SOUTH AFRICA: Pawprint Safaris Group Hunt My Quest For A Big Waterbuck

[gillettehunter]

Dang that Rust is a real mess. That is a real problem. I always wish that you could get to the bottom of who screwed up and why. Not a chance tho. Sorry about your rifle.
Bruce

 

[Hank2211]

Great write-up so far and beautiful trophies! Really sympathize about all the travel back and forth to JNB. You're in Africa, and you want to be enjoying it, not on highways for 4-5 hours/day.

Thanks for the pictures of the rust. I've never seen that before as a result of an airplane trip. I assume it could happen if the guns were kept in an unheated luggage compartment, and they go from -50 to +25 in a short period of time, but you'd think the air in the case would have to be pretty humid when they were first stowed - and it must have happened before they got to JNB (ATL?). It still takes a bit of time for rust to develop. Or else the case was left out in the rain. Either way, not what you pay for.

I took rust removal products to the Cameroon jungle just because of the rain and humidity, but have never thought of packing that stuff for trips to South Africa. Good for you for thinking of it - lesson learned for me!

 

[MAdcox]

Beautiful Sable!
Hope you’re able to get some satisfaction on the gun issues. Sounds like a mess to have to deal with on a hunt. But it looks like you sure didn’t let it keep you from having a great trip with your dad.

 

[Nyati]

Great report, very good trophies !

 

[Ridgewalker]

Art II, that is unbelievable a gun could get that badly damaged in such a brief time! Delta just keeps digging themselves a deeper hole. Just wish there was a good option. Someone should be losing a job over this IMO.

 

[tarbe]

Note to self...cosmoline!

Yikes!

 

[johnnyblues]

Well done. Congratulations

 

[Art Lambart II]

Day 4

I get to sleep in this morning because I finally get to sight in my own guns. Carlos and I meet at 6:30 finalize the days plan and eat breakfast. By 7am we are at the range to sight in my T/C Encore in 300 Win Mag, two shots and I’m good to go. This morning we plan to hunt a nearby property for Waterbuck, Carlos tell me the terrain is not very hilly but it is very thick and difficult to stalk. His description was fairly accurate but was he call very thick I would call almost impenetrable. Carlos and I stooped, ducked, sidestepped and crawled our way down game trail after game trail but no waterbuck. During one of our stops Carlos and I changed the plan, this property only has one water hole so we decide to set-up a blind downwind of the water hole and wait for a thirsty Waterbuck. On our way to the waterhole we encountered what I’ll call the “African Red Bush Cow” not just one but about 30 of them. Carlos tells me that the ranchers use them for “Tick Management”, he explains that the cows are fairly easy to round up and treat for ticks and that it is common practice in the area. Carlos and I quickly find an excellent spot for a blind and get to work, 30 minutes later we are ready and waiting. Soon we see movement, it’s one of the cows coming for a drink, it’s not one of the cows its all of the cows, soon they set up a great wall of beef around the waterhole and drink their fill, then laydown to sun themselves. Around 11am the cows start to move around and a nice 13” warthog comes in for a drink, I already have two hogs that size so I let him walk, then around noon an Ostridge shows up for a drink. It’s close to 2pm so we decide to head for a different property and try for a specific old and sneaky Waterbuck. This new property is very large and diverse, it had hills, valleys, deep overgrown ravines, savannas, ponds and tall grass lands. I had only read about hunters following lions into the tall grass and how dangerous it is but in the back of my mind I thought “it can’t be that bad, it’s just grass”. After walking thru that sea of tan, with the stalks waving over my head and limiting my sight to 6 – 8 feet in every direction I completely understand why Francis Macomber was afraid. An hour before sunset as if on que this property came alive, the plains game appeared everywhere, impala, blesbok, zebra, blue wildebeest, kudu, bushbuck, waterbuck cows but not a single waterbuck bull. It’s four days into my hunt and I haven’t seen a waterbuck bull, plenty of cows but no bulls. During the final minutes of this hunt with the sun sinking low behind the mountains I realize I need to make some changes to my rifle set-up so on the drive back I ask Carlos is he has any camo tape I need to dull my scope if we keep hunting these field edges. He smiles and said “I’m glad you asked because I didn’t know how to ask you to tape up your scope”. Drinks, dinner and more drinks rounds out the evening and another great day at Pawprint Safaris.

 

[375 Ruger Fan]

Dang that Rust is a real mess. That is a real problem. I always wish that you could get to the bottom of who screwed up and why. Not a chance tho. Sorry about your rifle.
Bruce

Art II, that is unbelievable a gun could get that badly damaged in such a brief time! Delta just keeps digging themselves a deeper hole. Just wish there was a good option. Someone should be losing a job over this IMO.

