Rifle Lessons Learned from the Zimbabwe Professional Hunter Proficiency Exam

[Rob404]

Nah, simply a matter of time and acclimating yourself. There are some exceptions. I shot a .505 Gibbs once and I'm done....forever. No intention of ever shooting one of those again.

But a .375 is a piece of cake now. Load up some lighter bullets and it really extends the time. The last time I shot my .458B&M, somewhere between a .458 Win and .458 Lott, I touched off more than 20 rounds. Half of those were 250gr bullets that are just a hoot to shoot. Besides if you shoot at a public range like I do, it's kind of fun to see other shooters going all giddy over the size of the bullets your shooting. (Okay, perhaps that's some sort of compensation issue)

Will you want to touch off 50 rounds the way you might a .223, doubt it. But it's not a one and done and honestly if you're planning a DG hunt, you really need to spend range time to where you're not afraid of the rifle so that you are only focused on that big bad whatever that will stomp/bite you when you cause it to leak.

Your right ,we have the usual casual shooters and Then theres a group of us serious Shooters,,who are out to do something other than make Noise,,I spent the summer working on loads for Rifles that I was considering for Plains Game,,then the 375 Bug got me,,whether or not Ill ever use it for DG who Knows,,but I like the versitility it offers

 

[spike.t]

.

I am so glad to hear yet another opine on the "American attitude", and the shoddy American products (sarcasm intended). Perhaps we Americans should spend much more of our cash to buy wonderful European rifles (if it is not made in Europe it is absolutely substandard!)

absolutely correct you all need to get rid of your substandard mass produced model t rifles :heh:, and go and buy some decent ENGLISH made rifles :hail::beer:. if you have to slum it a bit then go to that europe place hbrother: and buy something from there.....:stirring: :biggrin2:

 

[sestoppelman]

The bad extractor thing on Rem rifles was debunked years ago, wonder why it keeps popping up. Many tests have shown it to be at least as good as a Mauser if not better. My brother took one to Namibia and it performed just as well as my CZ which is to say perfect. I did however witness a guy at the range a while back whose NEW Rem 700's bolt would not close. How it ever left the factory that way is beyond me. I have used Rems for many years myself with no issues. My first was an ADL .308, great little rifle.

 

[colorado]

I bought a brand new Rem XCR II in 375 H&H in the spring of 2011 for a brown bear hunt that fall and had the same problem, the bolt wouldn't close on Remington Factory 375 H&H rounds. The extractor was too big. Bad Quality Control. Took it to my gunsmith (Kevin Weaver) and it's a sweet rifle now (Sako extractor, welded on bolt handle, rechambered to 375 Weatherby). Got my bear. I also have a CZ 550 in 500 Jeffery, totally different build quality, it's like a tank. I really like Rem 700s, for many years a BDL in 270 was my only rifle, but the CZ 550s are in a different class as far as how solidly and well built they are.

 

[tlwhhf]

Well, now that we have heard the truth about what to avoid, how about some advice on what to use. What really works and what should we (those of us who are not PHs) be looking to buy, get familiar with and use on our trip to Africa.

 

[sestoppelman]

Welcome to the forum! You may have gleaned from this thread that CZ rifles are pretty well thought of, though many will gripe about the trigger (owner adjustable!), blocky wood, too heavy, barrel too long, action rough, etc etc. I have a couple and I like them. Depending on what game you are planning on will determine the caliber. You don't need a big bore for plains game, any old elk rifle will do fine. The 9.3x62 is pretty popular and an excellent choice. One of the best rifles I have ever owned and used on two safaris was a CZ 550 American so chambered. Superb shooter and flawless in operation. Many like the newer M70 Winchesters, though I have not used one but many on here have. For plains game don't be afraid to take a Rem 700, it will do just fine as long as it has been doing the job for you at home. If going for buffalo or other dangerous critters, most will opt for a controlled round feed rifle, (read 98 Mauser type), with the long extractor that grabs the rim right out of the box and holds on to it until you pull it out. No action is foolproof, any can fail. Familiarity with your rifle counts for a lot. Caliber is less important than quality ammo and shot placement. A 30-06 in a reliable rifle with good ammo will do 90 percent of what needs doing in Africa. The .375 will do the rest if you can.

