and diversity. Understandably many think only of big game, with literally dozens of antelope species to choose from, not to mention the Big Five and a wide assortment of other unique animals of all sizes and descriptions. And compared with most other parts of the world, the sheer numbers of most species is breathtaking. I, too, have been captivated by the intoxicating lure of Africa’s big-game hunting.
But along the way, safari by safari, I found my attention being increasingly distracted by game birds. Whether flushing a covey of francolin while mid-stalk on a fine kudu bull, watching with amazement at the endless flights of doves as I check out a waterhole for warthogs, or being sold out by squawking guineafowl when closing the distance on buffalo, I was discovering that the opportunities for bird hunting were every bit as numerous and notable as they were for four-legged critters. So when planning to hunt Namibia a couple years ago, I dedicated time to hunt birds as a “must-do” on the agenda.
I admit I’m an avid wingshooter by nature – if not by nurture. It wasn’t as though the numbers of game birds I was seeing in Africa awoke any feelings in my soul that weren’t already stirring. It’s simply that with each flush and flight and flurry of feathers, the idea of devoting time to birds grew from a germ to an all-out determination. Packing a favourite over/under smoothbore into the two-gun case before leaving for Namibia just cemented my commitment.
Rather than risk temptation and fall back into old habits, I took my shotgun for a walk the very afternoon I arrived at Danene van der Westhuzen’s Klawka camp, one of two hunting concessions she manages with her husband, Gysbert, under the Aru Game Lodges banner. Whenever you’re hunting new country it takes some time to get accustomed to your surroundings, so I wasn’t fully prepared when a couple of common buttonquail rocketed up from the tall grass at my feet just minutes into our walk. PH Stephan Joubert and I both emptied our doubles, and in quick succession the two quail tumbled to the earth. Despite a thorough search, unfortunately we weren’t able to recover them. Perhaps they were merely wing-tipped and ran off to distant cover, but I still got that queasy feeling in the pit of my stomach, known only to hunters who wound and lose an animal. It matters little that it’s “just” a bird and not something larger.
We hunted on, and over the next hour collected four red-billed francolin, or spurfowl as some refer to them, chunky common residents a little bigger than a Hungarian partridge. They tend to inhabit open, grassy wooded cover, especially near watercourses, and much like pheasants would rather run than fly. To get them up we’d first push them into dense thickets. Crash the thicket, and they’d flush, rather like hunting ruffed grouse in dense stands of young poplar. The francolin provided the perfect conclusion to a first day’s hunt.
They say everybody has a fight plan until they’re hit by that first punch. That’s guineafowl hunting in a nutshell. Pushing with beaters is one of the popular ways to hunt these strange birds, and invariably your strategy sounds pretty good – beaters here, moving in that direction, shooters there. Of course, that’s before the first guinea recognizes something’s afoot. Then the plan falls apart, as guineafowl have a nasty habit of not following the script you wrote. In part, it’s what makes them incredibly fun to hunt, but their ruthless unpredictability is also what makes them so frustrating.
We set up two drives for helmeted guineafowl, both thoroughly and precisely battle-planned. Total body count for the two drives? Two! I guess by some standards, that that could be recognized as a success, but on each occasion we reckoned that there were 20 or more guineas within our theater of operations. And our reckoning was right, based on the number of birds I counted flushing early, late, and in every direction but the one we wanted them to fly in.
But, my, they’re beautiful in the hand – hefty and colourful, if a bit odd-looking with a horny helmet and bald head of blue and red.
One morning we opted to walk-up hunt guineas, much as one might for sharp-tailed grouse or pheasants, the primary difference being that we were hunting without a dog. From several hundred yards away, however, we’d spotted a several guineas cavorting through a grassy flat area, pockmarked with the odd thorn bush. We circled to ensure the wind was in our faces, not to manage our scent but rather as a means to help reduce the noise we’d make, then walked slowly forward to where we’d seen them last. Guineafowl have incredible eyesight and hearing, so it was more than a little surprising when they held until we were well within range. Four shots between us and four birds down – it really couldn’t have unfolded more perfectly. I don’t want to spoil my story, so I’ll refrain from describing the majority of our other attempts at sneaking up on these crafty veld denizens!
Nobody goes to Africa for the doves. That’s what Argentina’s for, after all, or perhaps Mexico. But if you don’t take advantage of the dove hunting opportunities Africa offers, you’re missing out on some exceptional gunning. You won’t experience the powder-burning extravaganza common to the dedicated dove destinations – there will be no 500 and more bird days. What you can expect, however, is sustained shooting, morning and evening, for a wide array of species.
