The Gift of Africa- An Unexpected Hunting Adventure

[KipCarson]

The school that ZDS built, there are a few block houses for the teachers to live in too. There’s not much in the way of materials other than a chalk board and chalk. School scheduling is irregular at best but this is the nicest school for miles and miles around as it is. The one community well pump is in the school yard and the health clinic that is staffed a few days a week isn’t far away.

 

[KipCarson]

One interesting wildlife sighting did occur just as we entered the village. As the cruiser passed by a few large trees we startled some sort of eagle out of the top which swooped low just above our heads as it made its escape. The funny thing was is that it was carrying a freshly killed Samango monkey in its talons. With each beat of the wings the limp monkey’s arms and tail would flop around giving it the look of a macabre marionette puppet. Just not something this American sees everyday! Too bad I’m not a quick draw artist with a camera.

After a lunch of bushbuck casserole we headed out on the hunt for Nyala in the sand forests and pans of the Coutada. If you’re familiar at all with Africa you’ll know they often do a lot of burning. Here at home I burn a decent bit of property every year, usually totalling to a few hundred acres. It’s well thought out and planned controlled burning which is useful and beneficial on so many levels in wildlife management. They do it over there too for many of the same reasons except, it is in fact very UNCONTROLLED. But hey, with over 700 square miles of mosaic wet and dry environment it’s going to stop somewhere. Whether it hit water, or the too moist sand forests, or just went out when the humidity increased at dark in the evening it was going to stop somewhere. All week long every day after it would heat up after lunch time we would set random fires and just drive off to let them do their thing unchecked and unsupervised. Sometimes we’d go by a day later and only a couple acres would have burned, sometimes maybe a couple hundred. But one thing was for certain, the animals loved it! The early burns from when we arrived were already greening up before we’d left and I found it interesting just how often we’d find hartebeest drawn in to those areas long before any grew up had started. It was like they enjoyed chewing on charred vegetation or something. As we would drive along, we would light balls of toilet paper on fire and chuck them into the dry grass as we passed. It was the kind of thing you’d end up in prison for in the U.S.! On a couple days when some clients had collected all their animals they spent the entire days driving around the far corners of the coutada lighting the grass on fire and we could see the smoke for miles. It was the kind of thing that would give a resident of the western wildfire prone states PTSD.

Hartebeest in a fresh burn

Oribi in a fresh burn


We got into Nyala all afternoon, and just never could find anything big enough. I can’t tell you how many times I heard “He’s nice, but we can do better.” And we would keep on moving. We stopped at what seemed like a random place in the road and got out of the cruiser. Bredger informed us that there was a pan a little way through the woods that had Nyala in it every evening we were going to check out. As we went to leave the truck my dad asked if he needed to bring his bow since I had the 300. I insisted that he bring it because this is hunting and anything can happen. Hamish the PH who joined on our Buffalo hunt was tagging along on this afternoons adventure too. We started off in our line and soon got near the edge of the pan. It wasn’t really thick so we had to start crawling pretty early on. We crawled, and crawled, and crawled some more. And that was just to get to a point we could get a look over what was there. Sure enough there was a shooter on the far right edge of the pan and the wind was to our advantage. So off we went with more crawling. We finally got to where we were about out of cover when Bredger turned around to me and whispered “Get your dad up here.” He was second to last in line and I got his attention to crawl up to the front. “What is it?” “You’re up! It’s in a place you can get close enough to get a bow shot, Go with Bredger!” I said. He couldn’t believe it! At this point he was glad he brought his bow! The two of them took off crawling at a snails pace and the rest of us stayed sitting to wait. They were gone a while and from our position we couldn’t see what was going on. About 5 minutes had passed when I saw movement in the grass in front of me and the form of a female nyala appeared only 40 yards away. She was coming our direction. I gave everyone a quick signal and we all laid on our backs in the grass and brush. I don’t know what was going on where dad had gotten off to but some of the Nyala in the pan were about to feed right onto us and it wouldn’t be long before they would spook and blow the whole thing. As we waited for what seemed an eternity we suddenly heard the warning bark of the Nyala. The jig is up I thought! One of them somewhere in front of us knew something wasn’t right. About a minute after that we heard the twang of a bow string!

What had happened was dad and Bredger had made it out close enough to get a shot as nyala were feeding all in front of them. Some of them had flanked them and come almost completely between us and had gotten a whiff of us. Just before they were about to shoot the Nyala, an even better bull walked from the thick forest edge onto the pan giving them a broadside shot at 35 yards!

Vasco doing his thing, trying to make every picture perfect.

I was surprised how far the Nyala went on a double lung hit. He went further than any whitetail, or even any elk we have shot like that went. But it was steady blood and he was piled up at the end having buried himself in a tangle of vines. Another great day in the books with fresh grilled Nyala steaks served for supper!

There are only three days left to go and dad still has to find a bushbuck. I still need a waterbuck and a nyala, plus a few more meat quota animals.

 

[Salmonchaser]

One interesting wildlife sighting did occur just as we entered the village. As the cruiser passed by a few large trees we startled some sort of eagle out of the top which swooped low just above our heads as it made its escape. The funny thing was is that it was carrying a freshly killed Samango monkey in its talons. With each beat of the wings the limp monkey’s arms and tail would flop around giving it the look of a macabre marionette puppet. Just not something this American sees everyday! Too bad I’m not a quick draw artist with a camera.

