With out last hunting club meeting we had an interesting speaker. From what he said and what I have read on the forums the last couple of months and even years, I started wondering about the expectations of hunters. The speakers view was that a successful hunt is not measured on the amount of animals you have hunted but the way they were taken, he also said that on a couple of occasions he went on a hunt and went home empty hands, but he still had a great time being in the bush and following possible prey. To him the hunt was about the experience than the actual kill. I must add this person did hunt a Springbok in the Karoo with a knife and if I remember correctly it was two. So for him it is all about the challenge to get his prey.

What is your feeling on a successful hunt? Must you get the animal you are looking for? Do you want to get all the animals on your wish list? Will you be happy if you had a great experience but did not get the animals? How will the money you have spent on the trip influence your feeling on the success on the hunt?

Did hunting become a quest to get as much as possible animals in as short as possible time due to the cost involved?

We all have different views, the questions asked are not to criticize anybody, and it is also not intended to promote a mud-slinging contest.

Up to now I was always successful on my own hunts, but there may come a day when things do not work out the way I would like it to be.

What are your thoughts/views?

For me the hunt is about the overall experience, not the number of animals bagged - and certainly not the size of the horns.

I deer hunt with a bow several months a year, and my average success rate is about one deer for every 5 full days of hunting. I hunt in areas where there are a lot of deer - I can tell this from the amount of fresh spoor. But I sometimes go a month without getting one. Stuff happens, and that stuff is part of hunting.

So when I go to Africa I don't expect to kill everything on license, but I do expect to be hunting in an area where all the game species I'm hunting for exist in reasonable numbers. I expect to see (and hopefully follow) fresh sign every day.

I went to RSA a few years back, and my reading lead me to expect what I'd call a "shooting holiday" rather than a hunting experience.

That's pretty much what it was - only the eland was a real hunt. The rest was just shooting as far as I was concerned. I have no plans to go back to RSA with a rifle. If I go back to RSA it will be with a bow -- and only after some careful research.

Did I have a good time? Was there a reasonable expectation of success for what I was hunting? Did I have a good time? Did the guide/PH perform his end of the bargain reasonably well? Did I have a good time? When I think back over that particular hunt in the years to come, will I have a good feeling about it? Did I have a good time?

As Gatorgordo said, "Did I have a good time?"
My hunting buddy and I have gone on several hunts where one of us did not bag game. One up in northern Quebec, two friends did not get their caribou, I broke three ribs, and weather was the worst we'd ever had in that area. Did we have fun? You bet and we're scheduled to go again next year!
Something as simple as a mule deer doe hunt (almost guaranteed success on public land where we hunt), the shooting of game is anti-climatic. Its the end of the hunt...but not of the fun.

JACO, I'd need a calculator to add up all the money I've spent on hunts where I came home empty handed, but I don't remember a hunt in the last 64 years of hunting where I didn't enjoy the HUNT!

HUNT, That is the word for what I do, and enjoy. Sometimes you get the bear, and sometimes the bear gets you, that's hunting.

I've never carried a tape measure in my pocket, and I couldn't tell you what most of my trophies measure, and simply don't care about that. However, I can look at a mount, or a picture of an animal I've taken 40 or 50 yrs ago, and remember every detail of that hunt, and in the end, that is what I'm buying with the money, MEMORIES! Since I normally hunt alone, or 1 on 1, when I die those memories will go with me, but damn they are sweet while I have them! Blood is not what interests me!

As I wrote in my hunting journal way back,while flying home from a Safari, and only again discovered recently,while reading some old stuff, the ending sentence of the recording of that hunt, reads:

"If I die today, I've had a life well spent, for I've been to see the Elephant, and smelled the smoke of Africa!"

It is now in my signature line on AR.

Well said MacD37. Memories is what it's all about in the end.

Jaco,

For me, a successful hunt is not the same as a good or an enjoyable hunt. One can always have the latter, regardless of the outcome. A successful hunt, however, is one that produces a dead critter(s).

