African Hunting Questions

B

BrianBM

New member
I watched an hour or two of OLN earlier today that left me with questions.
The animals hunted were a red hartebeest, a blue wildebeest (sp?), a wart hog a/k/a extremely uglybeest, some smallish deeralope that I'd never heard of, and another wildebeest, black I think.

1) Anyone have any idea what chamberings we use here that would be fine there? The wildebeest looked suitable, in size, for what we'd consider as a larger elk chambering, .338 WinMag, .340 Wby, and so on. No doubt a 7mm magnum or .30-06 would do, if you get the right shot, but what are the optimal chamberings for these animals? What makes the PH happy?

2) No one bothered with camo clothing. Is camoflage clothing an American hobby? I was mildly surprised to see a PH and client stalking the red hartebeest (pretty animal, must say, very pretty) without spending much time prone (at least on camera) and without camo. I assume that, for deeralope game, a deeralope chambering would be fine too; .280 or 7mm-08, and so on.

3) The PHs did carry small binoculars but did NOT carry a pistol. Would they bother to do so if you were chasing, say, Cape Buffalo or lion, or are pistol backups another American eccentricity.

4) Warthogs are ugly. REALLY ugly. And the trophy looked smaller then many feral hogs here. Does Africa not have large hogs?

5) Are all PHs white, or does that reflect OLN's judgment of what American viewers want to see?
 
I have a trip to South Africa lined up for next July. I've talked to the PH's and land owners quite abit over the last few months. Pistols are nearly impossible to bring into the country over there. I don't know what the restrictions on residence over there having pistols, but I would imagine there there very strict as well. I' m not to sure a pistol would have much of an effect on a charging cape buffaloe anyway. The PH's usually carry large bore rifles while hunting areas with dangerous game anyway. For medium sized plains game as you were describing, they recommend .270 and larger. Atleast where I'm hunting. I'll be taking a 300 win mag and a 7mm weatherby. They've told me that would be just fine. I know one guy going with use that has already taken just about everything besides Eland with a .270 Weatherby. As far as the Wart Hogs, I think they get up to about 250lbs.
 
The guys hunting dangerous game in Africa use .416 Rigbys and .375 H&H, etc. The backup is usually a .700 nitro express or something. Id rather have that than a pistol.:D
 
I thought the .700 Nitro Express was a woodchuck cartridge? You load the woodchuck into the cartridge ... etc. :D
 
"Pistols are nearly impossible to bring into the country over there. I don't know what the restrictions on residence over there having pistols, but I would imagine there there very strict as well."

I live in S.A and unfortunately you right, owning a pistol is a very privileged thing indeed. Fortunately for me, i got my two handguns before the new laws came into effect, so i am safe, but for everyone else its a nightmare trying to get a handgun license. The gun laws here are very restrictive. Only allowed one handgun and one shot gun for self-defense (good luck trying to get either!) and only two rifles for hunting!:eek: The biggest threat in S.A is not from 4 legged animals, but rather from two legged beasts!
 
A Christian Missionary told me that the 30-06 and .243 are very popular in South Africa for plains game.

An Engineer I worked with hunted South Africa every year for a decade before his untimely death related to cancer. Larry took a custom .338 MAG and his old but prized .270 on the first hunt. The 338 was never even fired as his .270 slew large animals such as zebra and gemsbok as if struck by Thor's hammer. Larry hunted with 150 grain Nosler Partition bullets.

I'm not an African expert; simply stating what what my co-worker shared with me. But Larry was no fool and he took hunting very seriously. He used his 338 MAG in Alaska for moose and caribou then sold it.

Jack
 
Camo in Africa

I read that camo clothing in Africa is associated with either the military or with poachers. (40MM, chime in and tell me if I am wrong). The article hinted that camo can land you in trouble with various groups there, so you are better off sticking with khaki or green.

I just checked the source - it was in our local paper, so take it with a grain of salt.....
 