After a lunch of bushbuck casserole we headed out on the hunt for Nyala in the sand forests and pans of the Coutada. If you’re familiar at all with Africa you’ll know they often do a lot of burning. Here at home I burn a decent bit of property every year, usually totalling to a few hundred acres. It’s well thought out and planned controlled burning which is useful and beneficial on so many levels in wildlife management. They do it over there too for many of the same reasons except, it is in fact very UNCONTROLLED. But hey, with over 700 square miles of mosaic wet and dry environment it’s going to stop somewhere. Whether it hit water, or the too moist sand forests, or just went out when the humidity increased at dark in the evening it was going to stop somewhere. All week long every day after it would heat up after lunch time we would set random fires and just drive off to let them do their thing unchecked and unsupervised. Sometimes we’d go by a day later and only a couple acres would have burned, sometimes maybe a couple hundred. But one thing was for certain, the animals loved it! The early burns from when we arrived were already greening up before we’d left and I found it interesting just how often we’d find hartebeest drawn in to those areas long before any grew up had started. It was like they enjoyed chewing on charred vegetation or something. As we would drive along, we would light balls of toilet paper on fire and chuck them into the dry grass as we passed. It was the kind of thing you’d end up in prison for in the U.S.! On a couple days when some clients had collected all their animals they spent the entire days driving around the far corners of the coutada lighting the grass on fire and we could see the smoke for miles. It was the kind of thing that would give a resident of the western wildfire prone states PTSD.

Hartebeest in a fresh burn
View attachment 381380
Oribi in a fresh burn
View attachment 381373

We got into Nyala all afternoon, and just never could find anything big enough. I can’t tell you how many times I heard “He’s nice, but we can do better.” And we would keep on moving. We stopped at what seemed like a random place in the road and got out of the cruiser. Bredger informed us that there was a pan a little way through the woods that had Nyala in it every evening we were going to check out. As we went to leave the truck my dad asked if he needed to bring his bow since I had the 300. I insisted that he bring it because this is hunting and anything can happen. Hamish the PH who joined on our Buffalo hunt was tagging along on this afternoons adventure too. We started off in our line and soon got near the edge of the pan. It wasn’t really thick so we had to start crawling pretty early on. We crawled, and crawled, and crawled some more. And that was just to get to a point we could get a look over what was there. Sure enough there was a shooter on the far right edge of the pan and the wind was to our advantage. So off we went with more crawling. We finally got to where we were about out of cover when Bredger turned around to me and whispered “Get your dad up here.” He was second to last in line and I got his attention to crawl up to the front. “What is it?” “You’re up! It’s in a place you can get close enough to get a bow shot, Go with Bredger!” I said. He couldn’t believe it! At this point he was glad he brought his bow! The two of them took off crawling at a snails pace and the rest of us stayed sitting to wait. They were gone a while and from our position we couldn’t see what was going on. About 5 minutes had passed when I saw movement in the grass in front of me and the form of a female nyala appeared only 40 yards away. She was coming our direction. I gave everyone a quick signal and we all laid on our backs in the grass and brush. I don’t know what was going on where dad had gotten off to but some of the Nyala in the pan were about to feed right onto us and it wouldn’t be long before they would spook and blow the whole thing. As we waited for what seemed an eternity we suddenly heard the warning bark of the Nyala. The jig is up I thought! One of them somewhere in front of us knew something wasn’t right. About a minute after that we heard the twang of a bow string!

What had happened was dad and Bredger had made it out close enough to get a shot as nyala were feeding all in front of them. Some of them had flanked them and come almost completely between us and had gotten a whiff of us. Just before they were about to shoot the Nyala, an even better bull walked from the thick forest edge onto the pan giving them a broadside shot at 35 yards!

Vasco doing his thing, trying to make every picture perfect.
View attachment 381374View attachment 381375View attachment 381376View attachment 381377View attachment 381378
I was surprised how far the Nyala went on a double lung hit. He went further than any whitetail, or even any elk we have shot like that went. But it was steady blood and he was piled up at the end having buried himself in a tangle of vines. Another great day in the books with fresh grilled Nyala steaks served for supper!

There are only two days left to go and dad still has to find a bushbuck. I still need a waterbuck and a nyala, plus a few more meat quota animals.

I’ve killed a couple Nyala, that is a dandy. Well done.

 

[Dave N]

One interesting wildlife sighting did occur just as we entered the village. As the cruiser passed by a few large trees we startled some sort of eagle out of the top which swooped low just above our heads as it made its escape. The funny thing was is that it was carrying a freshly killed Samango monkey in its talons. With each beat of the wings the limp monkey’s arms and tail would flop around giving it the look of a macabre marionette puppet. Just not something this American sees everyday! Too bad I’m not a quick draw artist with a camera.

