{"id":643,"date":"2018-01-17T11:22:09","date_gmt":"2018-01-17T17:22:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/louisianashooting.com\/?p=643"},"modified":"2023-04-08T00:30:41","modified_gmt":"2023-04-08T05:30:41","slug":"nyala-with-a-handgun-in-mozambique","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/louisianashooting.com\/nyala-with-a-handgun-in-mozambique\/","title":{"rendered":"Nyala with a Handgun in Mozambique"},"content":{"rendered":"\r\n

Poen Van Zyl of Zambeze Delta Safaris<\/a> was standing 15 feet above me atop a vegetation-strewn termite mound surveying the abandoned garden through a well used pair of binoculars.\u00a0 The local tribesmen that call the famed Coutada 11 of Mozambique home practice slash and burn farming, clearing enormous areas in the forest and then abandoning those areas after one or two years of use.\u00a0 The forest was quickly reclaiming the area with vegetation, and the constant hum of tens of thousands of bees signaled that many of the plants in the area were flowering.\u00a0 It was mid-July and the weather had been unseasonably cool and wet, but had turned warm and humid, typical for winter in costal Mozambique. In addition to bees, the local antelope also visit these abandoned gardens. We were looking for an old mature bull Nyala that Poen knew frequented this particular garden. \u00a0\u00a0The unmistakable trumpet of an elephant rang out and Will Fawcett and I locked eyes. In addition to being a friend, Will is a professional hunter with Numzaan Safaris<\/a> in South Africa and joined me as an observer on this safari in Mozambique. The details of this adventure had been made at the 2016 Safari Club International<\/a> (SCI) Convention in Las Vegas. The plan had been for Will and me to hunt in Mozambique for two weeks, then fly back from Beira, Mozambique to Johannesburg, drive down to the Freestate to pick up a couple of species I had missed on my first safari to R.S.A. in 2014, and then finish the trip with a couple of days in Limpopo. Will and I smiled at one another nervously.\u00a0 Elephants in the area could spell trouble and that elephant sounded close.\u00a0 The elephants in Mozambique are survivors of several civil wars and are not particularly fond of humans.\u00a0 In fact, one could say they are downright aggressive.\u00a0 I imagined a scenario in which we found the old bull about the same time that the elephants ambled into the garden.\u00a0 I tend to have that kind of luck.\u00a0 To compound the problem, I was the only person with a firearm, and it was a revolver.\u00a0 I had absolutely no interest in trying to turn an angry charge with a revolver. Poen looked down and waved Will up.\u00a0 Will labored up the termite mound and then Poen and he whispered and pointed while they formed a plan.\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0From the ground out of earshot, I took the planning as a good sign.\u00a0 Perhaps the old bull was in the garden.\u00a0 After an eternity while I watched the afternoon sun inexorably dip toward the western horizon, Will and Poen came down to my level and laid out the plan.\u00a0 There were five bulls in the garden.\u00a0 The closest one was immature and alone.\u00a0 Several dozen yards deeper into the garden were three mature, but young bulls.\u00a0 All three of them were shooters, but none of them were the \u201cproper\u201d bull.\u00a0 The old man we were after was about 150 or so yards from us, close to the edge of the garden where it disappears into the forest.\u00a0 To compound our problems, the elephants were close and would not tolerate our presence in the garden and the sun was very low in the western sky.\u00a0 \u201cPerfect,\u201d I thought.\"\" As quietly as possible, we began to move toward the old bull trying desperately to skirt around the younger bulls as not to alert the old bull to our presence.\u00a0 Luckily, baboons frequent these gardens as well, and the noise that stalking hunters make pales in comparison to the noise a troop of hungry baboons can produce.\u00a0 Despite our best efforts, the immature bull spotted us and sounded the alarm.\u00a0 The older group of three bulls began to move away from our location and, unfortunately, we had lost sight of the oldest bull as we began the stalk.\u00a0 With faith as our only indication that the old bull was still in the area, we stuck to our plan and moved forward.\u00a0 Suddenly, Poen\u2019s tracker, Gotchi (pronounced goat-chee and meaning piglet in Zulu) froze.\u00a0 Through years of hunting as a pair, Gotchi and Poen communicated with no words exchanged.\u00a0 Gotchi set up my shooting sticks and Poen slid to a position just to the right of them. \u201cCan you see him?