I'm wondering if this can be attributed to improper barrel break in procedure...........

BTW, very nice sable!

 

[Art Lambart II]

Had I oiled the exterior of the gun or packed it in a sleeve my gun would have been fine but I trusted Delta to deliver my guns on time and I paid the price. Next time I'll use oil.

 

[Art Lambart II]

Day 5

It’s another cold morning in South Africa and my safari is half over, still plenty of time to get my Waterbuck. Carlos and I have two options this morning return to the really thick property and hunt the water hole or return to the property with the tall grass. Several years ago @CAustin took a gold medal Bushbuck off the property with the tall grass so today my dad is after one of his sons on that same property, so Carlos and I decide to hunt the water hole. With my scope freshly taped and my shiny nickel plated rounds in my pocket and not on my rifle stock we head out for the days hunt. The morning is still cool so we decide to stalk until 9am and see what we can find. The brush is thick, really thick and calls for offhand snap shooting, that’s ok if you’re the first guy in line but really tough if you’re not. Around 8:30 we jump two waterbuck, one is a shooter the other we didn’t see well enough to make an assessment. With are quarry on its feet we head to the water hole and wait for our plan to work. It’s warner than the day before and the time passes easily. Several audio books downloaded to my phone and a pair of ear buds make days like these enjoyable. At 10am the heard of Bush Cows show up for their morning drink then laydown in the warm African sun. Sometime around 11am that same 13” warthog showed up again from the same direction, according to Carlos “That hog has a short time to live”. Shortly after the warthog left the Ostridge showed up and hung around for about 40 minutes. Lunch came and went without an antelope of any type coming to drink so we settled in for the wait until “Prime Time”. At 2pm or so the Bush Cows decide it’s time for a snack and they all head our way. Carlos and I did such a good job building that blind that it looked like the tastiest thing in the area to those cows and on they came. At the time I was laughing too hard to take any pictures but the memory is clear in my mind. Six cow started eating our blind and Carlos snatched up the shooting sticks and a handful of dirt clods and started chasing the cows away, soon they moved off and headed back to the water hole only to return to the blind 20 minutes later. Again Carlos defended our blind with dirt clods and shooting sticks and again the cows retreated to the water hole. Ten minutes later the cows returned for their third assault but this time Carlos went on the offensive and chased them off in a different direction. After this third bombardment of dirt clods the cows finally decided to move on. The water hole remained quiet until 30 minutes before sunset when a Waterbuck bull showed up for a drink, unfortunately he was a juvenile so all we could do was watch him drink and let him grow. Next a trophy Duiker came to the water hole and I passed on him hoping that large Waterbuck would show up. Finally a Jackal came in for a drink and I passed on him as well, I now the rule “see a jackal shot a jackal but I was hunting Waterbuck. Darkness soon ended our hunt and we headed back to the lodge to recount the day’s events. The story of Carlos’s stalwart defense of our blind was the highlight of the evening.

 

[nztimb]

Was seeing that in my minds eye as I read it through.

 

[Art Lambart II]

Day 6

Today is a special day I get to hunt with my father, we’ll be hunting for his Kudu and my Waterbuck. Dad isn’t hunting for just any Kudu he wants one that’s 55” or larger, we’ve seen several 52 maybe 53 inch Kudu’s but nothing that measured up to his standards. Carlos, dad and I drive out to “Hidders Hideout” to pick-up Christian our driver for the day. We put a plan together and head off to a property none of us have hunted before. I guess you would call this property long and narrow (if you call 1 mile narrow) but its only fenced on three sides the fourth side (one of the narrow ones) is one of the steep rocky Hills / Mountains so the animals can travel freely across the mountain into and out of this property. As we drive the property we realize that this place looks like Kudu heaven, we start to see Kudu cows and smaller bulls but nothing in the 55 inch range. We continue to look for Kudu until lunchtime then drive back to “Hidders Hideout” to have lunch then look for my Waterbuck. During lunch we spot a nice Kudu bull that we had seen every time we hunted this piece of property, he soon earned the name “Mañana”, if Dad didn’t take a Kudu this afternoon he would come back tomorrow and hunt him. After lunch we changed focus to my Waterbuck and headed to a grassy area of the property the waterbucks frequented. After several minutes of driving and glassing we spot a small heard of waterbuck cows and decide to stalk in closer to see if a bull is with them. Moving thru the tall grass keeping the occasional bush between us and the cows we manage to close to 100 yards. We stop and glass but don’t see a bull anywhere, we move closer and cows get nervous and start moving away, again there is no bull in site. We continue to follow the cows thru the grass but we never did spot a bull, we almost stepped on a warthog or two but that Waterbuck bull eluded us again. Its 3:30 and we decide to head back to Kudu heaven and continue to hunt for Dads Kudu, we saw lots of cows and 50 – 53” bulls but nothing dad was willing to shoot. As night falls we drop Christian off and head back to camp for dinner, castles and bourbon or was that castles, dinner and bourbon.

