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What can I say about my 18th trip to Africa and my 5th hunt with Frontier Safaris? I've been so many places over the years and have hunted with so many quality outfitters. It has always been a good time. However when I have a group of folks wanting to go in their first safari I know there is one place that is fantastic for a first safari. That is the Burchell Game Reserve in the Eastern Cape. It is 75,000 acres of beautiful and varied habitat. This is where I would wind up with my group after the Namibia safari was over.
The Buffalo
I never thought I would ever hunt a buffalo on a game ranch. This is because I've hunted them in the Caprivi and Zimbabwe in the most challenging of circumstances. Over the years I've learned more about these Eastern Cape Buffalo and have come to know what a challenge they are. The Burchell's decided many years ago to restock this property with the original Eastern Cape genetics that were preserved at the Addo Elephant Park. As many of you know the Buffalo were shot out of this area decades ago due to the disease risk they posed to cattle. This area has mountainous terrain up high and the extremely dense bush of the lower areas. The Buffalo tend to graze the mountain side at night and spend the day in the thick stuff. Finding a big mature bull would mean glassing early and late to find that right opportunity. We had a nice breakfast as usual and headed out early to begin glassing the mountainside. On the first day of the safari I was not expecting to see much and was ready to put in the work required to be successful on this type of hunt. As it was just getting light enough to see we easily spotted a bull, two cows, and two calves coming down the mountain. Sure enough these rascals were headed for the thick bush as they always do and then you never see them again. That particular bull was walking steadily so we never got a good look at his horns. Fred Burchell, my PH and good friend, decided that we might just track them a bit and see if we can get a better look at the bull. We had only been on the fresh tracks for a short time when I stopped to speak to the camera and explain what we were doing when Fred whistled urgently to us as a cow and a calf busted out of the brush to our left. As any experienced hunter can imagine cows and little calves can be dangerous. We paused to let our blood pressure ease down a bit and discussed our plan. Neither Fred, the tracker Mzonke, nor myself were particularly taken with what we had seen of this bull so we decided to get out of that thick bush and continue glassing. We drove a bit down the road that parallels the mountain and just as we stopped in a decent spot to glass Fred spotted a lone bull about a 1000 yards away. He took time to get his spotting scope out and take a better look. This was a big mature bull and he was all alone. I thought to myself "why is this big bull not with the cows"? He was certainly bigger and more mature than the other one. Fred led the way and we went straight up the mountainside. The wind was fickle but we couldn't worry about that just yet as time was not on our side. Up, up we went. It was extremely steep and rocky but I stayed with Fred step for step. Fortunately we had some ridges to walk behind so the bull never saw us. As we got closer a quick check of the wind was made and it was now clearly in our favor. Now we were getting close and had closed the 1000 yards to get to where we needed to be. We got just above the bull and Fred peeked up over the ridge to see exactly where we needed to be. Then I moved into shooting position and worked for a second to situate the quad sticks on this rough and rocky ridge. The bull was feeding and did not know we were there. I put the red dot of my Krieghoff .450/400 on the bulls shoulder and let one fly and then immediately another. My first shot hit just behind the shoulder and the second one in the neck and he was down! There is nothing quite like stomping a big buffalo with a double gun. We waited for a few minutes and approached cautiously. That bull never moved a bit. What an elating first morning but I was thinking to myself: that was anticlimactic, How did this happen?, I rarely even see buffalo here! As we began to carefully position this bull for pictures here on this very steep incline we discovered more to the story. This bull was injured from fighting and this was why he was alone and grazing later that usual. A bull had hooked him in the back side of the horn just under the boss and left a huge rotting hole there. What kind of force must it have taken to do this kind of damage? As can happen in hunting, this was just my lucky day. My bull would nearly stretch the tape to 40". To top it all off I later found out that no one had ever taken a buffalo here at the Burchell Game Reserve on day one.
The Buffalo
I never thought I would ever hunt a buffalo on a game ranch. This is because I've hunted them in the Caprivi and Zimbabwe in the most challenging of circumstances. Over the years I've learned more about these Eastern Cape Buffalo and have come to know what a challenge they are. The Burchell's decided many years ago to restock this property with the original Eastern Cape genetics that were preserved at the Addo Elephant Park. As many of you know the Buffalo were shot out of this area decades ago due to the disease risk they posed to cattle. This area has mountainous terrain up high and the extremely dense bush of the lower areas. The Buffalo tend to graze the mountain side at night and spend the day in the thick stuff. Finding a big mature bull would mean glassing early and late to find that right opportunity. We had a nice breakfast as usual and headed out early to begin glassing the mountainside. On the first day of the safari I was not expecting to see much and was ready to put in the work required to be successful on this type of hunt. As it was just getting light enough to see we easily spotted a bull, two cows, and two calves coming down the mountain. Sure enough these rascals were headed for the thick bush as they always do and then you never see them again. That particular bull was walking steadily so we never got a good look at his horns. Fred Burchell, my PH and good friend, decided that we might just track them a bit and see if we can get a better look at the bull. We had only been on the fresh tracks for a short time when I stopped to speak to the camera and explain what we were doing when Fred whistled urgently to us as a cow and a calf busted out of the brush to our left. As any experienced hunter can imagine cows and little calves can be dangerous. We paused to let our blood pressure ease down a bit and discussed our plan. Neither Fred, the tracker Mzonke, nor myself were particularly taken with what we had seen of this bull so we decided to get out of that thick bush and continue glassing. We drove a bit down the road that parallels the mountain and just as we stopped in a decent spot to glass Fred spotted a lone bull about a 1000 yards away. He took time to get his spotting scope out and take a better look. This was a big mature bull and he was all alone. I thought to myself "why is this big bull not with the cows"? He was certainly bigger and more mature than the other one. Fred led the way and we went straight up the mountainside. The wind was fickle but we couldn't worry about that just yet as time was not on our side. Up, up we went. It was extremely steep and rocky but I stayed with Fred step for step. Fortunately we had some ridges to walk behind so the bull never saw us. As we got closer a quick check of the wind was made and it was now clearly in our favor. Now we were getting close and had closed the 1000 yards to get to where we needed to be. We got just above the bull and Fred peeked up over the ridge to see exactly where we needed to be. Then I moved into shooting position and worked for a second to situate the quad sticks on this rough and rocky ridge. The bull was feeding and did not know we were there. I put the red dot of my Krieghoff .450/400 on the bulls shoulder and let one fly and then immediately another. My first shot hit just behind the shoulder and the second one in the neck and he was down! There is nothing quite like stomping a big buffalo with a double gun. We waited for a few minutes and approached cautiously. That bull never moved a bit. What an elating first morning but I was thinking to myself: that was anticlimactic, How did this happen?, I rarely even see buffalo here! As we began to carefully position this bull for pictures here on this very steep incline we discovered more to the story. This bull was injured from fighting and this was why he was alone and grazing later that usual. A bull had hooked him in the back side of the horn just under the boss and left a huge rotting hole there. What kind of force must it have taken to do this kind of damage? As can happen in hunting, this was just my lucky day. My bull would nearly stretch the tape to 40". To top it all off I later found out that no one had ever taken a buffalo here at the Burchell Game Reserve on day one.
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