At Aru, we had three primary species to target. The largest is the Cape Turtle dove, with that distinctive early-morning call that I associate with southern Africa more than nearly any other sound. Only slightly smaller is the Laughing dove, with its distinctive black-mottled rusty-coloured breast. Finally, we enjoyed flights of Namaqua doves, pretty little birds sporting unusually long tails; the males have a characteristic black facemask and throat. Our standard tactic, simple as it may have been, was to hide beneath the shade of a large tree adjacent to a watering hole. Each morning and late afternoon, as if on cue, the flights would arrive. Generally it would be half a dozen birds or less, though on occasion as many as two dozen would fly in en masse. Seldom would we wait more than 10 minutes between volleys, though this would carry on for an hour in the morning, a couple hours during the late-day hunt.
On our best hunt I think we tumbled 70 or so doves between the two of us -impressive, though certainly not Argentinian numbers. The trade-off? In Argentina you don’t have the opportunity to watch giraffe, zebra, wildebeest, springbok and many more species go about their business while you’re reloading or awaiting the next flurry. Having experienced both, I much prefer the relaxed, yet steady pace and otherworldly backdrop of Africa’s dove hunts.
Before reluctantly packing for home, I insisted on one last Nambian sandgrouse hunt. As with the doves, three distinct species were available – Namaqua, Burchell’s and Double-Banded. Despite their names, they resemble doves or pigeons much more closely than they do grouse. More importantly, I can assure you their flight doesn’t resemble anything close to the predictable, even flight path of most grouse. Think of a pigeon on amphetamines trying to escape a peregrine falcon, and you’ll have some idea of how sandgrouse fly.
I was so keen to hunt them not just for their sporting qualities, but more because classic African literature is rife with references to clouds of sandgrouse arriving daily at hidden waterholes, and I wanted to better understand what the fuss was about. The truth is, the clouds are no longer there, much as they aren’t for many other species. At Aru we could expect flights of anywhere from four to a couple dozen birds. Unlike the low-flying doves that would arrive suddenly, invariably we’d see the sandgrouse coming from a long distance, winging high over the trees for their date at the local watering hole. I suppose that opportunity to prepare should have translated into better shooting percentages, but it never did for me. Not that I cared much – as I said, there’s always another bus just minutes away when bird hunting Namibia.
I’ll go back to Africa – I always go back. Now, whenever I do, hunting birds will be a regular part of the plan. In just a few short days in Namibia I discovered in a new way that, for hunters, Africa remains the land of opportunity.
Ken Bailey is an outdoors writer from Canada. When not hunting big game or birds, or fly-fishing, he’s writing about his experiences. And when the bills need to be paid, he is a consultant in the wildlife conservation industry.
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Nov 7, 2017 | Countries, Hunting, News
[vc_row][vc_column][vc_column_text]By PH Jofie Lamprecht
Everybody has a favorite place. Your favorite table at a restaurant. A special spot on the beach. A spectacular view. Your hideaway in your home.
Mine starts with a 300-foot ascent up to a plateau overlooking the surrounding countryside. Vast vistas of the African bush. So different on the top compared with the below. Trees, bushes and grass have been preserved on the top for 850 million years when two tectonic plates of soft, red sandstone clashed, eventually slipping, and one was forced on top of the other. Dinosaur tracks from 200 million years ago and more recent Bushmen etchings mark its history.
This unique plateau is my favorite place.
Patrick joined me – our second safari together, buffalo being the primary target animal. Sable and eland were also on the list, but our foot-dragging quarry was what this hunt was all about.
Ascending the plateau for the first time, Patrick was immediately captivated by the aura this place has on people.
“Welcome to Jurassic park,” is what I usually say as we grind up the steep incline. Day One had seen us skunked by several herds of buffalo bulls – they all ran away from us in our clumsiness. Hunters too noisy in the thick bush.
Day 3: It was a cold morning with the golden orb of the sun just breaking the horizon. The Cruiser ground to a halt in thick red Kalahari sand, and the dragging spoor of bulls was evident for all to see. Soup-bowl-size tracks connected with drag marks between each of the big, old, short-legged buffalo bulls’ steps. We disembarked from the vehicle for closer inspection. The dung cold, but very moist. The urine had not sunk too deep into the sand, and the night-mice had not scampered over the tracks. It would not take too much effort to catch up with these bulls – but would we get a look?
