Curious why cape buffalo have the same minimum caliber requirement as Rhino, Hippo and Elephant?

[Philip Glass]

I've always wondered why the .375 cal minimum requirement applied to Cape Buffalo in the same way it does to the larger dangerous game ie Hippo, Rhino and Elephant.

Now, I have never hunted Africa and have no direct experience with these game species. I know that Cape Buffalo are known for their toughness, their "meanness" and I've seen videos where they soak up a LOT of lead.

But from an anatomical perspective they are a ~1,600lb Buffalo vs a 3,000lb+ Hippo, 5,000lbs+ Rhino or a 15,000lb+ bull elephant.

They just don't seem to be in the same weight class compared to other megafauna.

Thinking of local examples at home, North Americans hunt the North American Bison which grows larger than Cape Buffalo (to to 2,700lbs) with 30cals like 308, 30-06, 300 WinMag etc.

It sounds like the Australians hunt their Water Buffalo (2,000lbs) with 338's as well but recommend a 375.

So a few questions:
1. Do you believe the caliber restrictions for Cape Buffalo should be the same as the larger African game? i.e. 375.
2. Do you think there should be an exception for using 338's, 35's etc. on Cape buffalo given their effectiveness on other buffalo species around the world?
3. Do you think the 375 minimum is actually too low for hippo, rhino or elephant?

I'm asking these questions as I sit here planning my Bison hunt where I intend to bring my 338WinMag with 250gr partitions.

No offense here but some schooling is required. As soon as you stated "Now, I have never hunted Africa..." I knew where you were coming from. African animals are tough and I mean that in every sense of the word! It can not be overstated. We all have stories of how much lead Africa game can consume. An Impala is not like a white tailed deer. A buffalo is nothing like a bison. I shot a bait impala just behind the shoulder with my .375 and though it created a gaping hole in him he ran nearly 200 yards. My whitetails would have fallen over immediately from any shot from a .375!
1. Yes. Not because they are hard to kill but because people make bad shots.
2. There is no place in Africa for the .338. A .375 sets you up to hunt the continent.
3. No but I may choose a larger caliber at times.

 

[Philip Glass]

Buffalo maybe one of the easiest of the big 5 to kill, but they also maybe the hardest to stop. My next one if I decide on another one will be with a 458lott or something bigger..

I think the cats are the easiest to kill of Big 5

 

[Philip Glass]

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That was with a .416 and a center punch on the heart. That buff went at least 100 yards and was pissed off every step of the way.

Good shot Yancy! Let do it again.

 

[Forrest Halley]

American bison have a rather unique anatomy WRT their lungs (thus sayeth Steve Rinella). You only have to put a bullet into 1 lung to cause a full pneumothorax in both lungs. This is 100% fatal. An excited bison, breathing heavily, won't take long to deflate both lungs.

This is why the lungs were the preferred spot to shoot for commercial hunters because the death was quiet and slow and didn't alarm the herd. From a distance the herd wouldn't be frightened by the report of the rifle.

I have never bought the argument about recoil anyway. My 12 year old (weighed 120lbs) made a 1 shot kill on a lion with his 375H&H Mag. My other son has killed lion, elephant and hippo with the same 375H&H Mag at 14 years old (he was 5'8" and 145 lbs). Recoil is not a factor once you shoot the gun enough to be comfortable with it. Those same boys were fully capable of shooting my preferred 470NE at those ages. That's because they actually shoot them.

I would continue to encourage every hunter to shoot more often. The Big Bores are not that intimidating the more you shoot them. And the more you shoot, the better you become.

I believe there is a lot of truth to your statements right up until the recoil level reaches the point of retinal detachment and concussion. Maybe 90 ft-lbs or less for somewhat regular use. I had an interesting day at the range where I fired my .375 twice for zero check. It rolled nicely for both shots. The Range Safety Officer watching exclaimed, "Whoa! That's a lot of recoil!" I simply replied, "No, I'm just rolling with it instead of letting it beat me up." The AR types have really ruined everything, but I believe nearly everyone can be trained to wield the .375H&H(Nobody cares about the Ruger.).