After a lunch of bushbuck casserole we headed out on the hunt for Nyala in the sand forests and pans of the Coutada. If you’re familiar at all with Africa you’ll know they often do a lot of burning. Here at home I burn a decent bit of property every year, usually totalling to a few hundred acres. It’s well thought out and planned controlled burning which is useful and beneficial on so many levels in wildlife management. They do it over there too for many of the same reasons except, it is in fact very UNCONTROLLED. But hey, with over 700 square miles of mosaic wet and dry environment it’s going to stop somewhere. Whether it hit water, or the too moist sand forests, or just went out when the humidity increased at dark in the evening it was going to stop somewhere. All week long every day after it would heat up after lunch time we would set random fires and just drive off to let them do their thing unchecked and unsupervised. Sometimes we’d go by a day later and only a couple acres would have burned, sometimes maybe a couple hundred. But one thing was for certain, the animals loved it! The early burns from when we arrived were already greening up before we’d left and I found it interesting just how often we’d find hartebeest drawn in to those areas long before any grew up had started. It was like they enjoyed chewing on charred vegetation or something. As we would drive along, we would light balls of toilet paper on fire and chuck them into the dry grass as we passed. It was the kind of thing you’d end up in prison for in the U.S.! On a couple days when some clients had collected all their animals they spent the entire days driving around the far corners of the coutada lighting the grass on fire and we could see the smoke for miles. It was the kind of thing that would give a resident of the western wildfire prone states PTSD.

Hartebeest in a fresh burn
View attachment 381380
Oribi in a fresh burn
View attachment 381373

We got into Nyala all afternoon, and just never could find anything big enough. I can’t tell you how many times I heard “He’s nice, but we can do better.” And we would keep on moving. We stopped at what seemed like a random place in the road and got out of the cruiser. Bredger informed us that there was a pan a little way through the woods that had Nyala in it every evening we were going to check out. As we went to leave the truck my dad asked if he needed to bring his bow since I had the 300. I insisted that he bring it because this is hunting and anything can happen. Hamish the PH who joined on our Buffalo hunt was tagging along on this afternoons adventure too. We started off in our line and soon got near the edge of the pan. It wasn’t really thick so we had to start crawling pretty early on. We crawled, and crawled, and crawled some more. And that was just to get to a point we could get a look over what was there. Sure enough there was a shooter on the far right edge of the pan and the wind was to our advantage. So off we went with more crawling. We finally got to where we were about out of cover when Bredger turned around to me and whispered “Get your dad up here.” He was second to last in line and I got his attention to crawl up to the front. “What is it?” “You’re up! It’s in a place you can get close enough to get a bow shot, Go with Bredger!” I said. He couldn’t believe it! At this point he was glad he brought his bow! The two of them took off crawling at a snails pace and the rest of us stayed sitting to wait. They were gone a while and from our position we couldn’t see what was going on. About 5 minutes had passed when I saw movement in the grass in front of me and the form of a female nyala appeared only 40 yards away. She was coming our direction. I gave everyone a quick signal and we all laid on our backs in the grass and brush. I don’t know what was going on where dad had gotten off to but some of the Nyala in the pan were about to feed right onto us and it wouldn’t be long before they would spook and blow the whole thing. As we waited for what seemed an eternity we suddenly heard the warning bark of the Nyala. The jig is up I thought! One of them somewhere in front of us knew something wasn’t right. About a minute after that we heard the twang of a bow string!

What had happened was dad and Bredger had made it out close enough to get a shot as nyala were feeding all in front of them. Some of them had flanked them and come almost completely between us and had gotten a whiff of us. Just before they were about to shoot the Nyala, an even better bull walked from the thick forest edge onto the pan giving them a broadside shot at 35 yards!

Vasco doing his thing, trying to make every picture perfect.
View attachment 381374View attachment 381375View attachment 381376View attachment 381377View attachment 381378
I was surprised how far the Nyala went on a double lung hit. He went further than any whitetail, or even any elk we have shot like that went. But it was steady blood and he was piled up at the end having buried himself in a tangle of vines. Another great day in the books with fresh grilled Nyala steaks served for supper!

There are only two days left to go and dad still has to find a bushbuck. I still need a waterbuck and a nyala, plus a few more meat quota animals.

I like the change in color at the tips.

 

[KipCarson]

Day 8:

It rained during the night and this morning the temperatures are much cooler and everything is damp. An all day trip is planned to a far corner of the Coutada. One thing I learned this morning is that the things that make an ideal condition at the house are a hunt killer here. The wildlife activity this morning was virtually zero. Very few animals were seen for the first few hours of the day except for the occasional warthog. I love cold, damp conditions for Whitetail hunting, but if you are looking for nyala , that is the last thing you want. I must say the sun was brilliant this morning, coming through the trees. Everywhere you turned was a scenic view, albeit void of animals.


We were a couple of miles from camp when we rounded a corner to seen a young nyala bull standing in the middle of the road, looking at us. He stood looking very confused as we drove right close to him before he took off into the trees. It was only seconds later that I learned the source of his confusion. Someone, I’m not sure who saw them first, cried out, “Elephants!” There was a stirred up trumpeting herd of elephants on one side of the nyala with us pinching him from the other side in the land cruiser. No wonder he was confused! We stopped the cruiser and sat in awe as a large herd of elephants, maybe as many as 40 head, came quickly stomping past while trumpeting their displeasure at our presence. They were quite noisy, and after looking at antelope all week, they looked about the size of barns. Even the babies looked to be the size of the land cruiser. Now that is another species added to our list! Is this number 20 now? It truly is amazing how an animal so big can hide so well, because as soon as they hit the thicket of the forest, except for the resounding echo of their calls, they were swallowed up without a trace as if they had never been there. And sure enough, where they crossed the road around the bend in front of us, there were more trees to be cut off so we could pass.