Our Heym double rifles unsheathed – one ‘older’ 88B in .500 NE – mine called, “the Hofman” after a late friend of mine, and the new – 89B in .470 NE. Both rifles true masterpieces of German engineering, the 89B with more classic English lines – more my cup of tea, I have to admit, to my chagrin. The double ‘thunks’ as the large cartridges are dropped into their barrels made for this special chosen war.
We load essential gear and start our trek on the spoor up the road, the tracks following the two-track for almost a mile. Barrels were cold in our hands, muscles just starting to loosen from the night’s slumber and the previous day’s exertion. The spoor swings off the two-track into the bush, into a wide-open field that had been burnt clear the previous year by a lighting strike. I grab Gideon by the shoulder. He’s a master tracker with vast experience who I have known for over 30 years.
“Buffel,” I say in my native Afrikaans.
At a distance of approximately 200 yards I see the black mass of at least three buffalo busy grazing on the grass of the recovering field. With the wind in our faces, but no cover to put the stalk on our quarry, I decide to loop around the outskirts of the field to make use of the available concealment, burning valuable time while these buffalo are moving in the open. This gives the hunter more opportunity to get a view of their horns from more than one angle, preventing them from disappearing into the thick bush, which makes judgment very difficult.
We get around the cover of bush and I glass around. My heart sinks a little. Only one buffalo left cropping peacefully undisturbed in the grassland. We put the stalk on him. Going through the checklist – big body and hard bosses seen from the side, but how wide? Plucking grass with his teeth and lips, he slowly turns to show his genetics. Horns are much narrower than his body from behind. A solid pass on this buffalo. We can do much better in this area.
Patrick taps me on the shoulder and points – two bulls passing in the dense bush to our left. I silently nod, and we soundlessly sneak out of the close proximity of the first bull. The other bulls are going to be tough to get up to in the thick stuff now – and with the added complication of this other bull at our backs. Once clear of our first bull we advance toward the tracks of the bulls Patrick had spotted. I turn over the lead to Gideon – his talent in the spoor – mine the stalk, trophy judgment and the minor issue of a .500-carrying bodyguard. Gideon finds the tracks and turns on them, walking easily, looking 10 feet ahead at the sign left by our quarry.
I often wonder about concentration levels. The average child today lacks concentration for more than a few minutes at a time. In Gideon’s master class caliber – a whole day of tracking is not a problem.
The breaking of bushes, and crushing and crunching of grass, clear my thoughts as we silently and carefully approach. I take the lead from Gideon, Patrick closely following behind me – a shadow of my steps – alert and ready. The morning cold being broken with the welcome sun now warming our backs, as the thick sand-slogging turning this into an early-morning workout. The noise gives way to the sight of moving black shadows feeding noisily through the African savannah.
Having hunted Cape buffalo in five African countries – these Waterberg buffalo certainly had to be the hardest to hunt. Aware and alert – any noise brings them to a standstill – noses and eyes seeking the disturbance. We had to be ‘very quiet and very sneaky’ to get close – just like Elmer Fudd.
On the left, a huge mass of black filled my Leica binoculars. I go through the checklist. A white scar on the rump of the buffalo is noted. He is another pass – old, but not what we are looking for. I turn my attention to the third one. He is facing away from us. His horns hang well past his body from the back. An average Cape buffalo’s body is 40 inches wide – the benchmark for most buffalo hunters. Big body. But what about his boss? He disappears into the thick bush!
We loop around. Each step is taken carefully in the ‘corn flake’-strewn bush. Our feet are clad in very quiet Russell Moccasin boots. Concentration is absolute on our mission. We advance – slow and steady. With each step the bush is getting thicker. “K-dup k-dup k-dub k-dub,” we hear the advance from behind. With the wind in our faces, the first companion already checked got our wind. I look behind us, and here the bull comes in slow motion in the thick red Kalahari sand to warn his mates. My heart sinks. “This stalk is over,” crosses my mind.
We are close, 25 yards from the two bulls we followed. The third bull runs up behind us and circles around. The two bulls ahead of us have their heads up – their full attention on any potential threat. The third bull has made a full circle and is now with his comrades.