The real question is how many did they wound? 7.62x39 and 303 British have both accounted for a lot of buffalo in Africa. Here’s a 12 gauge slug from a poacher, badly infected, but healing. A different poacher killed a buffalo on my final day in a different camp with a homemade 12 gauge shotgun.
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This is a Cape Buffalo. The American Bison was what was talked about being killed with arrows. I'd say that there were a few wounded for sure over the centuries, but there is a key anatomical difference in the lungs.

 

[fourfive8]

I dunno the answer relative to Cape buffalo legal minimums vs the other big heavies’ legal minimums, other than, IMO, use enough gun with tough premium bullets for any big game. (The big cats require a different approach within the DG category) If you can’t shoot enough gun for larger, tougher game then maybe stick with lesser game. Sorry, my opinion doesn’t have to conform to any ESG/WOKE protocol.

I’ve witnessed plenty of shooters who flinch and can’t shoot worth a crap, even relatively small calibers. And, relative to “nostalgia and show”, I will never understand hauling around, maybe for miles, a heavy, clumsy double. Only to increase the chances for pulling the first, most critical shot using open iron sights, that few ever master, during the excitement of a close DG encounter. The clumsiest rifle I have ever shouldered was a high end double in 500NE… I’m talking $100,000 high end.

 

[AimSmall]

Mother Nature uses the lion, and to some extent, leopard to train Cape buffalo survival skills. Unlike faster animals, the slower buff must stand and fight to fend off the lion.

P*ss him off and he will toss you over the biggest tree around, then stomp you into compost.

Whoever decided 375 was the beginner round likely new this.

 

[Flewis]

I think the cats are the easiest to kill of Big 5

You are right, I just always blank on then as part of the big 5.

 

[Tanks]

These are the bullets we found in my elephant. Two AK-47 rounds, .30 cal soft and an 8mm/.375 solid. The old bull most likely had them in him for decades. Use enough gun, not just the minimum.

No wonder they are skittish.

 

[Bert the Turtle]

And that’s just the ones you found!

 

[Safari Dave]

Is 375 required for leopard and lion?

I swear I've seen videos of leopard hunting with .308, 30-06 etc.

It is is some countries.

 

[grand veneur]

AK-47 bullet from the orbital cavity of a buffalo that I shot in the Caprivi on the border of Angola.

The former abscess cavity with bone destruction.

 

[Northern Shooter]

Thanks everyone for chiming in and offering your input. For those that hinted at not being able to handle the recoil above 338, I own and comfortably shoot both 375 and 458. 458 WM is my favourite caliber to shoot.

This was moreso a thought exercise to evaluate if Cape Buffalo could be exempt from the 375 min requirement the same as other dangerous game like the big cats.

I personally believe a heavy for caliber .338 or .358 would be sufficient for cape Buffalo given their ballistics which compare favourably to other accepted DG cartridges.

A couple examples:
250 Gr 338 WM - .313 SD - 3914ft-lb

275 Gr 338 WM - .344 SD - 3784ft-lb

300 Gr 338 WM - .375 SD - 4000ft-lb

275 Gr 358NM - .307 SD - 4600ft-lb

300 Gr 375 HH - .305 SD - 4300ft-lb

286 Gr 9.3x62 - 305 SD - 3540ft-lb

400 GR 450/400 - 338 SD - 3732ft-lb

 

[Bert the Turtle]

And this is why there are minimums: to save people from their own inexperience.

For sure, a 338 would work. Certainly, modern bullets and to a lesser extent, powders, get more out of any given cartridge than the performance one could get 50 years ago. And a 338 with a TSX or North Fork, etc would no doubt work better on a buffalo than would a 375 with a fragile bullet. Perhaps a 338 with a good modern bullet would for practical purposes be as good as a 375 with a typical bullet when the minimums were enacted.

