Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Africa Okay, GregR -- where's the buff?

How'd you do? (I'll check FB). You sure do book for alot of happy people at GAO!!!!!!

Thanks, Barry. I had a great hunt but we had a bit of a mixup. I passed several bulls in the 40s on day one, including a 42 and a 44. The 44 was beautiful but still a year too young, and the 42 had a huge boss and deep drop, but he didn't curl back up. That is a serious trophy buff hunt and it was day one, so I have no regrets about passing it.

Day two we saw several nice bulls in the morning but I passed them all. That afternoon, we found two old dugga boys along the river. We hopped out and started tracking them, but they split up. We went after the first one and found him quickly. He was an ancient 38-39-inch bull - fine for Zimbabwe but not what I was looking for in that area. We left him and found the other track and started walking.

We caught the second bull quickly and knew he was a shooter immediately. He had a huge drop, massive boss, and a good curl. He was about 45 inches if not a bit bigger. We caught him several times but the brush was too thick for a shot and he kept moving deeper and deeper into the super dense mopanes. About a half-hour before dark, we lost his tracks in a large area with lots of pebbles. The trackers searched for a while and found them again. Ten minutes later we caught up to the bull in some more thick brush.

The PH and I looked through our binos but couldn't see anything but shoulder. The PH said "I'm sure it's him. Take him." I hammered him with the .375, ran about 40 yards after him and hit him again just in case. He went down right there. We were elated when we walked up, but it didn't last - it was the 38-39" bull we'd passed earlier. Evidently, he'd been paralleling his buddy trying to meet up with him and the trackers were on the right track.

It was an honest mistake, but the outfitter was awesome about it. He gave me the choice of getting my money back or coming back for a free hunt. I'm definitely going back in either May of this year or July of next. This area has the best buffalo hunting I've ever seen. This is also the first time I'd ever seen buffalo in the rut - they fight like mad and other bulls come running in to check it out. Unfortunately, I am not man enough to rattle with buffalo skulls or to try and deal with five or six bulls charging in from different directions looking for a fight! I'll post a pic of my buff on Facebook later today.

I finally succeeded in my quest to take a Limpopo bushbuck on this trip, the only animal in South Africa I hadn't taken before now unless you count a copper springbok and black impala, neither of which I plan to shoot.

Awesome! I like the FB / Aimpoint pix, too.

great report, what Company were you hunting with?

It's an outfitter who hunts a 130,000 free-range concession on the western border of a huge S.African park. I buy all his excess buffalo now.