In the thick bush, movement draws my attention to my left. The black mass moves branches and pushes trees out of his way. He turns, and the white scar gives him away. I turn my attention to the ‘wide’ bull I had seen just moments before. I can see he is hard-bossed – polished to a red-black patina. He lifts his head as the first buffalo gets to him, and they touch noses. My hand reaches back, and Gideon instinctively passes me the shooting sticks – not really necessary at this distance, but always better to use them if you can for a safe shot. Patrick slowly slides his Heym 89B .470 onto his rest – safety quietly clicked off.
“The one on the left. Wait for him to clear the bush,” my quiet instruction. The bull takes another step forward in apparent annoyance at the first bull’s disturbance and clears the bush. A long second passes, and then the blast from the 500-grain Hornady DGX soft-nosed bullet breaks the silence of the otherwise tranquil morning. The bush erupts with breaking branches and grunting.
Bomb-shock aftermath in the bush. We wait. A black mass stands to our left in the bush. Our bull?
Rifles at the ready, rifle slings and shooting sticks left behind, we advance. The buffalo to our left seems healthy and flees the scene. To our right I see a buffalo down – after quick inspection my finger indicates where the next shot needed to go. Patrick did not waste time to use his right and left barrels. With no reaction to the large pieces of copper-lead that were discharged, it was safe to move closer to ensure that this hunt had come to a successful conclusion. Insurance shots a must whenever buffalo hunting, in this case a waste of ammunition, the first bullet being perfectly placed through the heart and both lungs. Hugs and high-fives all round. An amazing morning just got better.
We admire the giant-bodied bull, with horns to match.
“When can we do this again?” Patrick’s only question.
Everyone has a favorite place. This one is mine.
Authors note: Patrick’s Cape buffalo made the NAPHA top 10 list, proudly being the NEW #9 Cape buffalo of all time from Namibia.
Husband. Father. Big Game Professional Hunter. Photographer. Writer. Jack Russell Lover, and a trained wine expert and a passionate “foodie” who adheres to blue-ribbon standards of food and service. Jofie’s specialty is dream safaris custom-tailored to each client. He is proud to uphold the traditions of ethical and fair-chase hunting, and works hard to get his hunters close to the game. He has a special place in his heart for the children who come on safari.
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Nov 5, 2017 | News, Uncategorized
By Wayne van Zwoll
It likely isn’t the rifle, ammo or scope, the wind or the rotation of the earth. Guess who’s left?
Honesty and diplomacy both fail when your pal is already crestfallen. But, “You made a bad shot” is more helpful, in the long run, than the dodge, “Maybe something’s wrong with your rifle.”
Rarely, something is wrong with the hardware. But the rifleman still bears responsibility. On safari years ago, I called a good shot on an eland, but heard the “whump” of a paunch hit. We trailed the bull, and I killed it. Confidence restored, I kept hunting. But my next shot was again off the mark. Then I saw that a windage screw on my Redfield scope mount had backed off the ring. Recoil had bounced it from the opposite screw. The next shot had sent it back, and so on. I should have checked zero right away, with three shots.
A zero isn’t likely to shift, but each is precise for only one person, load and position! Recently, I hunted with a fellow who worked for the firm that had built his rifle. One morning a fine buck appeared 120 metres off, and stood. I waited for it to wilt. But a couple of shots later, the animal left. Thick silence ensued. When I asked if he’d checked his zero, the man barked, “Our staff zeroed this rifle!” He targeted the .30-06 later and found it shot 40 cm high at 100 metres! Using a rifle zeroed by someone else is an easy way to miss game. There are others.
I once watched a hunter shoot a brow tine off a bull elk at short range. Fully exposed, the animal was statue-still while my pal steadied his rifle on sticks. But this was his first elk, and he had his eye on the antlers. Game is often missed – or crippled – because hunters lose focus. The target is not the beast or what’s on its head. With few exceptions, the target is the sphere of life between its shoulders.
A rifle-scope can help you send a bullet through the vitals – or impede your view of the animal. Night was zipping up the sun one evening when a young woman and her PH came upon a fine kudu just 30 metres off. All actors froze, the PH like a bird-dog on point. The rifle danced about as his client tried to find the bull in her scope. Its ribs were shadowed but unobstructed.
“Everything’s a blur!” she hissed, desperate. The kudu sunfished to the blast of the .300, and galloped off. Skilled tracking by the PH brought a second, killing shot at last light. Equipped with a powerful variable scope, the woman had neither a sharply focused image nor an adequate field. A 2½x sight would have served her better, without sacrificing 250-metre precision.