Still, I am reminded of a response the great shooting instructor Louis Awerbuck (RIP) once gave to a hypothetical question. He said “yes, you could do that. You could also stick a black mamba up your ass. The question isn’t if you can. The question is why would you want to.”

I think that sums it up. As an intellectual exercise, sure, it is an entirely reasonable question to ask and discuss. But in the real world, please don’t do this. It is called dangerous game for a reason. Do it the usual way with a 375 (or heavier if you truly shoot it well), live to tell the tale, learn the craft, then decide if you want to push the limits.

 

[DLSJR]

Here’s a recent example of how tough buffalo can be and why .375 is a good minimum…

In August I was hunting with my son in Tanzania, on MA1/Madaba in the Selous Game Reserve. My son was shooting a .375 H&H with 300 grain TSX’s, while I was shooting my .416 Hoffman with 400 grain Bearclaws and TSX’s. One morning we found very fresh sign of 3 buffalo bulls at a waterhole and started tracking them through tall grass. Tracking the first hour was easy due to all the wet mud they were leaving on the grass they passed through.

After a couple hours, we came onto the bulls and I hung back with the trackers while my son advanced with our PH, Alan Vincent. After about five minutes, my son settled on the sticks and shot the closest bull, which was about 30 yards away and broadside. He made a good shot, center of both lungs with the TSX passing through. The bull trotted away but turned to face them at about 100 yards, and took another TSX that went the length of one lung and back into the rumen. The buffalo fell over and shortly after gave out a death bellow. He was on his side with a very large pool of lung blood pouring onto the ground. Another death bellow and suddenly the guys were motioning me to get my butt up there as the other bulls were still there.
I advanced and once at Alan I could see just the front leg & shoulder of a buffalo at about 90 yards. I sent a bullet on its way, then another as it stepped forward and all I could see was its back leg. It ran in a semi circle and I shot again into the front of his chest, and still he was up so I sent a final bullet right into his mouth which dropped him on the spot. 4 shots over perhaps 45 seconds to a minute.

We quickly made sure my bull wasn’t getting up and then turned to admire my sons bull, which was laying about 30 yards away. WHERE THE F*CK DID HE GO??? His bull was gone, leaving only a huge pool of blood on the ground as proof he’d ever been there. We took up the track and after close to an hour found him and my son put him down for good with a couple quick shots. When Alan checked his GPS it indicated we were a bit over 2 kilometers from where the bull originally fell. More than 1 1/4 miles! For a ‘Dead’ buffalo.

After this experience, I have a lot less desire to shoot a Buffalo with my .375. we all agreed that if I hadn’t advanced and fired shots at one of the other bulls, my sons probably would have died where it fell. But it didn‘t.
It was shot well with one of the best buffalo bullets. Didn’t matter as it still went a long way after being nearly dead.

 

[Pirkan]

1. Yes
2. I wouldn’t go below .338 caliber
3. For body shots on elephant, yes. No for the others (except rhinoceros which I am yet to hunt and thus, can’t speak from field experience)

I’ve been doing all this with .375 Holland & Holland Magnum caliber rifles ever since 1974, so I am well familiar with the attributes & limitations of this caliber. It’s the Swiss army knife of rifle calibers, in terms of its versatility. The “One Size Fits All” of the big game hunting scene. Or at least, as close to this philosophy as is humanly possible.
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I’ll go a bit in-depth into your first question.

Firstly, it’s extremely unwise to compare the resiliency of American bison or Asiatic/Australian water buffalo with the Cape buffalo. The only common element between all of them is that they’re bovines. Yes, the Cape buffalo weighs less than an American bison or Asiatic water buffalo. But weight alone isn’t a reliable indication of a dangerous game animal’s tenacity for life. Cape buffalo are far more aggressive & cunning and stronger framed.

