Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Africa Confirmed A Few Things

I saw loads of those steenbok but didn't shoot one. I wholeheartedly agree on Mattheus....he is an amazing hunter, spotter, tracker.

Following the same plan as last year, we would hunt for a big kudu near the hills. Mattheus told me that since the camel thorn trees were dropping their pods, something kudu absolutely love, that we could probably get away with hunting the lower country where the trees and hills met. It looked like this........

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and this.....notice how easily you can see the cow in the photo below. Look closely just above her........

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We were slowly still hunting through areas like these when we stumbled into a honey badger approximately 20 yards from us, with a small skunk hanging from his mouth! What a cool sight to see, another first for me. We watched him for probably 5 minutes before he took his food into a big hole.

Going another 1/2 mile or so, we jumped 3 kudu cows with a nice bull tagging along. They made it to the top of a hill about 300 yards away, giving us a glimpse of the bull as they scampered over the top and out of sight. Since I only had one full day and a few hours left, we decided to go after him again. We went to the exact place the kudu topped the hill, glassed a couple of minutes, and Mattheus saw the top of a bush moving violently at 800 yards. We waited a minute and sure enough that same kudu bull cleared a small opening at that distance, so we were off again. As you can tell the brush is relatively thick, and actually he got us right in amongst them, having a cow walk by us at 20 yards. One of the most amazing things about Mattheus was that he could see the animals through the brush, which was what he was doing at this time. After spending almost two cumulative weeks hunting with him, I could tell when he was serious just by his mannerisms. He was "on point", staring through a huge thorn brush thicket only 40 yards in front of us. I couldn't see squat quite frankly. After what seemed like about 5 minutes of this standoff, he slowly set up the sticks, motioned for me to slowly get ready, and had me focus on a small opening about 50 yards in front of us. I got ready, Mattheus grunted as the bull stepped into it, looked at us, and I drilled him through the neck (all I could see was neck up), and he folded like a lawn chair, crumpling straight down. All we could do was smile, and I had a big one. What an adrenaline rush that was, as kudu bulls are an addicting creature to me, and I never tire looking at them or for them.

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I never measured him, and didn't care (although Mattheus said he would go about 50). Even though I had killed a 55" bull the year before, and knew this one wasn't that big, I still didn't care. He was a heavy horned bull with deep curls. What a hunt!!

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The 160 Accubond, once again, performed perfectly, held together well, and was found near the bull's stomach, a full 3 ft penetration. All of the 6 bullets recovered from the 11 animals I killed looked very similar.

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