 

[CAustin]

Day 6

Today is a special day I get to hunt with my father, we’ll be hunting for his Kudu and my Waterbuck. Dad isn’t hunting for just any Kudu he wants one that’s 55” or larger, we’ve seen several 52 maybe 53 inch Kudu’s but nothing that measured up to his standards. Carlos, dad and I drive out to “Hidders Hideout” to pick-up Christian our driver for the day. We put a plan together and head off to a property none of us have hunted before. I guess you would call this property long and narrow (if you call 1 mile narrow) but its only fenced on three sides the fourth side (one of the narrow ones) is one of the steep rocky Hills / Mountains so the animals can travel freely across the mountain into and out of this property. As we drive the property we realize that this place looks like Kudu heaven, we start to see Kudu cows and smaller bulls but nothing in the 55 inch range. We continue to look for Kudu until lunchtime then drive back to “Hidders Hideout” to have lunch then look for my Waterbuck. During lunch we spot a nice Kudu bull that we had seen every time we hunted this piece of property, he soon earned the name “Mañana”, if Dad didn’t take a Kudu this afternoon he would come back tomorrow and hunt him. After lunch we changed focus to my Waterbuck and headed to a grassy area of the property the waterbucks frequented. After several minutes of driving and glassing we spot a small heard of waterbuck cows and decide to stalk in closer to see if a bull is with them. Moving thru the tall grass keeping the occasional bush between us and the cows we manage to close to 100 yards. We stop and glass but don’t see a bull anywhere, we move closer and cows get nervous and start moving away, again there is no bull in site. We continue to follow the cows thru the grass but we never did spot a bull, we almost stepped on a warthog or two but that Waterbuck bull eluded us again. Its 3:30 and we decide to head back to Kudu heaven and continue to hunt for Dads Kudu, we saw lots of cows and 50 – 53” bulls but nothing dad was willing to shoot. As night falls we drop Christian off and head back to camp for dinner, castles and bourbon or was that castles, dinner and bourbon.

Well for your dad and myself the bourbon came first.

 

[kudukid]

Great report so far. Is that "big waterbuck" still running around in Africa or is there more to this story?

 

[Shootist43]

I'm the Dad. There's more.

 

[Ridgewalker]

Art II, I would like to hear “the rest of the story”, but I don’t mind you taking a break to help pay my SS so I can afford my next trip.
Ill have to admit I am a little anxious to read some more of your report having already cheated and seen the results on Facebook!

 

[Art Lambart II]

Day 7

Today @CAustin, Carlos and I are driving to an hour and a half away to hunt Springbuck, Black Wildebeest and maybe Red Hartebeest. As we drive to the concession Carlos goes over the type of hunting we’ll be doing and how long are shots will be, he’s confident that we can get to within 200 yards of our quarry and everyone is confident we can make that shot. We arrive at the property to pick up our drive and meet the owner in the process, during or conversation the owner mentions that there is a very nice Duiker on the property, this gets Charlies attention and now we’ve added Duiker to the list. As we start our drive thru the property Carlos and our driver point out herds of Springbuck and start to teach me how to identify a good ram from a bad one and what to look for in a real trophy. We slowly drive thru the property and I notice a very rounded brown rock about 10 yards off the road laying in the grass, as we draw even with the rock we slow down to look at a heard of wildebeest and that rock turns into a 6” Duiker, he raises his head and skips off into the tall grass, yes it was a 6” Duiker, I’m an old white guy I know what 6 inches looks like (get your mind out of the gutter, US paper bills are 6” long). Charlie, Carlos and our drive climb off the truck and head off in hot pursuit, a quite 20 minutes later they return to the truck empty handed.