 

[JTEX]

I seriously doubt ol' Ganyana is taking into account the actual "condition" of the rifles in use. Those guys have a hard time getting new guns there, they are expensive and Appys don't get paid much. Most I've seen there aren't terribly well maintained................. I have hunted in Zim with some PHs that had some pretty pitiful excuses for rifles.

Another thing to consider....and he actually said it......is how hard it is and expensive for them to get ammunition, so I will be willing to bet I and a bunch of you, shoot a magnatude of order more than most PH's do. I am generally good for 60 or 80 rounds of centerfire a week and sometimes a ridiculous amount of rimfire when it can be had.

Now for the up close and personal, I definantly will give it over to the PHs, they have much more experience and I'm damned sure glad to have one there when it's hairy, damned glad.

The rifle stuff is kinda funny............how can it take longer to stoke the mag on a 700 than a Mauser type, all things being equal like optics and mounts?

I am sooooooooo tired of hearing the Remington extractor thing, it just ain't true. I have had a few problems with Mauser type extractors and exactly one Remington extractor break in 40 years of shooting Remington 700s of all types.

The reason most bolt guns you see in Africa are CZs is because they are much cheaper there than a 70, 700 or a 77 and also much easier to be had.

I can't think of a single manufacturer that has not had at one time another some sort of QC issues. Sure Smiths see more Remingtons, there are a lot more of them out there......

I know Mr. Heath has huge worlds of experience but this "seems" just a bit colored to me at least.

 

[Pheroze]

He had a hard time finding fault with the ABolt

 

[Velo Dog]

Amigos,

Personally I have only experienced one extractor failure and it was my fault, not so much the rifle design.
I was hunting 4 legged vermin in hot sunny weather Nevada, with a Remington Model 722 in .244 caliber.
Upon firing a shot, the empty would not extract.
The little finger nail clipping sized / shaped extractor (virtually identical to the later Model 700 extractor design), would just pop off the cartridge "rim" and the bolt would open with no shell in tow.
I had to use a cleaning rod to dislodge it.

It is unknown if a Mauser large claw type extractor would have worked on this malfunction or not, I'd like to think it would have but, do not really know for sure.
However, it was my own fault because I was so young and new to reloading (my Father was not a gun person) that, upon my first time at a neighbor's loading bench, I immediately came down with a stubborn case of Velocity Madness which lasted many years.
In other words, I felt that I simply must load every cartridge for the last inch of velocity possible, during the folly of my sordid youth.

At the end of the day, even though I have always thought the CRF design was more to my liking in general, I would not mind taking a dreaded push feed to Africa for PG but, if for no other reason than to start out on the right foot with my PH, I would prefer the CRF, if I was to hunt DG with a repeater.
For heavy/thick skinned game at close range, I prefer a large bore double and the one animal I have shot in that category (shown in my avatar) was with a .450 No2 NE double.
However, I could see myself possibly someday using a large bore repeater on such an animal.
If so, it will be the CRF variety.

My parting shot (finally ! for crying out loud) is that I really enjoy reading from time to time the article:
"Rifle Lessons Learned From The Zimbabwe Professional Hunter Proficiency Exam."
I think the first time I read it was in my rondoval at hunting camp, Limpopo District, South Africa, via "Magnum Magazine" publication, or some other Africa magazine.
It is plum full of words and lessons to live by when selecting a Dangerous Game repeater.

Best Regards,
Velo Dog.

 

[huntingbigun]

Well not being a expert African Big Game PH but just a 58 year old avid reloader, shooter & hunter that has always used Rem 700 from 1972 to date and some how managed to avoid death by taken Lion & Leopard with 375H&H in that sorry excuse of rifle. I say the bolt, extractor has never happen to me and carried my rifles by horse, airboat, 4 wheeler about anything you can think of.

