ZIMBABWE: Charlton McCallum Safaris Oct 2021

[375Fox]

Sept 23 Day 3 - We head out and check pans along Mozambique border. We find buffalo, general plains game, and some roan tracks, but all the roan keep walking with wind. We see some kudu, impala, baboons, duiker, then about 11 am we see a small herd of roan with some bulls (running as fast as possible, a continuing trend during this hunt with roan). We eat lunch and set up at a water pan I’m going to call pan 1 for this report. Our trackers go and set up buffalo ribs as hyena bait at Nemwa while we watch this water pan mid-day. No activity. Our trackers return about 330 pm and say there is fresh eland tracks, a bull and cow, across the road since they left not far down road. Decision now is follow up on roan we saw earlier or follow eland. Alan asks me and I say let’s follow eland. We start track at 4 pm and they head straight to the water pan we just left. Coming in right behind where we were sitting, so we were very close! It gets dark and we head back to camp. End of day 3.

 

[Kevin Peacocke]

Very nice buffalo @375Fox, and the kudu looks good and old. Your trip in sounds hitchless, so good having people to meet you.

 

[Randy F]

Congratulations! Love the spread on that Kudu and what a grand old buff bull!

 

[375Fox]

Sept 24 Day 4 - starts with usual routine, breakfast and start from camp at 0530. On the access road leaving camp we find a fresh sable bull track. Alan decides this is a track to follow. We start on track at 0545, but the ground in this area is extremely hard and we are making very slow progress. He sends our driver Dube to check a waterhole near the airstrip and we skip ahead to some water pools in dry river bed, but sable hasn’t been to either. We start what turns out to be a very long day on this track. This sable goes into every form of terrain here, hard burnt ground, tall grass, thick brush, forest, everything. He won’t walk in predictable pattern, constantly changes direction, and we only occasionally find sign he’s eating or where he rubbed his horns. We think maybe he’s on a territory walk. We finally start to make some real progress on this track. We found a burnt area where he was eating green grass and found some droppings that were still wet at 3 pm. At 3:30 pm, we discovered why he was constantly changing direction and covering so much territory. His track finally met the tracks from a group of sable cows the day before, he’s trying to rejoin them. We couldn’t stay on his individual track anymore and had to call it off. Alan thinks he may be heading to water pan 1 to drink, so we take off there in land cruiser. This was really some of the best tracking I’ve ever seen. We were on this track from 0545 am to 3:30 pm and 8.5 miles on my phone. We lost the track several times, but Alan and trackers always managed to get back on it.
We reach water pan 1, no sable, but we do find really fresh roan tracks. Wind isn’t ideal, but we try and follow them up. They are only about a mile from the pan but they get our scent and are gone. I set my second trail camera up here before we leave.
We check our hyena bait and camera at Nemwa. The hyenas aren’t touching bait but are definitely interested. We see a really big but unfortunately only one horned kudu near Nemwa, also saw a few duikers and other kudu today. I’m thinking sable are going to be very difficult to get in this area because not many based on sign we are seeing.

 

[375Fox]

Here are some of the photos from the camera at Nemwa to this point. The game visiting this waterhole was actually very localized and we started recognizing individuals after a few days. There were 3 lone roan bulls visiting each night, but would always walk with the wind so we unfortunately couldn’t track them. I really enjoy bringing a trail camera with me. I did ask outfitter if this was practical first and they actually gave us a lot of value during hunt.

 

[Nyati]

So far...nice buff And kudu

 

[375Fox]

Sept 25 Day 5 - Our focus at this point is roan or sable. We head to Nemwa and check for sign and check my camera. Unfortunately lone roan bulls walked with wind (as they will this entire trip). We head to pan 1 find eland and sable herd tracks from the night, but also walking with wind. We check pans along the Mozambique border and find some roan sign at most, but nothing worth following. Buffalo sign is at most every pan. Decide to sit and watch what I’m going to call pan 2. We park a ways away and stalk in. See lots of impala. We sit against tree with a view of the water. Not much activity for a while but some impala start coming in. It’s late in morning and Alan tells me one is very good for area. I decide I’m going to take it, shoot about 30 yards from sitting position. We get it loaded up. We set up lunch at pan 1 for mid-day and send the rest of team back to camp with impala.