Charlie was up first for Springbuck and we soon saw a lone male in the distance and moved closer to take a better look. After several minutes of glassing the decision was made to take this ram, the details of this hunt can be found in Charlies post but the important part for my hunt was that Charlie made a perfect 200 yard shot with a 375 H&H and the Springbuck still traveled 200 yards up hill before going down. After taking pictures of Charlies Springbuck we started to look for one for me, 40 minutes later we came across a group of eight springbucks with a really nice ram. We positioned the truck for a shot and waited for a good broadside shot, at 190 yards the ram offered me the shot we were looking for and I squeezed the trigger. Carlos said the shot was high as I watched the ram spring off into the distance, a clean miss. I knew the fault was somehow mine and I was a bit shaken by the miss. We spent the next hour and forty minutes looking for another springbuck or a good black wildebeest, as luck would have it we ran across the same ram and the group of eight springbucks. This time the shot was 220 yards and I took carful aim and squeezed the trigger, the ram went straight down all four feet pointing at the sky. Smiles, high fives and relief that I had made a good shot, we climbed off the truck and headed for my trophy to take pictures. When we got to within forty yards of the springbuck the ram got to his feet and started to move away from us. As we watched in shock and disbelief the ram got further and further away, it was at this point that we realized the shooting sticks where in the truck, Carlos make a mad dash for the truck to retrieve the shooting sticks, it seemed like only a few seconds passed but by the time Carlos got back and set the sticks up the ram was an estimated 200 yards away, I shoot, Carlos yells HIGH and the ram moves on. The ram is not moving well, there is no spring to his movements and he clearly has issues with one of this front legs but even on three legs the rams pace forces us to run up hill to keep up and close the distance. My next shot comes at 250 yards but my heart is racing and the scope won’t settle for as long as I would like, I shoot and Carlos yells high, the ram starts moving again and our run up hill continues. Up ahead we can see where the ram is headed, a wooded hill top four hundred yards away. We need to reach the trees before the ram and Carlos calls for more speed. Somehow I reach the wood line before the ram and set up for a fourth shot. As I try to catch my breath and calm myself for this next shoot the ram starts to veer away, I take aim and fire, this time there is no cry of high but the ram keeps moving. We lose site of the ram as he crests a hill and moves down the far side, we again start our pursuit but as we crest the same hill the ram did our driver stops and says he’s down. Thank God, I can finally breathe again. As it turned out I hit the ram with 3 of my 4 shots, the first shot was high but left a softball sized exit hole completely destroying his right shoulder, the second or third shot grazed his neck and the fourth shot was thru his heart. Now it’s time to focus on my Black Wildebeest, an animal known for its toughness and ability to absorb lead. After the Springbuck my confidence is shaken, not in my rifle or ammunition but in my own shooting, we all have bad days at the range I’m hoping today is not one of those bad days. Our driver knows where the larger bulls hang out this time of the afternoon and soon we find a good bull and set up for another 200 yard shot. The pressure is on, the last thing I want to do is make a bad shot, I take my time and make sure my rest is rock solid and everything is perfect before I squeezes the trigger. Boom, Whack, the bull goes straight down, kicks once and never moves again. My shot was a little higher than I had intended but I can’t argue with DRT. With all these high shots I start to question my rifle and think something must be wrong, I start to inspect my rifle and quickly discover it was all me. In order for my scope to compensate for bullet drop at 200 yards my scope need to be set on 8 power, it was still set on 5 power, the difference between 5 power and 8 power for the first circle down on a Nikon BDC reticle for my load is 56 yards, no wonder all my 200 yard shots where high.

It’s about 2pm and we decide to try for a large Red Hartebeest I set my scope on 8 power and off we go. In less than an hour we find a herd of 40 or so Red Hartebeest with one good looking bull. Unfortunately all we can see is the head of our bull but we can’t get the truck any closer. Charlie recommends that Carlos, the driver and I get off the truck and stalk thru the trees on our right to try and get closer. We put Charlies plan into action and it works great right until Carlos sets up the shooting sticks. At this point the herd gets uneasy and moves down the backside of the hill and we loss site of them. Using the hill as cover we move closer and discover the herd has moved on, our drives says I know where they’re going follow me. Over the next 2 miles our driver said that two more times “I know where they’re going follow me”. Finally we catch up with them and get into a good shooting position but our herd of 40 is down to 20 and our bull must be with the other group. The two mile walk back to the truck was more like a speed walk rather than a casual walk thru a field, I guess Carlos didn’t think our pursuit of the Springbok was enough exercise for the day.

 

[nztimb]

That really illustrates the disadvantage of the so called "improved" scopes of today with thier aim point so conveniently marked it but only with a certain power reading.
The traditional 200 yd zero for the common hunting cartridges has a 250 yard window where the shot will be about 4 inches low and 8 inches low at 300. For almost all of the shots we might take inside 250yds there is no calculating to do, just aim, hold and shoot.
Glad it all worked out though and that you got the animals you worked so hard for.

 

[Ridgewalker]

Now that’s a hunt Art II! You keep tracking them until you finally wear them out.
Man springbucks just don’t look that tough! Of course it’s Africa and everything is tough!
I’m really enjoying your report...the good, the bad, and the ugly! Fun reading! Thanks!