Many modern day safari client hunters don’t fully appreciate just exactly how dangerous a Cape buffalo really is, due to the way in which majority of Cape buffalo are taken in Africa today. The white hunter gets them near the buffalo at an angle where the most opportune shot into the vital regions may be made, shooting sticks are erected, a telescopic sighted .375 Holland & Holland Magnum (loaded with premium grade controlled expansion bullets) is used for the kill shot and then it’s all over (assuming that everything goes according to plan, of course). There’s absolutely nothing wrong with this, as this is often how I myself (a client hunter) do it as well. But people have begun to forget that there’s a very valid reason why these irate looking bovines are called “Africa‘s Black Death”. It’s an extremely appropriately earned nickname.

Sure, smaller calibers have been used to successfully down African Cape buffalo for years. The 7x57mm Mauser (loaded with 173Gr DWM military surplus round nosed steel jacketed FMJ solids) was used very successfully by WDM Bell for taking Cape buffalo. But these were picked shots. Only when a hunter must take a shot at a Cape buffalo in dense vegetation/cover where there is low visibility, then will he look down at the bore of his rifle and wish that it was bigger.

I’ve culled several water buffalo in South Bengal under government orders in 1979, back when I was under the employment of the Ministry of forests. The rifles that I (and my men) employed, were the standard government issue .303 British Lee Enfield service rifle (loaded with 174Gr steel jacketed army surplus FMJ military ball). When hit in the soft region behind the shoulder, all of the game (males averaging at 2160 LBs live weight) could be consistently relied upon to eventually succumb to their injuries. But several of the larger water buffalo lived up to 18 minutes even after getting multiple shots through the heart and/or lungs. I would definitely not consider employing the .303 British against African Cape buffalo (even if it were legal).
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I've been immensely fortunate enough to have been able to hunt most of the world's species of wild bovines at least once up until now (Cape buffalo, American bison, Asiatic water buffalo, Seladang, Gaur, Banteng) with the exception of the Australian scrub bull (a dream game animal of mine). I can say with 100% certainty that Cape buffalo, Gaur & Seladang top the list in terms of:
1) Tenacity for life
2) Ferocity
3) Cunning

I shot a Seladang bison bull in Chiengmai, Northern Thailand in 1979 by employing a .30-06 Springfield (loaded with Kynoch 220Gr round nosed steel jacketed FMJ solids). I had made a heart-lung shot. The Seladang expired on the following day (but not before playing a very macabre game of hide & seek with me on the day that I shot him, when I had to eventually abandon the hunt for the day the moment I realized that HE WAS THE ONE STALKING ME). Were I armed with a caliber of rifle above .338… then, I’ve absolutely zero doubt that he would have dropped far sooner.
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I have nothing of value to ad to the discussion but I must say that the gentleman with the hat in the first two pictures looks very handsome

 

[Tam Dl]

Don Heath said in one of his articles that the 9.3x62 was superior to the 375 H&H, because of the poor performance of .375 DG bullets. But he was also supportive of the 375 as the best option for the average inbound hunter, as the bullet problem has long since been solved.

So one problem is why has the minimum level recommendation not been adjusted across the continent, if it was established when at least one reason for it is was bad bullets. A lot of the common sense reasons for this have already been suggested. But, probably marketing is part of it. Why can you shoot an elephant with a weapon developing 22lr levels of energy, but not a 257 Weatherby. A large part of it has to be that people don't want to know that their deer rifle, maybe their Coues deer rifle, Maybe the Coues deer bow, are up to the job. We are now entering at least the 5th evolution of bullets, with fully machined bullets that are precision engineered for particular terminal features, and yet some of the dominant rifle rounds remain from the black powder era, in the DG field. If the rifles didn't beat you up, it would not be half the fun.