We eat lunch and watch water hole. A herd of sable cows tries to come in. Wind and our blind is good, but they sense something and stop short of waterhole in brush. They hang out about 10 minutes and disappear. About 15 minutes later, a sable bull tries to come in. We never saw him, but he came in from slightly downwind of us and snorted for a couple minutes before moving off. These are first sable we’ve actually seen so far in trip. I start closing my eyes and opening every few minutes to check water, it’s better for me than moving too much I decide. At 2 pm Alan grabs my shoulder and says old sable bull coming in on right. He stops exact same spot as cows did and knows something is off. He starts to turn and run. Alan whistles and he momentarily stops. I shoot offhand standing at 60 yards quickly and drop him with a high shot. I run as fast as I can and put another one in him up close. Alan said all he saw was my dust! We have our sable down, a beautiful old bull. He measures 36.5 inches and keeps mass through his length. We call the rest of our team and they drive in. They are all really excited to have this sable down. All are convinced this is the same bull we tracked so far yesterday. Something I really liked seeing this trip, after we finished our photos, our trackers and game scouts would always do their own trophy photos. It was really nice to see them excited about the trophies too and not just doing a job. Take sable back to camp. Head out for a drive late afternoon. End of day 5.

 

[Rare Breed]

Sept 23 Day 3 - We head out and check pans along Mozambique border. We find buffalo, general plains game, and some roan tracks, but all the roan keep walking with wind. We see some kudu, impala, baboons, duiker, then about 11 am we see a small herd of roan with some bulls (running as fast as possible, a continuing trend during this hunt with roan). We eat lunch and set up at a water pan I’m going to call pan 1 for this report. Our trackers go and set up buffalo ribs as hyena bait at Nemwa while we watch this water pan mid-day. No activity. Our trackers return about 330 pm and say there is fresh eland tracks, a bull and cow, across the road since they left not far down road. Decision now is follow up on roan we saw earlier or follow eland. Alan asks me and I say let’s follow eland. We start track at 4 pm and they head straight to the water pan we just left. Coming in right behind where we were sitting, so we were very close! It gets dark and we head back to camp. End of day 3.

Great Kudu and Buff!!!

 

[Kevin Peacocke]

Sept 25 Day 5 - Our focus at this point is roan or sable. We head to Nemwa and check for sign and check my camera. Unfortunately lone roan bulls walked with wind (as they will this entire trip). We head to pan 1 find eland and sable herd tracks from the night, but also walking with wind. We check pans along the Mozambique border and find some roan sign at most, but nothing worth following. Buffalo sign is at most every pan. Decide to sit and watch what I’m going to call pan 2. We park a ways away and stalk in. See lots of impala. We sit against tree with a view of the water. Not much activity for a while but some impala start coming in. It’s late in morning and Alan tells me one is very good for area. I decide I’m going to take it, shoot about 30 yards from sitting position. We get it loaded up. We set up lunch at pan 1 for mid-day and send the rest of team back to camp with impala.
View attachment 429699We eat lunch and watch water hole. A herd of sable cows tries to come in. Wind and our blind is good, but they sense something and stop short of waterhole in brush. They hang out about 10 minutes and disappear. About 15 minutes later, a sable bull tries to come in. We never saw him, but he came in from slightly downwind of us and snorted for a couple minutes before moving off. These are first sable we’ve actually seen so far in trip. I start closing my eyes and opening every few minutes to check water, it’s better for me than moving too much I decide. At 2 pm Alan grabs my shoulder and says old sable bull coming in on right. He stops exact same spot as cows did and knows something is off. He starts to turn and run. Alan whistles and he momentarily stops. I shoot offhand standing at 60 yards quickly and drop him with a high shot. I run as fast as I can and put another one in him up close. Alan said all he saw was my dust! We have our sable down, a beautiful old bull. He measures 36.5 inches and keeps mass through his length. We call the rest of our team and they drive in. They are all really excited to have this sable down. All are convinced this is the same bull we tracked so far yesterday. Something I really liked seeing this trip, after we finished our photos, our trackers and game scouts would always do their own trophy photos. It was really nice to see them excited about the trophies too and not just doing a job. Take sable back to camp. Head out for a drive late afternoon. End of day 5.
View attachment 429700View attachment 429701

That sable is a beauty.