Over 500 rounds thru 375 and gets pretty hot in Florida not one failure and practiced rapid fire etc. I do build some using Jewell triggers,custom barrels,, free floated barrels, bedded actions & replacement stocks. The 280AI that one shot killed most of my plains game with out one problem. so I not sure if I agree with all that old article listed above in MY experience with Rem 700 as I bet ya I have out more rounds thru 700 action then must. Any mechanical thing can break and I do not like the Rem 700 trigger but it was replaced couple years ago by Remington with new model and worked well in 375. Plus my handloads are all on the max or above.

Kind like the Winchester 70 270 versus all other brands and caliber battle because Jack Oconnor said it was the best rifle but did not shoot a factory gun but custom built rifle will get most Americans going for hours. Plus most folks do not know he died in 1978 born 1901 wrote most of his books 40 & 50's lots have changed. Not to mention 30-06 can do about everything a 270 can but not the reverse. But it was in Outdoor Life so it had to be true................

I do preform maintenance on my rifles, most folks I find never have taken their bolt apart or know how or even cleaned trigger much less replace worn extractor. Rem 700 action or copy of it can be found in almost all benchrest guns and if proper technique is not used most any bolt action rifle can jam. I will defer to the experts on controlled feed deal but for me it worked fine and Louis could not believe how fast I put 3 shoots in the lion before he told me he was dead on the first one. Did not jam, handle did not break off and my two PH lived another day. The 2 other hunters with me all had same sorry guns except for one who had the vaulted got to have feed action for Africa it jammed every day and he missed or wounded 3 animals

I rather see someone carry a rifle they know how to shoot, have memory for safety and loading than a brand new just for Africa DG rifle they may have shot 25 rounds if they lucky but heck I just a uneducated American hunter so I defer to the experts that have shot hundreds of rounds thru the actions they talk so bad about using controlled testing IE clean gun, good ammo and familer with the action,

 

[Neil-PH]

I was fortunate enough to get hold of a 460 Weatherby in the late 1980's at a bargain price......no prizes for guessing why it was so cheap........but in its defence it has been the greatest weapon in my arsenal, and has never given an ounce of trouble. The confidence in its use comes from spending time with it and practice; like any weapon anyone chooses.

Weapons are man-made and are prone to trouble shooting, one way or the other, but to be fair to the manufacturers there are quality control regulations that exist to iron out potential issues, and in the years of professional hunting I can honestly say that of all the weapons I have seen and had clients work with, there has not been ONE problem with the mechanics of the weapon itself other than man made interferences to existing systems. Perhaps I have just been lucky.

I also use the 416 Rigby in CZ, and love the weapon. As a PH, the one modification I have done is to add a peep sight, and what a difference it makes for quick and accurate shooting.

 

[ZG47]

We all have a variety of experience and individual preferences based on a mixture of logic and emotion but consider this ... Mauser 98 rifles, FN 98 spotters, Brno spotters and CZ550s are designed so that:

rubbish falls away from the bolt face and cannot get into the trigger mechanism (unless you try really hard).

Remington 700s however, are designed so that:

Rubbish gets stuck inside the bolt face and moisture and foliage are directed to the trigger via the huge uncovered slot for the trigger block lever. NB Remington calls it a 'safety' because it is not a safety catch.

I started shooting with an SLR L1a1 which is a great self-loading rifle for various reasons including reliability and ease of maintenance. You can keep an SLR functioning reliably without an M16 mutant toothbrush (for the bolt face) but trying to do the same with that silly Melvin Johnson bolt in the Armalite rifles or any push-feed bolt-action rifle is a lot more difficult.

