Personal experience:
MY leopard taken with a .270, 150gr Nosler Partition. One shot, No follow up. My wife's leopard was taken with a .308 180gr Nosler Partition. One shot, ran twenty yards No follow up. I've witnessed the taking of two other leopard. One was shot/killed with a .30-06 150gr Remington CoreLoc. One shot No Follow up.. The other leopard I witnessed being taken was shot/killed with a .416 Rigby 400gr Swift A-Frame. The end result was the same. One shot, DRT.
Scopes used: Leupold 1.5x5 on my .270, and the same on my wife's .308. The -06 had an old Weaver 4x, and the Rigby had a Leupold 3x9. Nothing exotic or esoteric.
Have had the opportunity to discuss leopard hunting with several P/H's in Zimbabwe, and Zambia regarding which caliber they thought was "best" for leopard. There didn't seem to be any consensus for "Best." To the man, they emphasized the importance of shot placement, no matter the caliber.
Shoot straight, and you'll have your trophy.
Good to know the standard 400gr A Frame at roughly 2400 fps worked a DRT on the light cats, i made hollow points out of my A Frames for Leopard with my 400 H&H, it was also a 70 yard DRT, wanted to shoot buffalo and hippo with my 577 double, my bolt rifle had to do the rest, i can say 400gr A Frames leaving at 2400 fps work perfectly on:
Warthog at 169
Waterbuck at 222
Hartebeest at 228
Zebra at 277
The heavy mediums can indeed get it all done this side of 300 yards, last Oct/Nov trip to Tanzania was a hell of an experience.