Powerful glass can also delay a shot by magnifying wobble. The longer you aim trying to settle a reticle bouncing violently about the field, the more desperately you want to breathe. Pulse-bump becomes an earthquake as eye fatigue burns the target image into your brain. Muscles tire, wobbles become shakes. Aware the shot is unraveling, you yank the trigger and miss.
Long isn’t hard.
Shivering in the November dawn, the kid was also shaking from excitement. He couldn’t steady the crosswire, even when he leaned against the fence post. It would be a long shot – the deer looked small. He’d have to aim high. With the sight bobbing above the buck’s shoulder, the kid pressed the trigger. The buck kept eating. Two more shots brought no more reaction. The deer might as well have been cropping wheat on the moon.
Since that humiliation 50 years ago, I’ve avoided aiming high. Before every hunt I chant, under my breath: “Your barrel is already pointing up!” It is, relative to the sightline. It got that way when I zeroed!
When you zero a rifle, you’re adjusting the sightline to cross the bullet’s path at the distance of your choice. Because a bullet starts dropping as soon as it leaves the muzzle, the barrel must be elevated to hit a distant target. Your sight-line is a straight path at a downward angle to bore-line. The sight-line cuts through the bullet’s arc, meeting it twice. The second intersection defines the zero range.
Point-blank range is the distance at which a dead-on hold brings desired results. Most of my hunting rifles are zeroed at 200 metres. Given this zero, popular cartridges like the .30-06 keep bullets within 8 cm above or below center to 250 metres – a long effective point-blank range. A center hold to 250 will hit vitals on all but the smallest game. Bullets will strike highest just beyond mid-range (trajectory is parabolic).
Many hunters overshoot because game looks farther than it is. In broken country, your eye takes in lots of terrain. But bullets don’t follow ground contours. “Never hold off hair,” renowned hunter and outfitter Jack Atcheson told me. “If you think an animal’s so far that you must aim above it, you’re wrong or too far away for an accurate shot.”
A caveat: game on a flat pan or plain can seem closer than it is, because your eye snares so little earth. Your brain tells you: less terrain, shorter shot.
Distance is commonly assumed the biggest obstacle to accurate shooting. It does magnify errors in aim and shot execution, and the effects of wind and gravity. But other variables can also ruin your day. The longest poke I’ve taken at elk was twice the measure of the next-longest. Still, my bullet struck less than a minute of angle from point of aim. Perfect light, still air and a slinged-up prone position made this long shot an easy shot. Last month at this writing I missed – twice! – a gemsbok close enough for a chat. Clipped by another hunter, it was dashing through bush. My stance was poor, the iron sights hard to see.
Close shots don’t ensure kills. Neither do rifle-scopes with reticles born of calculus in tubes the size of irrigation pipes. Accomplished rifleman David Tubb has designed a scope reticle that compensates for spin drift – vertical displacement of bullets in wind. For right-twist rifling, a 3-o’clock breeze kicks a bullet not directly left, but to 10 o’clock. Left wind shoves bullets to 4 o’clock. Tubb’s horizontal wire is curved to track bullet paths down-range. Still, David insists hunters must master shooting fundamentals before sophisticated hardware is of any help.
To miss is human!
Marksmanship is an acquired skill. When you come to think yourself a “natural,” your targets are either too big or too close. Or you’ve bought into the myth that shooting prowess comes to every man as inexorably as facial hair. The pitiable souls who hang their egos with their targets are bound to be humbled.
Shooters who say they can’t practice because ammo costs too much or because they can’t access a range have little hope of shooting well. Many drills burn no powder. Practicing for small-bore matches, college team-mates and I donned shooting jackets and held rifles while we studied or watched television. We strengthened and stretched our muscles as they “memorized” bone-supported positions. We practiced deep breathing to bring oxygen to our eyes for sharper sight pictures. Empty hull in the chamber, we dry-fired to hone our trigger technique.
Once, closing the bolt of my Anschutz in a match, I brushed the trigger. The rifle fired. I’d barely sunk into position, had established no sight picture. The best I could hope was that the bullet had missed the paper entirely, as any hole would be scored. To my surprise, the bullet had centered the correct target on a sheet of 11 small black bull’s eyes!
Any shot to the middle without aim is great good fortune. But verily, this bullet went where the rifle had directed it. My position had allowed the rifle to point naturally at the target.