 

[Tam Dl]

A pal lent me about 100 copies of Rifle magazine that he found at a show. There were several studies of grizzly guiding experiences. The kind of boring articles one no longer finds in sporting mags. These articles analyzed figures from detailed after action reports, and found that the most efficient client rifles on Grizzly, was the 338 Win Mag. Things went drastically downhill with every increase in power sports tried to handle. The worst, something like 27 shots was in an encounter started with a 458 Win Mag. What was interesting was that guide performance also dove into the basement when the client had a really big gun. The reason for that is obvious, but not fully analyzed in the articles.

Guides did better with the 375. Since grizzly encounters often start beyond spiting distances, 375s were better than heavier rifles as they were flatter shooting. Should "clean up on Aisle 7", turn out to be on Aisle 200.

Two of the camps handled the issue differently. One mandated that the guides carry 338s. The reason being that they would get phone calls like this: "So what rifle should I bring?" "A 338 works out best". "What do your guides use?" "338s". But if they said their guides use 375s, you can imagine what the client would bring. What was not analyzed was whether the camp that had guides using 375s got any greater margin more business. Clients imagining that the 338 camp had either less aggressive bears, of guides...

 

[revturbo9967]

Thanks everyone for chiming in and offering your input. For those that hinted at not being able to handle the recoil above 338, I own and comfortably shoot both 375 and 458. 458 WM is my favourite caliber to shoot.

This was moreso a thought exercise to evaluate if Cape Buffalo could be exempt from the 375 min requirement the same as other dangerous game like the big cats.

I personally believe a heavy for caliber .338 or .358 would be sufficient for cape Buffalo given their ballistics which compare favourably to other accepted DG cartridges.

A couple examples:
250 Gr 338 WM - .313 SD - 3914ft-lb

275 Gr 338 WM - .344 SD - 3784ft-lb

300 Gr 338 WM - .375 SD - 4000ft-lb

275 Gr 358NM - .307 SD - 4600ft-lb

300 Gr 375 HH - .305 SD - 4300ft-lb

286 Gr 9.3x62 - 305 SD - 3540ft-lb

400 GR 450/400 - 338 SD - 3732ft-lb

Forgetting legality, I would never dream of hunting a cape buffalo with anything smaller then a 375.

 

[revturbo9967]

That’s a hole in the boss from a 375 (not from me) and the bullet was lodged in the back of its skull/boss area. This bull took all of the energy from that bullet, to its head, and shook it off and ran away. That’s why Cape buffalo have a minimum cartridge requirement. They are tougher than most African game.

 

[Dr Ray]

I've always wondered why the .375 cal minimum requirement applied to Cape Buffalo in the same way it does to the larger dangerous game ie Hippo, Rhino and Elephant.

Now, I have never hunted Africa and have no direct experience with these game species. I know that Cape Buffalo are known for their toughness, their "meanness" and I've seen videos where they soak up a LOT of lead.

But from an anatomical perspective they are a ~1,600lb Buffalo vs a 3,000lb+ Hippo, 5,000lbs+ Rhino or a 15,000lb+ bull elephant.

They just don't seem to be in the same weight class compared to other megafauna.

Thinking of local examples at home, North Americans hunt the North American Bison which grows larger than Cape Buffalo (to to 2,700lbs) with 30cals like 308, 30-06, 300 WinMag etc.

It sounds like the Australians hunt their Water Buffalo (2,000lbs) with 338's as well but recommend a 375.

So a few questions:
1. Do you believe the caliber restrictions for Cape Buffalo should be the same as the larger African game? i.e. 375.
2. Do you think there should be an exception for using 338's, 35's etc. on Cape buffalo given their effectiveness on other buffalo species around the world?
3. Do you think the 375 minimum is actually too low for hippo, rhino or elephant?

I'm asking these questions as I sit here planning my Bison hunt where I intend to bring my 338WinMag with 250gr partitions.

I think it goes back to the old days when the 375 was the standard benchmark.
Suggest that buffalo are very dangerous as you are on foot often in scrub country and buffalo can be “on” you very,very quickly.
The minimum calibers are there to make sure you are not undergunned leaving wounded and extremely dangerous animals to cause major problems / often to you the hunter.