 

[VertigoBE]

Congratulations @375Fox Some very nice animals so far! Can't wait for the rest of the report. Love that heavy mass on the sable, and of course the dugga boy is a great specimen too!

Cheers!

 

[KHohertz]

Congratulations on a great hunt. Fantastic trophies. What was the temperatures like while you were there? I will be hunting there the exact same dates next year with Alan for Elephant.

 

[375Fox]

Congratulations on a great hunt. Fantastic trophies. What was the temperatures like while you were there? I will be hunting there the exact same dates next year with Alan for Elephant.

Alan said I didn’t have typical late September early October weather. Most days I think were low 90s only 3 or 4 really hot days over 100 where it was tough initially to sleep at night. We had a couple days with cloud cover that felt much cooler and also had a good wind on most days. The report posted just before mine seemed to get some much hotter weather.

 

[375Fox]

Sept 26 Day 6 - We head to Nemwa to start again and check for tracks there and our hyena bait activity. The trail camera and tracks show the bait has brought the hyenas in to the pan but they won’t touch bait while it’s hanging surprisingly. We drive to pan 1 and find roan tracks on the road with a good wind. We check my trail camera at the pan and see they were just there at 3 am. We start tracking and catch up with them maybe 2 miles later. We spot the impala with them first then spot the roan. They are in very thick cover. We start to try and stalk in but the roan catch movement and start to run when we are about 100 yards away. They keep running for quite a while then finally turn with the wind. We send one tracker back to get the truck and we start towards the road while trying to possibly get in front of the herd of roan. We actually manage to get in front of this herd with a favorable wind. They are in tall grass along a dry river bed and walking. We parallel the herd trying to get a look, but difficult to see because of the tall grass and the herd is quite spread out. We do spot at least one bull, but herd crosses dry river and this makes it more difficult to follow them. We partially spook them. Alan thinks they are heading to what I’ll call pan 3. We get in the truck and drive there hoping they’ll come to water. We sit but limited activity just some impala and baboons. We head towards pan 2 and find fresh roan tracks again with an ok wind and start to follow. After a mile or two we catch up to herd, but it’s very noisy walking on the dry grass and leaf litter and the herd hears us and runs before we get a chance to see them, maybe 150 yards in front of us. We head back to truck and stalk up to pan 2. We bump a herd of roan trying to come into water but they take off into Mozambique. We make a final drive past remaining pans in last hour of light. We see a lone old sable bull walking calmly and further on we see a herd of sable cows with two younger bulls. We did a lot of tracking today and encountered 3 herds of roan, just very difficult to approach. These guys are very experienced trackers, also interesting to note they listen for the ox peckers with the herds of roan. End of day 6.

 

[375Fox]