Many hunters miss game because during the off-season they fire only from a bench. Deprived of a rest in the bush, they don’t know how to align their bodies quickly with the target, so the rifle is supported by a platform of bone and relaxed muscle. Muscles under load tire and twitch; the rifle bobs and quivers. When you trigger a shot, tensed muscles involuntarily relax, shifting the rifle before the bullet leaves. A rifle relaxing onto the target will spend more time there during the firing sequence.
You’ll do well to keep both eyes open. A squint against bright sun, pelting sleet or swirling dust makes sense. But depth perception requires both eyes working in tandem. Using two eyes also gives you a wider field, so you see more details that might affect your shot. Each pupil has evolved to control the light reaching the retina, dilating in dim light, constricting in bright sun. Darkness imposed by closing an eye encourages that pupil to dilate, as the other wants to throttle light. Closing one eye strains both. Animals you seek use both eyes to stay alive or launch an attack; why close one of yours at the moment of truth?
You see best when looking straight ahead. Aiming, your face is best kept upright on the stock. Prone and sitting positions tilt your brow; but the less tilt the better! Kneeling and offhand, your head should be erect, even if only the stock’s toe meets your clavicle.
While aiming and firing a rifle is a physical process, “Marksmanship is as much mental,” said my first coach, Earl. He tapped ashes from a cigar long enough to holster. “But don’t over-think. When you feel a good shot, let it go. Don’t analyze it. Don’t tell yourself it’s too good to be true. Just turn it loose.”
Late shots don’t count.
“I should have fired sooner,” Don told me. “At six metres, he lowered his head. I didn’t want to kill that bull.” The Norma solid connected at just two steps. Momentum carried the elephant forward. As Don leaped aside, the falling beast’s trunk broke his arm.
Even if your life never hinges on a quick shot, precision has a price. Opportunity may be fleeting as an animal pauses at cover’s edge. For close encounters, fast shooting can trump gnat’s-lash accuracy.
The era of exhibition shooting stateside passed during my youth, as Herb Parsons gave his final demonstrations to pie-eyed audiences. He’d milk a Model 12 in volleys that rolled like thunder, leaving smoke floating where seven clay birds had hung briefly. Herb would toss oranges and pulp them with .30-30 bullets. Emptying a 10-shot .351 self-loader from the hip, he’d dust 10 clay targets standing on edge. “They’re not hard to hit, folks,” he’d laugh, “just easy to miss!”
Arguably, smooth, fast, instinctive shooting is disappearing, as shooters (and now, hunters) focus on ever-more-sophisticated rifles, optics and loads to hit targets far away. But some long-range marksmen have missed spectacularly up close. The equipment that helps them at distance can impede them in cover.
Better prepared for catch-as-catch-can hunting were shooters whose exploits date back a century or more. Early among them: Phoebe Ann Moses, born in a cabin in rural Ohio in 1860. Hunting to feed her family, then for market, she came to hit quail on the wing with a .22. At age 16, after thrashing him at a local match, she married visiting sharpshooter Frank Butler. They later joined Buffalo Bill’s Wild West Show, she under the name Annie Oakley.
Petite and sweet-tempered, Annie became an audience favorite. Aiming in a mirror, she fired over her shoulder to burst glass balls Frank tossed. Germany’s Crown Prince, later to become Kaiser Wilhelm II, asked her to shoot a cigarette from his lips. She did, allowing after World War I that a miss might have changed history! Annie shot coins from Frank’s fingers. Firing 25 shots in 25 seconds with a .22 repeater, she could make one ragged hole in the middle of a playing card, or split that card edgewise with a bullet. Johnny Baker, another Wild West Show marksman, tried for 17 years to outshoot Annie. “She wouldn’t throw a match,” he said. “You had to beat her, and she wasn’t beatable.”
But nowhere do fast hits matter more than in Africa, when surly animals come for you. His brush with the elephant fresh in memory, Don took a client out for a lion. Big pug marks led the hunters to a fine male. At close range the client fired a black-powder load from his Holland 10-bore. The lion ran off, but the cloud of white smoke hung tight, obscuring three lionesses nearby. They charged. Two broke off, but one pressed on, low and lightning-fast. Don fired instantly. His 9.3 bullet smashed the spine between the shoulders. Dead in mid-air, the lioness cart-wheeled past the hunters.
Mused my friend: “Accurate may not be enough if you’re slow. But a miss is always worse!”
Nov 2, 2017 | News
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