It is or it should be obvious to any one experienced in shooting elephants, that the drawings on brain location in Bell's books is way off. I suspect those were not his locations as he had far to much experience to go along with those locations. If you look into an elephants ear slit, you will see that the ear canal is located about 1/3 of the way up from the bottom of the slit. It goes down and forward from there. The ear canal opening goes through the ascending portion of the zygomatic arch and is located a couple of inches forward of the ear slit it self. That location is just about central in a vertical location in the brain. Also about 1/3 of the brain lies behind the actual ear hole into the brain. That is the most vulnerable portion of the brain to hit.

465H&H

I just finished Gordan Cundill's book, A Hunter's Africa. In it he relates that as a young man he set out to emulate Bell and take an elephant with a 7X57. After executing a side brain shot on the first Bull, he was confronted head on by the second.
That was the last time he hunted elephant with a 7X57.
Slightly off topic, but I found the story interesting.

What kind of crap are you trying to pull here?

That is like no skull I ever saw. Maybe a calf, eh?

Beats me – tho at least this one would be a brainer when a no-brainer shot is applied

I recall Brian Marsh doing an elephant skull secioning several years ago in Magnum. Perhaps I can find it if nobody else can put their hands on it first.

As to the speculation on lost animals, whether shot with small or big bores... I think it goes without saying in the days when "sportsmanship" wasn't what it is today. After all, this wasn't sport hunting but rather business. It can be assumed that exceptional animals (big ivory) were pursued at lenght for monetary reasons but where the goal was to put as many on the ground in the shortest time - and remember much hunting was where the hunter wasn't supposed to be - I think we'd be remiss to think for one second that recovery of wounded animals carried the same importance as it does today. Somewhere I've read the heart shot was used extensively. If slightly off target, a 7mm hole would probably heal and surely not kill in a recoverable distance when hunting on foot!

The X-Ray picture of the Elephant head is genuine.
The original drawings if one puts ones self in the frame at the angle of viewing, not on the ground, would seem to be correct to me. There is a substantial difference in teh original Drawings above and the later books in the side shot. I could not tell you myself but if I could have one guy show me how to do it, I would pick WMD Bell.
http://www.digimorph.org/speci...ephas_maximus/skull/

Please note, as Fury01's link indicates, the X-ray view of the elephant skull above is for an Asian elephant. Just pointing out...

quote:

Originally posted by mouse93:

The cranial cavity in an adult African elephant is far smaller in relation to the size of the over all skull,than that X-ray opicture shows. The big African bulls brain is only about the size of an American football. I have to agree with Will in his quote below. If that picture is of an African elephant, then it has to be a calf.

quote:

by Will
That is like no skull I ever saw. Maybe a calf, eh?

here is a sectioned skull

botswana bull

bells drawing indicates a shot that would go in front of the brain but very very close and would possibly still kill the elephant due to hydrostatic shock ...

Here is one secret that Bell kept to himself.

This is an example of the skull of a really smart elephant:



This is the skull of a pretty stupid elephant:



As should be obvious from these images, it is far easier to shoot and hit the larger brain of a smart elephant than the smaller brain of a stupid elephant.

If it weren't for the fact that smart elephants can be harder to find, it would be smarter to hunt smart elephants than stupid elephants.

Yes but most of the stupid elephants were killed off long ago!

465H&H

quote:

Originally posted by Shack:

quote:

Bell practiced his marksmanship by pass-shooting waterfowl with his 7x57 rifle.

He is probably indicating proper elephant pass-shooting lead for elephant crossing at 10 mph at 25 yards range.

Either that or he was shooting them over decoys...

Seriously, would there be much lead needed with most centerfires up close, even at 10 mph?

With a rifle, eh? Hmm. All I have to say about that is that not all accomplished elephant slayers are superb shots at waterfowl, even with a shotgun. Trust me.

This section is of Elephas Maximus = Asian Elephant:

Although the individual bones are represented in both it is much lighter and smaller than Loxodonta Africana = African Elephant.

Copied from what is likely the most definitive anatomical study of the African Elephant skull anatomy by Van Der Merwe and coauthors from Onderstepoort Vetinary School Pretoria South Africa.








My particular interest "the Pnuematization ie aeration of the bones of the skull in mammals including marine mammals "

The implication is that though the skull is large the actual bone volume and mass is relatively small and this made it possible for Bell to shoot elephant with a small bore. The same is applicable to the choice of the culling teams in the KNP in the 70's to use the FN-FAL in 7.62 NATO. For the most the bullet is traversing air filled cavities.

The cavities that communicate with the ear ( ( mastoid antra)are "dry" in that they have no mucous producing cells in the lining. ( flattened squamous cell lining)

The cavities that communicate (true paranasal sinusses) with the nose have mucous producing cells and they secrete a thin layer of mucous that moves under the power of ciliated respiratory epithelium

The aeration of the Rhino skull as seen by X-ray: The brain cavity can be seen surrounded by aerated bone.