Showing recovered bullets from recently hunted cape Buffalo. Thought it might be of interest as sometimes enquiries about bullet choices for Africa / Buff hunting are posted here. I am not necessarily endorsing any brand here but it might help readers reach certain conclusions.

Rifle: .375 H&H

Bullets below taken from a Buff shot initially from 37 yards and finished from approx 15 yards.
Left is North Fork SS 300 gn, right is Barnes TSX 300 gn. Centre is Federal Trophy Bonded Sledgehammer 500 gn from PH's .470 NE.
https://drive.google.com/file/...n3V/view?usp=sharing

Next lot is recovered from another Buff shot initially at 72 yards and finished at approx 20 yards. Left to right is Barnes TSX 500 gn. ( from PH's .470 NE ), North Fork Cup Point Solid 300 gn ( shot from rear between hams at approx 5 yards, penetrating gut, stomach, forward organs, recovered in chest cavity ), North Fork SS 300 gn, and last two on right Barnes TSX 300 gn.
https://drive.google.com/file/...uiz/view?usp=sharing

Thank You! roger

So what was your over-all take on the bullets?

Grant,

This is a 300 grain Barnes TSX recovered from my bull (2500 fps at the muzzle).

It was either my first shot through the brisket at about 70 tards or the second shot (Texas heart shot taken at about 100 yards) and was found in the lung cavity. It weighed 299.8 grains after cleaning.

quote:

So what was your over-all take on the bullets?

I am going to stick with the Barnes TSX 300 gn as an expanding bullet. They have worked very well for me, retaining good weight and penetrating very well. At worst a petal might be lost sometimes but this causes no performance loss that I can see.
The North Fork Cup Point Solid 300 gn penetrated unbelievably well. I will load these again although I haven't used any solids at all in action on Buff to date. Always take several though.
The North Fork SS 300 gn was probably OK although one unopened, deformed bullet was recovered. Buff certainly reacted when shot with these but didn't seem any different to being shot with Barnes TSX. I'm not sure that the North Fork SS penetrated as far as the Barnes TSX but the difference may not be dramatic.
I really like handloading the Barnes for my Blaser R93. Very easy to work up good loads with great accuracy with several powders.
I remember Saeed saying in some post on bullets that overall monometals were the best, most dependable hunting bullets by far. My Africa hunting experience is almost insignificant against his but I am coming around to agreeing his comments are valid.

Frank, thanks for the pic. My suggestion to you is keep using those Barnes TSX for Buff. My loads shoot at just under 2500 fps, mostly with RL 15.

Well done! I'm most impressed that you got the bullets back. It was all I could do to get them to cape out the critter straight away - when I did. When I did not, I didn't even get the cape back because they'd let the hair slip.