Many African and South American countries ban all forms of camo....and change the rules regularly. There is really no hunting need for it, so why take the chance?
Rich
 
I know virtually nil about African hunting, but I remember reading some hearsay that .338 winmag is very popular for plains game, as is .30-06 and .300 magnums. If you go after DG, they will require a minimum of .375 HH mag, in a controlled-feed turnbolt.

It's a shame that there's such strict gun control over there in S.A. - seems to me that it wasn't 10 years ago that the country was still relatively free gun-rights-wise (??).
 
Interesting. OK, I can certainly see the association of camo with military, paramilitary and insurrectionist mayhem. South Africa has had enough of that.
And the PH and client were able to walk towards at least the black wildebeest, closely trailed by the cameraman, with the client right behind the PH. The herd - it looked to be no more then 20 animals - was staring at them. If you can fool them that easily, they deserve to be dopeybeest instead of wildebeest. And eaten.

Most of the chatter of whether an animal was a trophy pertained to horn and boss size and quality. One you shoot your dopeybeest, does the camp eat it?
Is it normal practice to skin the dope, and take it home? It'd be a shame to leave it to feed hyenas. Then again, they might be as tough as they are dopey (boy, I like that joke.)
 
Brian - I have gleaned all of my vast Africa knowledge from TV, so probably know nothing real about it. I think I have been told by someone on TV that the meat goes to "the village" for food. That might cut down on subsistence poaching some I guess.
 
To comment on a couple of your questions:

I think most PHs would carry handguns if the option wwas available to them. Peter H. Capstick used to carry a Browning HP in his "Leopard bag" until, as he put it, the Zambian Government decided that it would rather he just poke the angry cats in the eyes with his thumbs :rolleyes:

Most PHs are still white, which I assume is just a holdover from the days when "Professional Hunter" and "White Hunter" were interchangable. I'm sure there are more Black Africans in the job now than there were 40 years ago.

Warthogs, generally speaking, just aren't very big. They'd never get big like American feral hogs tend to be. There are big pigs - bushpigs and others - in Africa, but the Warties aren't among them. I think people see pictures of warthogs with their enormous tusks and assume that they're big and vicious. They're not very imposig, once you get close to them. Sure are cute, though :D

Camo clothing is actually recommended in parts of West and Central Africa such as Cameroon, where the hunting is for forest game rather than plains game. I can understand the paramilitary connection, and if I was advised against it, I wouldn't wear it. Better yet, I wouldn't hunt and area teeming with Paramilitaries. If you go hunting in Northern Uganda or Eastern Congo, You're liable to get into trouble with or without Camo:o
 
Good point. I'm more then happy to limit my exposure to war to reading about it. Might watch the idiot box now and then, but that's about it.
 
I did get to spend some time in Somalia, courtesy of Uncle Sam. I agree with Cossack. There are places in Africa that just don't make sense to go due to the dangers involved. I can't imagine rolling around Somalia trying to hunt. During my time there, we made some Atlatls and tried to hunt in our compound with no success. There were these tiny deer creatures that looked about the right size for roasting, but a nervous critter the size of a coyote makes a hard target for atlatls.
 
Chasing small quick game with atlatls .... just as well there were MREs around.
;) Yikes.

Excitable people with firearms make me nervous and I avoid them. I'll never get to Africa, so this is all just to satisfy my curiousity.
 
africa answers

brian bm

you ask a lot of good question and i will try and answer them as good as i can. i am not a outfitter nor a ph. i have been hunting since the age of about 7 and i hunt wart-hogs about twice a week .in the winter(hunting season) i go on several hunts all over south-Africa. like most white males i was in the army and enlisted permanently( for a while). at the moment i am busy opening a gun shop as a hobby.in my existing business i have a lot of game farmers and game ranches as customers.

now to your questions. you have already received some good answers which just shows that
the american hunters are well versed.

1) for the animals that you mentioned the good old 30-06 is MORE than enough. i suspect that the animals may appear larger on tv than what they actually are. i will not go smaller
than a 270 but if need be i will use a 243 on any of the game in your first question. any game larger than the eland will mean the limit of the of the 30-06. i hunt with a 308 and 300H&H.