 

[gizmo]

It has been said several times in here but i will say it again. a lot has to do with the condition of the rifle when it was bought. From my understanding many appy's and ph's alike have to buy second or third hand rifles in less than acceptable condition IMO. I'm not saying that American rifles are the best because there is a huge difference between a ruger or remmington and a H&H that took three years to build. But..... you dont have to spend tens of thousands of dollars on a rifle for it to be functional, accurate, and safe. I have Rugers, winchesters, remmingtons, and the lot. They see thousands of rounds through them every year and no serious problems. Some of my field rifles I use to guide and hunt with myself quite frankly have had the piss beat out of them and still work great. There is a lot to be said for proper maintenace. I have been a Policeman for thirteen years and my duty weapons, a glock ( no its not an American weapon but can be lumped into the same category as there is a huge misconception in America that if it isn't a 1911 45 cal then its junk) and a Rock River Ar15 have had litteraly upward of 50k rounds fired though them. Both continue to work flawless as well as all my other American made "junk". A rifle is a mechanical tool much like anything else. If its of decent quality and well maintained it will work everytime. You can by a Ferrari but if you dont take care of it I promise it will break eventually. Not to mention everything mechanical eventually breaks at somepoint. period. Two world wars have been fought and won, I might add, with the use of these "junk" winchesters, browning, and remmingtons. As far as the comment about American only learning to shoot through "military training" I say this. You show me a more effective fighting force anywhere in the world. The training given to our military and police here in the states rivals any training anywhere in the world. I know, I've been through it. While I wasn't in the military ALL of my formal weapons based training I have had as a policeman is modeled after the military. Not to mention few people, on average apples to apples, are going to be able to compete with the average American recreational shooter. We have the luxury of, for the most part, being able to shoot as much as we wish. Americans have fought and won many wars with our American made riflles and bailed Europe out twice with them. I seem to recall the British using our "junk" in both World Wars because half of what they had was absolute crap or outdated. This isn't even scratching the serfice of the absolutly worthless arms the French had. Hunters here in America spend A LOT of time in the field every year in conditions every bit as trying on equipment as can be found in Africa or anywhere else in the world for that matter. If our guns were so poorly built then why would millions, yes millions of shooters still use them. I respect the gentleman in the article's accomplishments and experience but.... he is obviously bias and there, as mentioned before, are several variables left out such as where the rifles came from, what condition they were in, if they had been maintained propeerly, etc... Yes if I could affoard a 60 to 80k rifle I might buy a fine English gun. That being said probably not because I could take several trips to Africa with the "junk" I have used for years for the cost of one. Several million American hunters and shooters as well as untold numbers of people around the world that shoot American firearms can't all be wrong.

 

[Brian Cameron]

This man told it like it is. Hats off to this fine gentleman. The Winchester M70 Classic Safari would benefit by being built like a Dakota Arms Model 76. IMHO the tang safety is still the best safety on a dangerous big game rifle. I loved this article and think this is the way dangerous game rifles ought to be tested and rated before being sold to us as the consumer as these people do before a person passes a test for hunting privileges on dangerous game in Africa. Just as this man stated, Americans are duped into buying total crap on the store front level that a custom redo is almost mandatory before a rifle is ready to save the firer's life in a supreme tight spot that happens more times than not. Loved this article.

 

[CAustin]

Do tell. I have taken three of the big five with one of those worthless Rugers with no issues. Then I have taken 19 plains game with a Ruger #1.
Here is the way I look at it........I stick a round in the chamber, I aim at the animal, I pull the trigger and when I aimed properly the animal falls dead.
What else need be required of a hunting rifle? Yep if you want to get of two rounds very fast buy a double......or allow semi automatic. Would put a Browning BAR in 30-06 into any fight or hunt!
Like Gizmo said American rifles have bested the enemy in two world wars.
Any rifle is subject to jamming when it hasn't been properly cared for.
Anyway it's fun to hear someone run down American firearms! We sure build and sell a lot of them.

 

[Brian Cameron]

Do tell. I have taken three of the big five with one of those worthless Rugers with no issues. Then I have taken 19 plains game with a Ruger #1.
Here is the way I look at it........I stick a round in the chamber, I aim at the animal, I pull the trigger and when I aimed properly the animal falls dead.
What else need be required of a hunting rifle? Yep if you want to get of two rounds very fast buy a double......or allow semi automatic. Would put a Browning BAR in 30-06 into any fight or hunt!
Like Gizmo said American rifles have bested the enemy in two world wars.
Any rifle is subject to jamming when it hasn't been properly cared for.
Anyway it's fun to hear someone run down American firearms! We sure build and sell a lot of them.

