Refining your dangerous game cartridge selection over the years

[Challer]

I have learned to love the 375H&H for nearly everything. While I continue to eye a 416RM for my R8, I am grounded by the fact bullets have advanced tremendously in the past 50 years. They don’t add mass but they do everything else far better.

Safari solids if I need a solid. Have enough A frame Swift probably for 10 years. Been toying with monometals, TSX.

 

[mdwest]

It was a simple process for me…

I bought a Winchester 70 in 375 H&H… it was intended to be my DG rifle forever.. I have no aspirations of elephant… my big 5 hunting will likely be limited to cats and buffalo for life and it’s enough for crocs and hippo on water as well… so… with 1 rifle purchase I was done…

Or so I thought…

My wife also liked the Winchester… she is a full 14” shorter than I am with a LOP that is a full 2” shorter than mine…

The stock was cut down to fit her… leaving me with no DG rifle (although she now had a wonderful Winchester DG pew pew)…

So I built myself a 416 Taylor from a Mauser action and an ER Shaw barrel I picked up along the way somewhere…

I wasn’t sure how well I would like the Taylor.. but now having it as my primary big bore for maybe 6 years.. I can sincerely state that I love it… super reliable, slings 400gr Barnes TSX a little over 2400 fps, accurate, and the rifle actually turned out to be extremely nice looking as well…

I’m pretty sure it will be the last DG rifle I ever own… (I don’t hunt DG often enough to justify more in the collection)…

 

[Hunter-Habib]

I started hunting in Africa in 1974 at a time when the only firearm which I personally owned, was my wartime service pistol (a .32 ACP Webley & Scott Model 1921). At that time, I was mostly hunting in Africa with rental rifles. For hunting dangerous game, the only choices of caliber were either a .375 Holland & Holland Magnum or .458 Winchester Magnum back in those days. Factory loaded ammunition for any other dangerous game caliber had not been made since 1969 when ICI Kynoch (sole producer for ammunition in the British Nitro Express calibers at the time) had ceased operations. And ammunition production for the British Nitro Express calibers would not resume until BELL (Brass Extrusion Laboratories Limited) would take over the reigns in 1984. I chose to put my faith in the .375 Holland & Holland Magnum for most of my dangerous game hunting purposes (since practically all white hunters used to possess a rifle in this caliber to loan to their clients) and I seldom regretted my choice (save for body shots on bull elephants).

In 1975, I bought my first shotgun (a 12 gauge Pakistani Sikender single barrel). Then, I bought a .22 LR caliber BRNO Model 2 in 1982. And a 7x57mm Mauser Churchill Gun Makers Model Deluxe in 1989. In 1990, I sold the Pakistani Sikender shotgun with a 12 gauge 3" Magnum Beretta Model 626E boxlock ejector side by side. In 2007, my son-in-law bought me a .375 Holland & Holland Magnum Remington Model 700 Kevlar Stock Custom (it remains licensed in his name) which I use for most of my dangerous game hunting purposes these days. Nothing fancy but it serves me extremely well (although I really wish that the young man would have picked a variant with a traditional walnut stock instead of that unsightly kevlar stock). I recently had McBride’s Guns in Texas fit the rifle with an M16 extractor, in order to aid with more reliable extraction (the factory made Remington Model 700 extractor is far too flimsy for any serious use in my humble experience, esp. for magnum length cartridges such as the .375 Holland & Holland Magnum).

In the future, I plan to add either a lovely .600 Nitro Express double rifle or a .505 Gibbs magazine rifle to my battery. I’ve recently been negotiating with a friend for his .600 Nitro Express Butch Searcy boxlock ejector double rifle. If I manage to snag it, then that should round my battery out rather nicely.

A .600 Nitro Express

A .375 Holland & Holland Magnum

A 7x57mm Mauser

A 12 Gauge 3" Magnum

 

[colorado]

If I had to keep only one rifle it would be my CZ 550 in 500 Jeffery. I"m definitely taking it on my next brown bear hunt and will be taking it elk hunting again this fall I don't know if I've mastered it, but it comes up naturally to my sight picture, swings like a fine shotgun and so far everything I've shot with it (two cow elk) has been DRT as you would expect.

 

[Red Leg]

My first DG rifle was a Ruger "African" in .375 Ruger that I purchased in 2005 or so. I owned it for about six months, finally concluding I hated it. As a lover of fine firearms, it simply reminded me of something made in shop class. Soon thereafter, I acquired a custom .375 built on a FN action. I accounted for my first buffalo with it along with a slew of plains game.

Next was a Blaser S2, because like many here, I found doubles fascinating. The S2 was particularly interesting because like the R8, barrels and calibers are interchangeable. Mine has 500/416, .375, and 30-06 chamberings. The .375 set accounted for my second buffalo and both it and the '06 barrels took plains game (out to 225 yards or so).

Around this time, I had Craig Libhart build me a magnificent .404. It shoots sub MOA and would be a fine DG rifle. It has never been to Africa. Why? I am coming to that.

Not long thereafter, I handled an R8 at a friend's shop in Maryland and I was smitten. Set up as a .375 it had the heft of a 30-06 and the OA length of a .308. Fit was as perfect as the custom Libhart. The barrel collection grew to include a .404 and three different stocks. But it was in .375 configuration that it accounted for my next two buffalo and a host of plains game from Sunni to eland.

Configured in classic sporter stock and standard .375 barrel

There has also been a fine English .470 (recently sold) and I won't count the 9.3x74R's. But it is a .375, the R8 in particular, that gets the nod for an actual hunt in Africa. There is, in my experience at least, nothing yet made quite so versatile and practical for anything in Africa than Holland & Holland's perfect creation.

 

[Rare Breed]

My first DG rifle was a Ruger "African" in .375 Ruger that I purchased in 2005 or so. I owned it for about six months, finally concluding I hated it. As a lover of fine firearms, it simply reminded me of something made in shop class. Soon thereafter, I acquired a custom .375 built on a FN action. I accounted for my first buffalo with it along with a slew of plains game.
View attachment 637223

Next was a Blaser S2, because like many here, I found doubles fascinating. The S2 was particularly interesting because like the R8, barrels and calibers are interchangeable. Mine has 500/416, .375, and 30-06 chamberings. The .375 set accounted for my second buffalo and both it and the '06 barrels took plains game (out to 225 yards or so).
View attachment 637224

Around this time, I had Craig Libhart build me a magnificent .404. It shoots sub MOA and would be a fine DG rifle. It has never been to Africa. Why? I am coming to that.
View attachment 637226

Not long thereafter, I handled an R8 at a friend's shop in Maryland and I was smitten. Set up as a .375 it had the heft of a 30-06 and the OA length of a .308. Fit was as perfect as the custom Libhart. The barrel collection grew to include a .404 and three different stocks. But it was in .375 configuration that it accounted for my next two buffalo and a host of plains game from Sunni to eland.

Configured in classic sporter stock and standard .375 barrel

There has also been a fine English .470 (recently sold) and I won't count the 9.3x74R's. But it is a .375, the R8 in particular, that gets the nod for an actual hunt in Africa. There is, in my experience at least, nothing yet made quite so versatile and practical for anything in Africa than Holland & Holland's perfect creation.

@Red Leg absolutely love the wood on all your rifles!!!