Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Africa We need a Zebra thread!

HS--I don't know that it is that much of a story, as I have used a Sharps as my rifle of choice for over 20 years.

I took the zebra on my second trip to South Africa, using a Shiloh Sharps Business Rifle in 45 2 7/8, often called a 45-110. The load was 106 grains of 2f black powder pushing a 511 grain round nosed paper patched bullet out of one of my Steve Brooks molds. It pushes the bullet to 1380 fps. This is pretty much the old buffalo killing load from the American west in the 1870s. I use the standard buckhorn barrel sights and a blade front sight made from a copper penny. The Sharps sights are a buckhorn with a ladder that stands up and a sliding leaf for long range. I have correlated it with a Leica CRF 1200 rangefinder. These sights are much more capable than most people suspect and in conjunction with the excellent set trigger give the Sharps its well earned reputation for long range accuracy.

I have had good results with the Sharps, and had gotten complete pass through penetration on every animal I had shot on the first safari. I had shot a blesbok from end to end the previous day,in the chest and out the base of the tail on this second trip. When we spotted the herd of zebra and began the stalk, my PH commented that he thought my string of pass throughs was about to come to an end. I asked him why, and he said that his 375H&H would not consistently shoot all the way through a zebra and he doubted the Sharps would.

I had a pretty good string of pass throughs going, and I told him that I would shoot the zebra on an angle to maximize the penetration distance as a sort of penetration test. We got within 96 yards, and I shot the zebra from sitting cross sticks as it quartered toward me, taking it on the left shoulder. The paper patch bullet exited just in front of its left ham after traversing the body from front to back on a diagonal path. The animal went a bit over 100 yards before it died on its feet.

It is a beautiful skin, and I had it made into a rug. It covers the bed in our guest bedroom.

Anyone with pics of their zebra with a levergun?

Barkoff: I can most assuredly attest to Sharpsguy's shooting prowess with those Sharps. AA good friend of mine who posts here under the "Evil Twin" moniker, gave me a lovely Shiloh-Sharps as a retirement gift. I had no clue (still don't) as to the art/science involved with these rifles so Sharpsguy kindly invited me to his place in Texas for a two day crash course in advanced riflery. He lives the dream baby! His reloading house is but a short walk from his FIVE HUNDRED yard range! Anyhow I couldn't believe what I accomplished. In just a few short sessions, I was hitting the metallic Ram sihlouette at 500. If I can do it, just imagine what he can do with these rifles, he's probably shot a few hundred thousand rounds in his career with them! Further, he has a neat video when he used to be a sponsor for Goex that shows him taking a springbok at an incredible (and lazered) 525 yards! He's the real deal and made me into a convert. jorge

Barkoff--Good eyesight helps, for sure. I am farsighted and have astigmatism, and have slightly blurred vision without my glasses. Having said that, my vision corrects to 20/15 with glasses. Jorge is a retired Naval Aviator, so his eyesight can't be what you might call bad.

What it amounts to is that after years of study and research, I finally figured out how the old buffalo (bison) hunters of the old west used their rifles and sights. Anyone with normal eyesight can do it. All you have to do is see the front sight as clearly as possible and the animal. The animal can be blurred a bit, and it still works. The problem today is that no one wants to learn how to use these sights correctly and grew up using scopes. There is a system and a slight learning curve, but most people with average eyesight would be able to do it if they knew how.

Barkoff- My 45-110 Business Rifle weighs 11 pounds, 8 ounces. I have a 45-90 that weighs 12 pounds 2 ounces. I would say that most of my hunting Sharps weigh 11 to 12 pounds. I do have have a couple of heavy barreled Sharps that weigh at or just over 15 pounds. Almost all of my rifles have 30 inch barrels.

Not all of the original buffalo hunters used 15 pound rifles, although a great many did. There were a lot of rifles on the buffalo range that weighed 12 to 13 pounds.

The reason for the heavy rifles on the buffalo range was three fold. The first was that the heavier weight tames the recoil somewhat and makes them easier to shoot for an extended string of shots. These guys regularly shot 50 to 100 shots a day, so this was important. The second reason was that the heavier guns are more accurate and absolutely go to sleep on the cross sticks. They are so steady that you think you are on a bench rest with sand bags. The third reason for the heavy barrel is that it doesn't get hot as quickly as does a light barrel. This makes fouling managment of black powder loads much easier on a long string of shots.

Hunting bison in the west was very different from what we do today with their long shot strings, and these bull barrel guns were purpose built for it.

My normal hunting Sharps at 11 to 12 pounds are not so heavy that you can't carry them on a day's hunt, but their weight does make them a bit easier to shoot than say an eight or nine pound rifle.

Spring,

I really like the one without the shadow stripe, but I get the feeling they aren't that common.

Any Zebra beats my current one, nada.

Charles

Shadow Stripes are usually absent on the Hartmann's Zebra but found on burchell's. THere are other varities of Zebra but soembody a lot smarter than me will need to tell you about them.
Lee