Obviously you must of not read this fine gentlemans article in full. The over-veiw was IN A TIGHT 99% of American store bought rifles wouldn't function as needed as intended if your life was dependent on them. Oh sure if shot placement and bullet performance works as intended your golden. It's the margin of error that these two that can get a new hunter unaware of the dangers into if bullet performance and shot placement go awry. Your argument is moot here budro, you know as well as I these things has happened going to continue to happen all on account of lack of experience in the dangerous game arena. This is why Don mentioned that the push feeds ought to stay to the lighter plains game or the bench where all the naysayers rub shoulders lol. And he is right you know he's right I know he's right bout the sales of junk the American public buys and this is the sad part, they think they got the best rifle available by reading what some gun writer's, have which been paid to talk up said fire arm, have made his particular fire arm look like the dragon slayer from hell lol. My question to you is why do you slam this guys article when you know everything he said is a 100% true. You obviously know what your doing from your experience's if you've done what you've boasted here and that's neither here nor there to me. What this guys saying is if firearms manufacturer's are going to label a weapon as a dangerous game weapon, it might ought to operate IN A TIGHT like one if needed in said situation. He pointed tbe flaws out good and bad, throwed in some comical bullshit while at it and in general told it like it was. I'm from alaska usa and arm wrestle 12ft brownie's with a 460 A-Square Short in a Winchester M70 Classic Safari at distance, a 450 Alaskan in a Winchester 1886 lever-action where when we're whispering in each others ear on who's fixing to do who. I've got a free bear hunt to the first som-bitch that can tell me they hunt with a knife huntin brown bear. I'm much obliged by being in such company of all of us here on the comment page but I'm simply purity hard to impress just as this fine gentlemans article here by the man himself ... Don Heath

 

[Ray B]

Congratulations!!! You've misused Obviously, insulted someone's mother, neither of which you know, and have shown that your vocabulary was obtained from third grade boys whispering words, the meaning of which they do not know. Best wishes to your continued education. :<)

 

[Brian Cameron]

Congratulations!!! You've misused Obviously, insulted someone's mother, neither of which you know, and have shown that your vocabulary was obtained from third grade boys whispering words, the meaning of which they do not know. Best wishes to your continued education. :<)

Your the type of rookie ol'don in his fabulously well put together article was tying to protect from yourself by tying to learn you up on what the firearm you throwed your hard earned money away on is supposed to do lol ... good thing it wasn't me tying to learn you up cause I'd just let you be and let the gene pool sort itself out and then get a good chuckle lol have fine and splendid day my little one

 

[Ray B]

Are you that poor of a typist, or are you that poor with grammar/spelling?

 

[Brian Cameron]

Congratulations!!! You've misused Obviously, insulted someone's mother, neither of which you know, and have shown that your vocabulary was obtained from third grade boys whispering words, the meaning of which they do not know. Best wishes to your continued education. :<)

Are you that poor of a typist, or are you that poor with grammar/spelling?

Our country is in parallel at the moment on account of left minded individual's of your nature my friend, while pointing that inexperienced small finger of your's at me don't forget you've got the other three pointing at you cause your thumbs been cut off by sticking it where it don't be long lol I can tell your from populated area because you talk like your from a zoo ... better you than me I'll pass thank you. Went to college been here done that and your still right where you started not very smart. I'm not the least worried cause I know the gene pools in the cities are already sorting themselves out by just the last few posts I've read of your's it's a scary world out here today and I'm glad I'm here and your there lol now lets stay with the original threads objective that seems to have blowed completely over your head. Now back to what I was saying before I was rudely interrupted here, Mr. Don Heath's article is right on time and tells it like it is. Truth is your probably a CEO of one of these gun manufacturer's he's put to shame. Great article by Don Heath