If you are hunting plains game with a medium caliber, pretty much any brand in the right magnification will do. The only pitfall to avoid is too much scope...depending on where you go, most of your shooting will be inside 100 yards.

If you are using a 338 or heavier, you have to take toughness into account. Recoil breaks scopes, and the heavier the scope the more shearing force it has to withstand. So you should avoid monster scopes at all costs. Also, the variables are bulkier and more breakage-prone than the fixed powers. Given that you will likely be using your heavy caliber on something that might charge, these facts call for a small, compact scope by a quality maker PREFERABLY A FIXED POWER.

Now for the hearsay. A gunsmith who builds heavy caliber custom rifles recently wrote an article in Rifle magazine about scope failure. His take: you can't go wrong with a Leupold; or Swarovski if you have the money; the old steel Weavers and the newest Weavers if you are on a budget. Burris Fullfield if you have a little more to spend. And the B&L scopes (now Bushnell Elite) are also very tough, according to this gent.

I've only been to South Africa twice to hunt plains game. This was in the northern part of the Limpopo Province. The terrain was bushveld (brush country; ranges usually average about 50 to 150 yards). Both times I used the same model scope; Leupold 1.5-5x 20mm Vari-X III. A Ruger M77 Magnum in .375 H&H on the first trip and a Ruger M77 MkII in .30-06 on the second trip. (Each rifle has its own scope.) I usually kept the scope set at 3x.

Though I have far less experience upon which to base an opinion, I agree with Ray's thinking. I really like the 1-4x and 1.5-5x Leupolds. I also have a Leupold 2.5x Compact on a Ruger No.1 in .375 H&H and I like it. I do own a Leupold 2.5-8x Vari-X III and a few Leupold 3-9x 40mm Vari-X II and VX-II scopes. For plains game, these would also be good choices.

-Bob F.

For my plains game hunt, I used a Leupold 4x12x40 AO Vari-X II on my 338 Win Mag and everything was fine.
Jeff in Texas

I use Leupold exclusively. I have had a 1.5x5 for years that I was going to use on my upcoming hunt but low and behold it finally crapped out. So I mounted a straight 4x Leupold on my rifle and all is well again. I have a Leupold 2.5x8 on my other rifle and have found that after 40 years of hunting thats the biggest scope I will ever need except maybe for groundhogs beyond 300 yards. With that combo the other day I fired a 3 shot group of 1/2 inch at 200 yards. After that I went on to center a golf ball at the same distance. Who could possably need more?

It seems to me that especially on harder kicking guns you would need a smaller scope. Theres less stress on a smaller/lighter scope especially on a harder kicking gun and also you would probably use a bigger gun on bigger game hence a larger kill zone so no need for a 14x scope really. These are my observations over the years but somebody else might see it differently of course but hey--thats what makes the big wheel go round and round

One absolutely great choice is Docter Optics. I have a Docter 1.5-6x42 with a 30mm tube that is spectacular for the money. Natchez has them for around $580 or so. Docter builds scopes in Zeiss's old factory, on Zeiss grinding machines. They are every bit the equal to the Diavari at half the price. The S&B's with 34mm tubes are great for low light, but a bit pricey. Leupold is very good, but be careful, the vx2's are not one piece tubes, and many of the vx3's with 30mm tubes (other than the tactical or LPS models) have 1" internals mounted in 30mm tubes.

The Docter I have has been used on my 375H&H, a 470 Capstick, a 500 Jeffrey's and a 505 Gibbs with no problems in 2 years, and I shoot a lot. It is also a fairly long scope for mounting on long action rifles without fear of binding the mounts against the bell or using offset rings.

i have a s&B 1.5-6x42 with a A7 non-illuminated reticle.

I guess the only flaw is at extreme long range the crosshairs are thicker than say a leupold's crosshairs and cover up the target. realistically, i dont know if Ill ever shoot an animal that far away anyway, farther than 300 yards.

S&B's 34mm tube are only available on the PMII tactical scopes, people bring those to africa??????

My scope list doesn't too much different than yours:

.300 Win. Mag. -- Leica 3.5-10X

.338 Win. Mag. -- Leupold 2.5-8X

.375 H&H -- Leupold 1.75-6X

.458 Win. Mag. -- Leupold 1.5-5X

.416 Rem. Mag. -- Leupold 1.5-5X

In terms of ruggedness and eye-relief, Leupold has been the best scope brand I've ever used, and I've owned over 100 different Leupold scopes over the last twenty-eight years.

The Leica was built by Leupold for Leica to Leica's specs, and it has also been absolutely superb in every way, and with the same eye relief as Leupold.

AD

• Leupold 3x-9x on my .30-06
  
• Zeiss 3x-9x on my .30-06
  
• Leupold 2.5x-8x on my .375H&H
  
• Burris 2.5x on my .470 Capstick

George

I have not been to Africa yet but on my new CZ 375 I mounted a Leupold 1.75 X 6 with Talley rings. So far I have been pleased with the setup.

Following conventional wisdom my first dedicated african scope was the Leupold 1.5 x 5 straight tube mounted on a .375 H-H. It broke after about 300 rounds of practice shooting off hand. Leupold fixed it and I took it to Zimbabwe. We just never hit it off. For various reasons I just did not like it. I tried to get used to it and save the marriage. That scope was even switched to my deer rifle for a while so that no one could say that we didn't try to work things out. I think that our political views, religous beliefs, and ethnic backgrounds were just too different for things to work.

My safari rifle nows wears a Leupold fixed 6x and it has done everything that I could ever ask a scope to do. By the way my deer rifle has been scoped with a Leupold fixed 6x for years.

Fixed-power scopes are never dumb. I've owned quite a few Leupold 4Xs over the years that were simply great and fantastic scopes; tough and trouble-free.

AD

I have just purchased two scopes for my .375 H&H. Both are used, slightly older model Leupold shotgun scopes with the heavy Duplex reticles and are parallax adjusted for 75 yards. One is a 2x7 variable (which will be the primary scope) and the other is a fixed 4x (will be the backup), and they are (will be) mounted in Leupold QR rings. They are nearly identical in their outside dimensions. I haven't shot them yet, but I'll do so many times before I take them on a safari (2008). The only thing I might change is the mounting system - I really would like Talley QR with one of Bockman's pop-up peep sights.

If I was going to be shooting something much more powerful than the .375 H&H I would really consider a smaller variable or low-powered fix scope. I understand that the 2.5x fixed Leupold is one of the stoutest scopes ever made.

I have a 2x7 Nikon Monarch on a .260 Model 7 Rem, 2x7 B&L Elite 3200 on a .308 Model 700 Rem, and a Vari-X II 3x9x40 Leupold on a .300 Win Mag Rem 700 ADL. I have also used a 3x9x40 Nikon Monarch and it is also a very nice scope. The B&L Elite 3200 2x7 has a shorter objective bell which allows much more flexibility in mounting position.

Can you give a measirement of the "free tube" length for ring placement? Natchez says they have not specs from the factory.

Thanks,