First trip to South Africa
My wife and I are not big travelers but I got the bug and decided to make it happen. Just got back yesterday. Hunted 8 days with Somerby Safari's. My goal list came down to the wire. Working on a couple articles now. The 2 springbok's are an interesting story but will have to wait until the article to tell that one.
Firearms used:
.375 JDJ shooting 270 Speer soft points at 2000 FPS (zebra, gemsbok)
7-30 Waters, 120 Nosler Ballistic tip, 2400 FPS (13" barrel) (impala, springbok, duiker)
Day 1 Afternoon
the .375 JDJ was good, I was off a tad right and high at 100 but I attributed that to being tired. I was at least calling them. Guide said it was plenty good enough and the 1" high at 100 is what I told him I set it at. 7-30 was shot for the first time without a suppressor. Some weird stuff was going on here about taking suppressors out. He was suspect about these but at 50 yards on the second shot after a scope adjustment, he yelled dead nuts and started laughing as he walked away. Perfect zero. 3 more shots at 100 and we called it. I used the BOG carbon fiber tripod and I had an old sandbag I took half the sand out to better fit. Works pretty well with some practice. I don't think I made a successful shot off of it. Missed a springbok at 130 but I did a dumb hold and went over its back. Used it on a jackal and didn't have the sandbag, just an old shemagh. Not sure if that is to blame or if I was just tired.
Day 2, AM
Old mare, quartered towards me, shoulder destroyed and made nice hole in ribs, heart and a lung. Ran about 100 yards. Bullet stayed together but couldn't recover since it was floating somewhere in 100 pounds of guts. Ran about 100 yards.
Day 5 morning (2nd concession)
From a blind, 80 yards. I'm soaking the bullet now to get rid of some "debris" but it destroyed the shoulder and heart. From what I can see, a good bit of lead broke away and I found the bullet bulging the skin on the other side behind the shoulder. I am debating switching to the 140's or wait until I can find the partition bullets. We got skunked by these for 2 days on the first place. Had a shot at 20 yards on one but 1 branch was in the way so I held off.
140 might work better at distance too. That being said, the impala dropped immediately.
Day 6, late AM
My dream animal. We were sitting and calling other properties because we are running out of time. We already drove 6 hours WSW of the first property and were on the phone with one 2 more hours west. Every successful stalk only showed young or small bulls. This one ran in front of us out of nowhere and, on a trot, I got a shot off at 140 yards. Only hit a rib since it was a little bit back but it was quartered away. .375 Speer did its job, had a decent exit wound of nearly an inch. I put one in the shoulder from the front for insurance after it ran about 60 yards.
30 minutes after Gemsbok
Found them starting to bed under a tree. We went from desperately behind schedule to ahead of schedule in less than an hour. Story on this later...
Day 8 early AM
Steenbok was on my list but we stalked a few at night successfully and they were all females. This Duiker was seen with another male where I got the impala so we took a shot and he showed up. 85 yards, ran about 20. Perfect placement behind the shoulder. Good exit hole.
Apparently I'm the only one that thinks this is funny
Day 1, noon
I can't afford to hunt an elephant but I did kill this one with kindness.
Honored to share with the group. Hopefully the articles are decent. I sent a draft to JD and he gave me a thumbs up.
Learned a lot about the 7-30 also. The 120 shed half the weight in the impala. I think the 140 Nosler BT is the way to go with this one but I will do some test later.