So I tend to separate the successful part from the overall experience and enjoyment one derives from just being afield, searching for game and being with friends around a warm fire or in the bar tipping toddies at night. Some of my most memorable hunts have resulted in no shots at all, yet I still cherish the experiences I had on them. -TONY

Of more than a hundred hunts over 47 years, I'd call only a few, maybe 4 or 5, unsuccessful. In those cases, either someone was hurt, or I was made to feel a fool by an unscrupulous guide/outfitter (and the hunting was crappy, to boot).

Jaco:

On a hunt this June in SA I took a gemsbok the first day & a nyala the second. I spent the next four days up near the Botswana border hunting bushbuck with a green PH, & my wife & I had the time of our lives. I did not take a bushbuck, but just being able to hunt, on foot for an animal that had never been shot in the daylight on this particular ranch was a special experience. The young PH gave me the option every night, after our day long hunts, to go out & take a bushbuck with a spotlight & had a hard time understanding my answer of no. I guess his exposure, to this point, of hunters from the US led him to believe that the taking of the animal was the most important thing. He worked his tail off for us & I would not hesitate to hunt with him again.
I had been in Africa twice before, but it was my wife's first trip. She, as well as I, enjoyed the bushbuck hunt much more than the harvest of the other two animals.
I also have to agree with MacD37. Memories are what it's all about.

Very wise words from Outdoor Writer!

A successful hunt produces a dead animal of the type that was nominated at the start of the hunt. I have very often nominated a "Queen Impala" when setting out in the morning. These hunte were very seldom, in fact only once, successful. But, boy, did I enjoy most of them.

In a sence more of these were actually also in a weird way successful! If I'm on a hunt with some buddies and really short of cash, that's when I nominate that I'm going to hunt: An impala Queen! That way the chances of having to pay a trophy fee is drastically reduced - i.e. success! But then, as Outdoor Writed correctly states a successful hunt has a dead critter at the end of it!

In good hunting.

Andrew McLaren

I totaly agree with those that have said that a successful hunt is one that that was fun and enjoyable. Did I enjoy it enough that I would like to do it again. I also expect to have a reasonable chance at the animals on my desired list. The bigger the trophy the better and the harder I have to work for it the more satisfying it is. Sometimes my main goal has been to learn how to hunt the desired animal much more so than actually taking one.

For others I am sure it it depends on their goals. A collector wants the biggest and the most of anything and usually cares less how he gets it. The worst in my opinion are the hunters trying for the variuos SCI levels where you have to have lots of animals of different species to get rewarded. Seems to me the poorest reason to hunt.

What can ruin a hunt for me is if the safari company or PH lies to me or trys to pull the wool over my eyes. That will make me seath with anger.

465H&H

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As long as everything is in place to provide a true hunt for the quality of animals I'm looking for I can go home without firing a shot, be happy and I have done that. The first time I had a perfectly shootable lion come to the bait and I chose not to shoot him I was happy for the rest of the safari. Hunting and particualrly safari is so much more than dead animals.

Mark

I agree with the general tenor of these responses, but feel the need to state what some may consider to be too obvious to bother stating at all: All else being equal, it is always better to hunt and kill what one is after than to hunt and come home empty handed.

Still, right behind hunting and killing what I'm after, my next favorite outdoors activity is hunting and coming home empty handed!

quote:

Up to now I was always successful on my own hunts, but there may come a day when things do not work out the way I would like it to be.

I guess I am having a little trouble seeing past this quote. Can anybody who has hunted for any length of time really say that ALL their hunts have been successful? Fortunately, many of my hunts have been successful, whether measured by dead animals, great experiences, or both. Alas, a few have been much less than successful, for a variety of reasons, but generally related to the guide, ec., whether or not the killing occurred. It just seems strange that anyone would claim that every hunt had been successful.

On a totally different note, I think there is a (natural) tendency after any reasonable safari, to revel in what went right, and gloss over the negative aspects. Sure, there were probably some disappointments, whether not getting the animal you sought, or some other inconsequential problem during the trip. Those small disappointments help us appreciate the successes. This is an essential part of hunting everywhere.

Bill

Though not the only factor, my shooting plays a substantial part of how sucessful the hunt is. I practice diligently and use top quality equipment. A clean and quick kill is way better than a drawn out affair due to bad shooting. Of course I still screw up as much as anyone.
This makes the big 5 more appealing to me as they are tougher than most other game..