As they filed by I thought this was a nice elephant…

A few seconds later this guy came by showing just how puny the other “big” one was. The PH said that’s a really big elephant for this part of Mozambique.


We searched all morning and as the temperatures rose the animal activity started to increase. By 10:30 or so we started finding nyala out moving and looked over quite a few only to decide again and again, “He’s nice, but just not what we’re looking for.” Just before lunch we parked the cruiser and made an almost 2 mile hike out into some promising bushbuck areas that also held waterbuck and the occasional nyala. We hadn’t gone far when we spotted a bushbuck. He looked pretty good but the problem was he had spied us first and was running full speed ahead. Every time he would pass behind a bunch of palms I would expect him to stop and take cover but he continued to pop out the other side still running. As far as I can tell that dude is still running. I think we must’ve kept tabs on him for more than 700 yards before we finally lost track of him. Of all the species I’ve observed these things have the best survival instincts by a factor of 100. A bit later on the home we saw some nyala cows coming in our direction and as we watched a bull was bringing up the rear. And he was a good one! They were coming our direction so we dropped low and waited. As they went out of sight behind a grove of trees we started hearing the hoots of some baboons. And it escalated quickly. I have no idea what got them fired up but they put up such a ruckus that the Nyala changed course completely. We tried to make a move to get closer, but the baboon troop by now had started off in a leap frogging run across the landscape carrying on like they had just won publishers clearing house sweepstakes. The nyala having enough of their foolishness turned away completely and were never seen again. After seeing probably 80 baboons every day, this is the first time I really wanted to shoot one of the little cusses. Oh well, time to head back to the cruiser to enjoy another nice bush lunch.

 

[Bowmannate2000]

One interesting wildlife sighting did occur just as we entered the village. As the cruiser passed by a few large trees we startled some sort of eagle out of the top which swooped low just above our heads as it made its escape. The funny thing was is that it was carrying a freshly killed Samango monkey in its talons. With each beat of the wings the limp monkey’s arms and tail would flop around giving it the look of a macabre marionette puppet. Just not something this American sees everyday! Too bad I’m not a quick draw artist with a camera.

After a lunch of bushbuck casserole we headed out on the hunt for Nyala in the sand forests and pans of the Coutada. If you’re familiar at all with Africa you’ll know they often do a lot of burning. Here at home I burn a decent bit of property every year, usually totalling to a few hundred acres. It’s well thought out and planned controlled burning which is useful and beneficial on so many levels in wildlife management. They do it over there too for many of the same reasons except, it is in fact very UNCONTROLLED. But hey, with over 700 square miles of mosaic wet and dry environment it’s going to stop somewhere. Whether it hit water, or the too moist sand forests, or just went out when the humidity increased at dark in the evening it was going to stop somewhere. All week long every day after it would heat up after lunch time we would set random fires and just drive off to let them do their thing unchecked and unsupervised. Sometimes we’d go by a day later and only a couple acres would have burned, sometimes maybe a couple hundred. But one thing was for certain, the animals loved it! The early burns from when we arrived were already greening up before we’d left and I found it interesting just how often we’d find hartebeest drawn in to those areas long before any grew up had started. It was like they enjoyed chewing on charred vegetation or something. As we would drive along, we would light balls of toilet paper on fire and chuck them into the dry grass as we passed. It was the kind of thing you’d end up in prison for in the U.S.! On a couple days when some clients had collected all their animals they spent the entire days driving around the far corners of the coutada lighting the grass on fire and we could see the smoke for miles. It was the kind of thing that would give a resident of the western wildfire prone states PTSD.

Hartebeest in a fresh burn
View attachment 381380
Oribi in a fresh burn
View attachment 381373

We got into Nyala all afternoon, and just never could find anything big enough. I can’t tell you how many times I heard “He’s nice, but we can do better.” And we would keep on moving. We stopped at what seemed like a random place in the road and got out of the cruiser. Bredger informed us that there was a pan a little way through the woods that had Nyala in it every evening we were going to check out. As we went to leave the truck my dad asked if he needed to bring his bow since I had the 300. I insisted that he bring it because this is hunting and anything can happen. Hamish the PH who joined on our Buffalo hunt was tagging along on this afternoons adventure too. We started off in our line and soon got near the edge of the pan. It wasn’t really thick so we had to start crawling pretty early on. We crawled, and crawled, and crawled some more. And that was just to get to a point we could get a look over what was there. Sure enough there was a shooter on the far right edge of the pan and the wind was to our advantage. So off we went with more crawling. We finally got to where we were about out of cover when Bredger turned around to me and whispered “Get your dad up here.” He was second to last in line and I got his attention to crawl up to the front. “What is it?” “You’re up! It’s in a place you can get close enough to get a bow shot, Go with Bredger!” I said. He couldn’t believe it! At this point he was glad he brought his bow! The two of them took off crawling at a snails pace and the rest of us stayed sitting to wait. They were gone a while and from our position we couldn’t see what was going on. About 5 minutes had passed when I saw movement in the grass in front of me and the form of a female nyala appeared only 40 yards away. She was coming our direction. I gave everyone a quick signal and we all laid on our backs in the grass and brush. I don’t know what was going on where dad had gotten off to but some of the Nyala in the pan were about to feed right onto us and it wouldn’t be long before they would spook and blow the whole thing. As we waited for what seemed an eternity we suddenly heard the warning bark of the Nyala. The jig is up I thought! One of them somewhere in front of us knew something wasn’t right. About a minute after that we heard the twang of a bow string!