Sept 27 Day 7 - Head to Nemwa for our usual routine, but today on the waterline cut there are two bushpigs just off side of road. We stop truck and stalk back trying to get a shot. Unfortunately the quota specifies male bushpig only so we can’t just shoot a big one like I’ve done in past. Alan identifies both as male bushpigs, but they’re aware of us now and they have repositioned in the thick brush. I just can’t see them even though Alan still can. We get on their track and try to get on them again, but no luck. Continue to Nemwa. The camera is getting pretty routine at this point, hyena are still interested in our bait but not touching it, and the regular 3 lone roan bulls have all walked out with the wind again. We make the drive through all the pans, we see kudu, impala, warthog but very limited fresh roan sign today. We have a small herd of roan cross the road near pan 1 in front of truck, but all cows and calves. We eat lunch and set up mid-day at Nemwa hoping for a bushbuck coming in to the water hole. See lots of kudu, impala, baboons, and two female bushbuck but no ram. Alan thinks pan 2 may be our best bet for this evening. We head for pan 2 and get set up overlooking the water hoping the roan try to come to water again like yesterday evening. We are set up for a while and a lone impala tries to come in to water. The impala in this area are extremely skittish around water and this one was no different. He tried to come to water for 30 minutes one step at a time. This was a really unique impala, one normal nice horn and the other horn equally long growing left instead of up. I considered shooting him but don’t want to ruin a potential roan hunt. This impala continues coming closer, 25 yards at one point. The mopane flies are relentless and thick, but we can’t move or we will scare off this impala. Alan has a face mask but I forgot my bug net, so I’m trying to think about anything else to not move and scare off this impala. The impala finally passes us. Just then the herd of roan comes in to drink with a big bull leading the herd. Alan says this is our bull. I get on my knee and take the shot at about 70 yards. It’s a high lung/spine shot and drops him instantly. I send another shot, but this one is higher still, but he is not going anywhere. We get up to our roan. It’s a beautiful 27.5” bull.
This was a really unique opportunity. The first Roan permit for a trophy hunter was only issued in 2019 in Zimbabwe. I’m not aware of any taken in 2020 and supposedly there are 3 permits available in Zimbabwe in 2021. This is potentially the second legally taken roan in Zimbabwe or at most the forth. There really need to be more permits issued to give this animal a value in these areas. Hopefully things keep moving in the right direction.

 

[gillettehunter]

Good job. Nice trophies. I’m enjoying your hunting report. Sounds like you worked hard for your animals. Love the roan. Mine was one of my most interesting hunts.
Bruce

 

[WAB]

Beautiful bull!

 

[375Fox]

Sept 28 Day 8 - All our primary animals buffalo, roan, sable are down, so no stress on hunt anymore. We leave a bit later at 0800 this morning. We head to Nemwa to build a proper blind for bushbuck and hyena and clear a path to quietly walk in to it. Leaving Nemwa, we see a beautiful ivory tipped kudu I’ve caught on camera several times. Alan estimates maybe 53 inches. We try and make a stalk on him but he sees us and runs into thick stuff. We back out and return to truck, no reason to push him because he’s regularly here. I pick up my camera from pan 1. We head back to camp for lunch and a rest. We head to the “cattle ranch” in the afternoon. It’s about a 10,000 acre “ranch” in the community area, but is outside the core hunting area, about 45 minutes from camp. Alan told me it started as a French impala project to leave the community a sustainable harvest impala farm, but fell into disrepair when they turned the project over. Now, CMS is paying for the grazing rights and has a small cattle herd here and some sheep. This gives a few locals some jobs and keeps the other cattle out. We went here to check for bushpig sign and put out some bait. Also want to talk with the cattle boys about any other animals they’ve been seeing here. There are impala, kudu, and a few elephant bulls on the “ranch.” Glad to have a change of scenery. End of Day 8.

 

[375Fox]

I never really got too many interesting photos from pan 1. The pan was drying so rapidly it was difficult to find a tree at the correct distance, but here are some of the more interesting photos I managed to get.

 

[Longwalker]

Thanks for sharing your stories! I was just days from putting a deposit with Charlton McCallum when this Covid-19 crap hit the fan. All plans were put on hold. For now I will be limited to experiencing this hunt through the stories of others, but still look forward to my turn eventually! Your excellent hunt report gives me more good stuff to anticipate!

 

[WAB]

Thanks for sharing your stories! I was just days from putting a deposit with Charlton McCallum when this Covid-19 crap hit the fan. All plans were put on hold. For now I will be limited to experiencing this hunt through the stories of others, but still look forward to my turn eventually! Your excellent hunt report gives me more good stuff to anticipate!

You can’t go wrong with Dande. I wouldn’t wait too long to book. Covid is globally endemic at this point. You might as well wait for the flu to go away before doing something.