2) cammo clothing used to be outlawed in s-africa. i am seeing more and more hunters using cammo these days. the the african bush are mostly shades of brown and khaki, so going with khakis makes sence. i allways thought the desert storm cammo will
do best as cammo in the south-african winter. remember that by far the minority of hunters
in south-africa are foreign hunters maybe 1 in 20 at most. the rest are locals that go on hunts or hunt their own lands they will see cammo as overkill and many will hunt with bush jackets and shorts.

3)i cant remember ever hunting none dangerous game with a hunter carrying a side arm, but if you want to carry one then do so.

4)that is true wart-hogs dont get as large as feral pigs. the biggest one i have shot was +_
110kg, but the tusks was massive. my tracker always says that he would rather track
a lion than a wounded wart-hog boar.

5)no not all ph's are white and not all are male, but most are and a lott are ex-soldiers

hope this helps, if not ask more and if i cant answer you i will get you the answers.
 
Thank you. That's a heck of a well-thought-out answer, too.

I haven't been on The Firing Line forum for some time. Life's other business precluded my getting started in hunting, but I'll get there eventually. At the moment, all my hunting is done vicariously, here and by listening to friends.

If there is a World Standard for medium game, the .30-06 seems to be it; enough rifle for almost anything you'd want to eat, anywhere on the planet. I'll be content with a 7mm-08. The cartridge is ample for anything I'm likely to see in New York State, and easier for extended practice then the .30-06 (no one I know seems to enjoy shooting their .30-06 for more then ten rounds at a time). That's as much rifle as I ever expect to need. A .280 Remington would be fine too. When I finally go out with money in hand, if a nice firearm comes within reach, well, it goes home and I have a new friend.

The warthogs are interesting quarry. Feral pigs here become poor food for the table as they get bigger, especially males (so I read). Is a warthog worth cleaning and dressing for the kitchen at home, or are warthogs merely a nuisance to be controlled for the sake of cropland?

Any pig that is around is a hundred kilograms is worth respect. I'm happy to take your tracker's word that it's safer to track a wounded lion into the bush then a wounded boar warthog :eek::eek:. At this moment both the lions and the warthogs are safe from my depredations. :D In the event I were to find myself in that circumstance, I'll be happy to take the tracker's advice, or the PH's instruction, and carry something chambered for a bigger cartridge. Or carry a ladder, and climb it in a hurry as needed.

If circumstance permits and you have the chance to hunt something you'd like to see on the table, or roasted in the field, what would it be?
 
the bigger the hogs and especially the boars the worst the taste gets. i have shot two
young sows the last 2 weeks about 15 months old. perfect for the table. what we do is i hand
the meat in at my friends butchery and they make the best little cheese sausages that you can grill.

what i want to eat is a young eland cow, although this is the biggest antelope in the world it tastes like veil. my other favorite is springbok. the thing about springbok is to shoot them when they are still relaxed as soon as they start running the meat gets spoiled to some extend due to the adrenalin. i sometimes partake in a springbok harvest and as soon as the
first springbok goes down we roast the liver with onions and garlic. this comes in handy as such harvests can take all night. the biggest harvest i joined was 117 springbok for the night
all head shots , game meat for export purposes .

just to clarify the tracker says he rather track a lion(not wounded) than a wounded wart-hog.

i shot a large wart-hog boar this week it went down like a tree trunk. i watched it for a while and waited until he stopped kicking the next thing i saw was the hog jumping up and disappearing into a thicket of dense bushes. i drove around the thicket for about an hour went home to get my tracker. we took up the spoor(tracks) from where i have shot it at first there was a lot of blood. we followed the tracks and the tracker only found three drops
of blood 500m from the first place i shot it. we spend the rest of the day looking without luck. i am telling you this because in all my years of hunting this about the fifth time i had to track something that had the potential to hurt me. but when you watch tv it seems to suggest that every African hunt is life threatening.
 
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