What had happened was dad and Bredger had made it out close enough to get a shot as nyala were feeding all in front of them. Some of them had flanked them and come almost completely between us and had gotten a whiff of us. Just before they were about to shoot the Nyala, an even better bull walked from the thick forest edge onto the pan giving them a broadside shot at 35 yards!

Vasco doing his thing, trying to make every picture perfect.
View attachment 381374View attachment 381375View attachment 381376View attachment 381377View attachment 381378
I was surprised how far the Nyala went on a double lung hit. He went further than any whitetail, or even any elk we have shot like that went. But it was steady blood and he was piled up at the end having buried himself in a tangle of vines. Another great day in the books with fresh grilled Nyala steaks served for supper!

There are only three days left to go and dad still has to find a bushbuck. I still need a waterbuck and a nyala, plus a few more meat quota animals.

Wow that's a beautiful animal.

 

[KipCarson]

Wow that's a beautiful animal.

Agreed, definitely a favorite of mine. The females are second to none for beauty too. I’d love a few of their skins tanned.

 

[KipCarson]

After lunch we made our way out to the edge of the open area of the floodplain and spent a while weaving in and out between the palm thickets in search of whatever we could find. The afternoon was hot and animals were active and running around everywhere. It wasn’t too long before we spotted an animal that didn’t seem like it matched the rest of them and I couldn’t make out what it was but the eagle eyed Vasco gave Bredger the signal to stop. It was a Bushbuck, and it wasn’t already running for the Zimbabwe border! We hopped out and handed dad the rifle and set off on a big loop that would put us out close to him and get us to the last cover with the wind right. He was feeding in a very wet part of the floodplain and it wasn’t long before we were wet and mud soaked over the tops of our boots. That’s just something you’d better get used to if you’re coming hunting in the delta. It was only a half mile loop to get in position but it was the kind of walking that was tiresome in a short distance. For part of the walk we were in plain sight of him and I was thinking he would be running at any second but he never caught us and remained calmly feeding. The closest we could get was 140 yards away and soon as we got there Bredger set up the sticks. Dad took a minute and squeezed off a clean shot and the bushbuck leapt into the air a ran 50 yards before falling. It was then that we had one of those lion-kingesque circle of life moments. We looked down into the grass below our feet, literally straight below the muzzle of where the rifle still was held propped on the sticks and there lay the tiniest newborn baby bushbuck. It hadn’t moved even when we had almost stepped on it. It was smaller than a newborn whitetail fawn. Never saw a mom anywhere even though we knew she must be very close, and what very well could be its daddy laid somewhere ahead in the grass of the plain.


We walked out to where he had ran to and had to fan out and search for a few minutes. It’s amazing how you could almost lose one of these guys in knee deep grass. No wonder it took a while to find mine in 6 foot tall grass. Bushbuck number 2 was in the bag!

I had just about convinced myself it wasn’t going to happen. Talking to another American hunter in camp that night we found out he had made 5 previous trips to Africa, in other places, and still hadn’t been able to kill a bushbuck. We had been blessed!
After pictures Vasco loaded up the buck and made the arduous trudge back toward the cruiser, refusing any help. I for One was happy to be headed back to dry land and out of the water.


Continuing on down the edge of the floodplain we came close to a large herd of waterbuck we had been looking at far off in the distance. As we got closer I could see there were a couple of them that were clearly exceptional when compared to their comrades. They were scattered out across a totally barren part of the plain with nothing but a single dwarf acacia tree in sight. They were a cagey lot who wouldn’t tolerate us driving closer than about 300 yards. They had seen this show before and didn’t want to watch a rerun. As we stopped to look them over I found out I was right and I wasn’t just imagining there to be a couple of big ones. Bredger decided our only choice would be to take off walking low at an angle acting disinterested like we were going to pass behind the rear of the herd. They were not a fan of this and kept easing off away from us as we cut the distance. With zero cover we just persisted a little bit and finally were able to close to 240 yards of the one we were after. Bredger set up the sticks and I eased into position. I was pretty sure exactly which one to shoot but with so many there we discussed in pretty good detail the position and body movements of the best one to make sure I did plug the correct one. At 240 yards the difference between a 27” vs. 30” could be an easy mistake! He had turned to the perfect angle and even at 240 yards off the sticks I felt solid as could be. I squeezed off another good shot and he also leapt up in the air before making short run and going down. Maybe it’s this caliber or maybe it’s just because I never shoot anything with a rifle, but I seemed like everything we had shot with this rifle, except the warthog, reacted by violently jumping into the air? Whitetails rarely seem to do that, I dunno. Whatever the reaction, they were dropping like flies and Bredger seemed overly happy with our shooting, which seemed pretty simple stuff to me. (More on that later)


Waterbuck are much larger than I think most people realize. It wasn’t until just before we left for this trip that I realized just how big they are while looking up close at a mount. They’re easily the size of cow elk. It makes them seem closer than they really are out on the open plain with nothing to estimate yardage against. The footage Joseph shot with my iPhone had them looking like they were no more than 100 yards away when they were 240. It was the coolest footage of the trip and I’m thankful he captured it. After pictures, as 4 of us heaved the 400+ lb animal onto the cruiser, we decided to measure him. Turns out he was over 30” long, I’m gonna need a bigger house to put these mounts in! Still 2 days to hunt and all that is left is to find the perfect Nyala and maybe shoot some quota meat. It’s been another wonderful day in the Zambeze delta.