\u201d \u201cNo.\u00a0 How far?\u201d Poen\u2019s tone was urgent.\u00a0 \u201cHe\u2019s right there.\u00a0 No more than 70-80 yards.\u201d\u00a0 The big old bull turned his head and the motion caught my eye.\u00a0 His old gray coat blended in perfectly with the surroundings. \u201cGot him.\u201d\u00a0 I put the Freedom Arms Model 83 chambered in .454 Casull onto the cradle in the shooting sticks and looked through the scope.\u00a0 I had set the scope on it\u2019s lowest power knowing through hard experience that spot and stalk hunting with a pistol is nigh on impossible with anything but the lowest power settings. I kept both eyes open and looked past the scope at the bull, aligning the pistol with him as to have any chance of seeing him through the scope.\u00a0 The crosshairs settled on his left shoulder, but he was facing away and the angle was severe.\u00a0 This was not a good shot and certainly not one I was going to take. \u201cDo you have a clear shot?\u201d \u201cNot yet.\u201d \u201cOkay.\u00a0 Don\u2019t rush it.\u00a0 He\u2019ll turn if you give him a chance.\u201d Time ticked by as the sun marched further to the west.\u00a0 I kept the pistol aimed at the bull but kept both eyes open as not to get eye strain waiting on him to turn.\u00a0 Clearly, he was not concerned by the closeness of the elephants or the setting sun.\u00a0 Neither was he concerned about the long walk we would have through the forest to get to the clearing where we had left Poen\u2019s truck an hour before. Finally, the old bull turned presenting me with an excellent slightly angled shot on his left shoulder.\u00a0 I cocked the single action pistol, aligned the crosshairs, settled my breath, and began to squeeze the trigger.\u00a0 The recoil from the .454 Casull is substantial, and one can easily jerk the trigger in anticipation of the crushing recoil that follows the shot.\u00a0 The only cure for this is practice, and a lot of it.\u00a0 The revolver roared to life and I heard the unmistakable smack of the Hornady 300 grain XTP-MAG as it connected.\u00a0 He trotted a few yards away, and I was able to put a second shot into his right shoulder.\u00a0 After receiving the second shot, he tried to escape to the relative safety of the invading forest, but fortunately, did not make it.\"\" As we were taking the photos of this magnificent trophy, I heard a strange noise from the edge of the garden.\u00a0 \u201cWhat was that?\u201d Poen looked up from the camera.\u00a0 \u201cThat is the rumbling of an elephant\u2019s stomach!\u201d\"\" He measured 74 1\/8\u201d and ranked number 6 with a handgun in the SCI Record Book.\u00a0 To say I had amazing success in Mozambique would be a vast understatement. In Coutada 11, I harvested seven SCI Top-10 species with handguns (Common Nyala, number 6; Lichtenstein Hartebeest, number 7; Chobe Bushbuck, number 7; Natal Red Duiker, number 6; and Blue Duiker, number 5, as well as the new potential number 18 overall Livingstone Suni, which should rank number 5 with a handgun when certified by a SCI master measurer.<\/p>\r\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"author":3558,"featured_media":645,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4,23],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/louisianashooting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/643"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/louisianashooting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/louisianashooting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/louisianashooting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3558"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/louisianashooting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=643"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/louisianashooting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/643\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1553,"href":"https:\/\/louisianashooting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/643\/revisions\/1553"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/louisianashooting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/645"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/louisianashooting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=643"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/louisianashooting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=643"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/louisianashooting.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=643"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}