 

[kansasdad]

Oh my! What a specimen of a waterbuck

 

[KipCarson]

Oh my! What a specimen of a waterbuck

Thanks! Given a few days it wouldn’t be hard to find another one this good, the only reason it took so long before shooting this one is we really hadn’t been looking too hard for a giant. I saw several in the skinning shed even better than mine. I think you should book a trip!

 

[KipCarson]

Day9:

Today we would spend all of our time looking for the perfect Nyala. The only problem was the weather. It had stayed very overcast drizzled cold rain intermittently throughout the morning. As we drove around today there was even less activity than there had been yesterday morning. We went down a few long roads that we had yet to travel over the last week and saw some new scenery. All of the mist in the air had gathered on the spider webs and was glowing in the rays of the rising sun. There were some pretty cool spiders here and the glowing webs showcased just how many there were.

After a few hours of driving without seeing much of anything we turned onto the main road that we had traveled just after daylight and I saw our tire tracks had been wiped clean except for an occasional patch of tread marks. More elephants! Their giant feet had packed the roadway flat and they must be pretty close by. Their piles of manure scattered down the road were so fresh they would have been steaming if the temps were much colder. And once again, elephants in the road meant stopping to clear trees yet again. About a half mile later we caught up to them. They were on the far side of a pan that the road crossed, looking almost black in color after being soaked all morning in the rain. They moved off into the forest shortly after spotting us and disappeared. That was about all that happened for the morning, it was definitely the most uneventful day of the trip.

After lunch the activity had increased and we continued the nyala search. Throughout the course of the afternoon we looked over at least 25 different bulls with the same response to each of them, “Just not big enough!” At one point we found 10 bulls together in one single pan and I just knew that surely one would be good enough,but once again we walked away as the sun was about to set. I really wanted a nyala and based on how many we saw every day I wasn’t that nervous, but I also know how “guaranteed” things can go when hunting. I hate the saying “Never pass on the first day what you would shoot on the last” but I’ll admit that saying was playing in the back of my mind. I was joking with Bredger and reminded him that tomorrow was the last day, and told him he had better just keep the gun away from me because if I heard “Just not big enough” one more time I was just going to start shooting!

Speaking of just not big enough, there was a funny conversation I had with Vasco almost every day as we were riding up on top of the cruiser. As we would pass a herd of nyala that only contained juvenile bulls I would tell him “Come on Vasco, find me big daddy!” We communicated ok enough to get by but being a native Portuguese speaker his English was very minimal. I don’t think he could ever get what I meant by “find me a big daddy” because he would always shake his head and pinch his fingers together and say some variation of “no, too small”. Every little bull we passed he thought I was telling him it was big and by the time we left he probably assumed I was the dumbest hunter he had ever seen! If I ever get to go back I will learn the phrase “find me big daddy!” in Portuguese. Only one more day to hunt and Bredger was saying we were going to bring a trailer and stack it full of animals on the last day. Let’s hope he’s not just joking! Once again, no animals were harmed in the making of these memories today.

 

[Salmonchaser]

Really nice bush buck, very nice.

 

[SC Living Outdoors]

This is great. I've enjoyed reading it. Seems like a real adventure.

 

[KipCarson]

Day 10: Final Hunt

Today was the day! Nyala coming right up! I hoped… We started off like most other days except after we left the camp we made one small detour by the skinning shed and hooked a trailer up to the cruiser. He wasn’t kidding, we were about to fill that sucker up with meat and fill a few hungry bellies! 2 more waterbuck and 2 more reedbuck were added to the bag this morning. For the next couple of hours it was going to be full scale African style redneckery! We took off once more toward the flood plain but to a different area that we had been hunting in. The first hour getting there was pretty uneventful since it was cool and wet again. I think the whole drive to the plain we only saw 4 female Nyala and some red duiker in the sand forest, but eventually we broke into the palm studded grasslands that encircled the plain. We started seeing game, hartebeest and zebras, but not what we were looking for. There was a bit more fever trees mixed in with the grassy palms here giving a touch more of the african savannah look than much of the other terrain we had been in previously. Finally we spotted waterbuck. It’s like their sixth sense was in full affect and they knew they were all of a sudden targets. We would be looking to shoot trophies for the meat quota just younger non trophies so finding ones to shoot would not be an issue. No females are allowed to be killed of any species in Coutada 11. Here when we’re meat hunting we take out sows and wouldn’t think of shooting younger bucks but in a system that is actively trying to increase numbers to feed lions etc. females are off limits. The first several waterbuck never let us get close to them, likely because the empty trailer bouncing behind us was making way too much racket. But it wasn’t long before a small herd let us drive to within rifle range. As we came to a stop Bredger told me to just shoot off the top of the rack of the cruiser. As I knelt on the foot rack and tried leaning across the top I suddenly had the most random severe charlie horse hit my leg and had to quickly stand up. The waterbuck took this pause to try to make their escape. It didn’t work though because they thought running ahead 100 yards and stopping was safe enough. I repositioned my backpack on top of the cruiser rack and knelt back on my jacket instead of the merciless knee busting expanded metal and got ready as Bredger maneuvered a little closer and came to a stop. As I was lining up to shoot one, Vasco and Bredger thought I was about to shoot the wrong one and kept saying shoot one of the 2 on the left. “Why don’t I take out the one that has a broken horn?” I asked. Bredger couldn’t hear me well enough in the cab of the cruiser and Vasco was about to have a fit thinking I was about to shoot a cow so I moved the rifle and blasted the second one to the left. A short 40 yards dash and he piled up in a heap. Turns out they never saw the one-horned wonder I was trying to shoot. We got to him, snapped a couple of pics and hauled him up into the trailer. They’re like trying to pick up an average sized donkey. Kinda look like one too come to think of it.



We moved a few hundred more yards and quickly found another herd. With one waterbuck in the trailer it mostly eliminated the excess noisy bouncing so they weren’t nearly as alarmed at our approach. Dad told me to shoot but I insisted he take the second one. Bredger pulled up to a stop, dad got down across the backpack and dropped him within a few yards of where he stood.
More pics and then another donkey to load up. You could end up with a hernia doing to many of these in a day!

We hadn’t been seeing any reedbuck in this area so we moved on to another area that was just lousy with them. As we were driving we passed on quite a few that were nearly trophy sized or showed really good potential to be trophies in a few years. Then we came across one that stood up from his bed under a tiny acacia tree to watch as we passed. He should have stayed laying down. He was on the right side of the vehicle so we turned that direction so I would be in the proper position to shoot off the pack. A squeezed off the shot and he just gave a jerk and stood there. I quickly bolted one in and said, “Did I even hit him?! Want me to hit him?” Joseph and Bredger were watching him in their binos and assured me it was a perfect hit. Sure enough a few seconds later he rolled in his tracks. For a little guy barely weight a buck twenty he took the .300 like a champ. It was right through the lungs just off the shoulder, he was the first animal that just didn’t react strongly. A few pics of him and then on to find the next one for dad to shoot. The reedbuck are much easier to toss into the trailer!



We passed several more reedbuck and saw a bunch of impala. Better rams than we had seen so far. I really want one of those.
Finally a shooter reedbuck jumped and ran and stopped about about 80 yards away. Dad got down on the gun but when he squeezed the trigger it clicked. He had forgotten to put one back in the chamber after I had taken it out after killing the last reedbuck. Unless we were actively stalking or about to take a shot we wisely kept the chamber empty. He quickly bolted one in but the reedbuck was off to the races. “Stay on him, he may stop” I said. Sure enough at about 150 he turned to look back. That was his last mistake. Down goes Frazier!

Our portion of the community meat quota was complete, but it was nearly lunchtime and we still hadn’t see a suitable Nyala. We drove over to the BV camp and dropped the trailer in the shade. Hamish was going to do us a favor and come pick up the trailer so we could once again stay out hunting. He was a very handy guy to have around. The trackers there were all smiles looking at our handiwork. No folks going hungry around here!


Beautiful horns on these animals!

 

[kansasdad]

Did the waterbuck hair feel a tad greasy to you? That's my biggest memory of Kenyan waterbuck. Well, that and how smelly their hooves are when they have been hanging around a swampy area.

 

[KipCarson]

Now onto the hunt for a suitable Nyala… only 5 hours left on the day. One last bush lunch as we headed back into the areas where we had been seeing so many of them. It seemed as soon as we ate lunch Nyala started appearing. Not 300 yards from where we ate we saw the first bull to make a stalk on. We could see him but couldn’t see his head. It took a little while of shadowing him through the thicket, but finally, we got a clear look at one very disappointing bull. “Just not big enough…” Onward to the next one! Over the next hour we found four other Nyala bulls but none was good enough. Should I be getting really nervous yet? The next Nyala we stalked turned out to be one I was familiar with. After we spotted him and close the distance, we realized it was the same bull we had spent so much time stalking with a bow on the second day of the hunt. His horns made a really big bell, but he did not flare back out at the top. Don’t pass anything on the first day that you would shoot the last day.? Well Bridger decided we should pass something in the last hours of the last day that I would’ve been happy with on the second day. As we walked away from this one, I was seriously getting a little bit antsy. There was just less than 3 hours of hunting time left. Stay positive Kip, it may just not be meant to be. We were heading back into the area I had wounded the nyala and we had seen several other borderline good enough bulls on multiple days. Hopefully in the last hour I would get to settle for something even if it wasn’t the best. I didn’t come this far to go home empty handed.

As we rounded a corner we spotted a Nyala ahead near the edge of a clearing and slowed for just a second as they determined he was to young, a few seconds let there was another one there in the same vicinity that looked decent to me and we drove forward to get a better look. As we were moving with our attention pointed forward I looked over to the left and I see a bull not 50 yards off the road watching us pass. I knew in an instant this one had to be big enough, He had good length, a nice classic bell shape and had started flaring back out at the tips. I grabbed Vasco’s arm and pointed over in the bulls direction. Zero reaction from him… but a few seconds later he gives Bredger the signal to stop. Bredger had caught a glimpse of him from the cab of the cruiser and he went ahead a couple hundred yards before stopping. Im positive there are bigger bulls out there but good grief I’m down to 2.5 hours of hunt time left! As we started stalking in his direction I turned and told Joseph who was videoing with my phone, “We’re finally about to shoot this one!” At least I thought I was. We took our time as we crouched and crawled sneaking ever closer. When we spotted him he was looking directly at us at only 60 yards away standing broadside. We were already on hands and knees crawling in the grass and he couldn’t quite make us out but was acting very nervous. I can’t tell you how relieved I was when Bredger gave me the nod and eased the sticks up. The urgency of making a quick shot was on me because I knew he would bolt at any second. But he paused long enough to let me get him in the scope. A split second before I pulled the trigger he moved. He turned directly towards us facing to wheee I had a square on frontal shot. I quickly asked, “Are you OK with me taking the front shot?” He didn’t respond, or maybe I didn’t wait for the answer, but either way I squeezed of the shot. He bucked up, spun around and instantly disappeared behind the palms. “Good shot!” I heard. “You didn’t mind me shooting him frontal, right?” not that it mattered at this point. I know some people think it’s sacrilege and unethical but at only about 60 yards he assured me he didn’t care.

We ease forward to the point of impact and found a splatter of blood. There were a few more drops over the next couple of yards. And Bredger had me move upfront next to Vasco just in case he jumped up and a follow up shot was needed. That proved to be a moot precaution because only after a few more steps there he was laying in the grass stone dead!

We were all thrilled as could be! With that shot our 10 days of hunting had come to an end, but what a ride it had been!
Bredger assured me he was a great bull,but still not the one he was looking for! I believe he will have some free days to do some hunting of his own between clients and I wish him all the best of luck finding that true giant Nyala and getting it with his bow.

We had fun taking pics, all the pressure was off and after all, we had taken everything we came for. We had gone from daylight to dark hunting for 10 straight days and squeezed out all the experiences we could out of Africa. As much fun as I was having it was starting to feel a little bittersweet. Tomorrow would look much different and unlike all my U.S. elk and mule deer etc. hunts I couldn’t just come back next year or anytime I wanted. I know one thing, if I never make it back to the dark continent I certainly can’t complain. This was one awesome hunt!

In these brief 10 days we had taken 16 total animals and in my opinion there hadn’t been a bad one in the bunch:
1 Cape buffalo
2 nyala
2 bushbuck
2 warthog
4 waterbuck
5 reedbuck

We dropped of the nyala with the skinners and headed out to a pan to sit and watch the sunset and soak it all in. The clouds moved in and spoiled the sunset but the conversation was first class and we were regaled with PH stories of trapping hyenas and leopards, buffalo charges, and eccentric clients! Wonderful end to a wonderful hunt!

I still have more to add to the end of this narrative but that completes the hunting part I guess!

 

[KipCarson]

Did the waterbuck hair feel a tad greasy to you? That's my biggest memory of Kenyan waterbuck. Well, that and how smelly their hooves are when they have been hanging around a swampy area.

Yes, they were very oily. And had a distinct smell similar to wet dog or sweaty horse I’d say. All the ones we shot had been on dry ground long enough not to be covered in swamp mud.

 

[KipCarson]

After all the pics were taken and we had loaded the Nyala up, I thought about something. I asked the Bredger, “You keep saying “good shooting, great shot” etc. like we’re doing really good and so I have to ask, do y’all have that many people show up who just can’t shoot?” 11 of the 16 animals had been shot with a rifle, all of them clean one shot kills, with no shots further than 240 yards. I’m not an avid shooter. I barely fire a rifle more than a couple shots a year, if that. I hadn’t even shot a deer with a rifle since 5 years ago culling does on my employers lease in west TX. His response to my question astonished me. He went on to tell about how multiple clients that had shot OVER 100 TIMES in a 10 day safari?!!? One guy who was there just before us shot about 15 times before he killed the first animal and then his PH still had to finish it off! Let me just say here I’m not saying that to brag. None of the shots were challenging and I don’t feel like our shooting was anything special at all. That being said, I was shocked to hear that. Also I was surprised to hear about the number of people who show up over there with basically no hunting experience. Who wakes up one day and says “I think I’ll take up hunting, let me book an African safari to start!”? Anyway my mind was blown by all that and it was easy to see why he was pleased. Except for the bow mishaps on the warthog and Nyala I’m glad we could deliver! I was also happy to hear the most egregious offenders were mostly not Americans. That being said, and it should go without saying, but if you book a hunt anywhere it’s probably a good thing to practice and show up prepared!

 

[Nick87]

I have never had any interest in hunting in Africa, however this has been an amazing thread/write up. Haven't even put a dent in reading it yet. Thanks for taking us along.

 

[Salmonchaser]

Great write up. I do recommend practicing with sticks as the PH there love to use them. I didn’t practice much with them and only took one out of 10 off the sticks. I dont’ recall the exact breakdown but most were kneeling, a couple from anthill prone. The first was a zebra wounded by the previous party. He jumped the road and down thru the brush. I took after him and after about 400 yards had him in an opening, a baseball slide, come up to kneeling and shot. Tracker was laughing like hell. PH said he had never had anyone do that.
Any way, again great write up. You really took some good trophies. I’m all fired up for my trip May 26. Bought my Airline tickets this morning.