My son goes to Namibia in 2 months, and the ranch owners where he will hunt have offered him a free eland to shoot on his trip. One of the PH's has a 50 cal. muzzleloader, and they would like to shoot some of my hard cast 400 grain 45 caliber bullets on it. They out-penetrate my 375H&H on testing, and I'm sure would drill right thru both shoulders on a bull. I have shot deer and elk with them at about 1600fps, and they just run 50 yards and fall over. If the ranges were kept reasonable (under 75-100 yards) would they perform adequately? Yea or nay?

Yay. Eland are big but relativly soft. No complicated angles on the vitals (like Giraffe). Will probably run quite a way but in Namibia thats not a problem.

Eland was my first animal in South Africa. I hunted mine with a plain old 30-06, 180 grain pills. One shot from 75 yards in the heart dropped it within 20 yards of impact.

I shot a huge bodied blue bull right through the top of the heart a couple of years ago with my .416 and the whole herd (including my bull) just stood there. My PH had watched the impact and as I was reloading he stopped me and said "no, just watch!" The animal stood for about 20 seconds, started to slowly wobble on his legs and fell to one side stone dead. It may be out of the ordinary but this animal's reaction reminded me a bit of how NA Bison react under such circumstances.

Best,

JohnTheGreek

my experience with eland includes tow kills. Both were with a 375 H&H and both were amazing. Eland soak up alot of lead! My opinion is they are simply big animals and have a lot of blood in their body so they take a while to bleed out. I know the locals hwo hunt them for meat shoot for the head or neck and my inderstanding is they do down very quick. For me I took heart/lung shots and the death took quite some time even with several large holes in the chest cavity. I think anyone who is going to hunt buffalo should first kill an eland simply to gain respect for how large animals can eat lead!

I shot my eland with my .30-06 with a Nosler Partition 200 gr.

Similar effect. Shot it with a quartering away shot to the heart through a small window in the bush. It ran about 15 yards and stood there. Shot it again broadside a third way up in the shoulders and it dropped. It took about five minutes of shivering and shaking before it died.

Yea.

But I would avoid hitting the shoulder blade if possible with a muzzle loader.

.

Not really a big Eland hunter, as I've only shot one, 30-06 (PH's rifle) and unknown military surplus FMJ ammo (probably 150gr)... this was simply a target of opportunity -

Anyway, one shot at about 60-yards, quartering away, he ran about 40-yards and fell over.

I think most would agree, however, that an eland can cover a lot of distance on a marginal shot.

Thanks for all the input, guys. I had lots of opportunities on eland last year on some big bulls, but never saw one I wanted. David will use his 300WM on everything else, but I think I'll send along a half dozen different brands and weights of bullets for the PH's to play with at their leisure. If synthetic powder wasn't illegal, and black so hard to get, I would love to go back next year and take everything all over again with the frontstuffer.

I shot mine with a .376 Steyr loaded with 300-grain Woodleigh Protected Soft Points at 2320 fps at 60 yards. It jumped up at the shot, ran 20 yards, and collapsed. I saw another eland shot with a .376 Steyr 270-grain Hornady factory loaded SP. It ran a couple of hundred yards before falling. Mine was hit through the arteries at the top of the heart; I'm not sure exactly where the other one was hit, but I suspect it was a double lung hit.

My buddy on my 2002 trip shot a HUGE eland with a .375 H&H loaded with 260-grain Nosler Partitions at 2600 fps at about 40 yards. The first bullet vaporized on one upper leg bone while breaking it, the second vaporized on the upper leg bone on the other side, breaking it, and neither bullet exited the leg; never even made it to the chest wall. With two broken legs the eland was anchored, but it took two more shots to finish the job.

My take-away is that while the eland is relatively soft, there's a lot of meat to get through and the bones appear to be very tough, so my preference is a medium bore of 9.3mm and above with premium soft points.

I haven't found eland to be all that tough to put down. In my opinion they are not as tough as elk but they're just as cunning, and they're tougher and much smarter than moose. I have taken four eland bulls -- an east African Patterson's, two Cape, and one Livingston's. Eland are one of my favorite animals to hunt. They are truly a great trophy animal.

The Livingston's was taken with a .375 H&H and 300 gr. Trophy Bonded bullets. The rest were taken with a .300 Win. Mag. and either 180 gr. Nosler Partitions or Winchester Fail-Safes. Ranges were between 100 and nearly 300 yds.

I've found that 180 gr premium bullets out of a .300 Win. are plenty of medicine. You don't need a .375 H&H for good kills, in fact in my experience the .300 kills just as well as the .375. Send a well-built bullet through the lungs and eland go down quickly, sometimes on the spot, and sometimes within fifty yards or so.

Quality bullets don't bounce off eland.........

AD

quote:

Originally posted by ALF:
The one thing about this huge antelope that has always amazed me is their ability to jump !

Even funnier story though not for the owner.

I was told this story while hunting on a west Nicholson property where a helicopter live game capture operation was going on. During my safari by the way

They caught a truck load of eland one of the days and loaded them up into the new game farmers truck. Off he went to his property where he had some nice new game yards built with 9-foot walls. Opened the ramp on the truck, down the eland ran, across the yard and vaulted the nice new game yard walls. Out into the wild. Paid for, delivered, but not his anymore.

Even a Fallow stag can pretty well jump a seven foot fence if he decides he can. I had a stag that would squat down, with no run up and leap over my game fence gates. Luckily he jumped back into the fenced paddock. Needless to say thi stag had a short life after I worked out he could do this.

I took a huge Eland bull with my 54 cal. flintlock longrifle, I used 120 gn FF Blackpowder, and patched roundball. The bull took the shot and I reached for my backup ( a 405 Win levergun) and my PH told me to wait. The bull stood stockstill for 45 seconds and just fell over dead. It was a 30 yrd shot through both shoulders. The ball stopped on the offside hide. I also took a Zebra with one shot from the flintlock. I think you will be fine with that load.......................JJ

NitroX

I had the same thing with a fallow buuck two seasons ago. he was standing next to a 6 foot fence on the boundary and I thought the only place he could go was towards me and thus present a clear shot. We put our heads up to make hime move and hhe just bounced over the top of the fence from a standinng start!!!

It was amazing to watch.

FB

I think size has a lot to do with how hard an animal can be to kill....

The amount of adrenaline makes a world of difference...

I have seen Eland killed with a 243 with one shot, and I have seen one take 5 lethal shots with a 375, so it just depends..Mostly on the first shot I would guess..

I prefer to use a .338 or larger myself...

Avoid the big shoulder/leg bone and funny angles and you should be fine. I won't rate eland as tough but tough animals to hunt where the bush is thick. And they can put a lot of space between you when they get spooked.

Just make sure the first shot is good. They can run for days otherwise.

Three weeks ago I shot a Derby Eland.

An arrow behind the shoulders whisled right trough at 16 yards.

Eland are not tougher than a .416" 400 grain Barnes X @ 2,400 fps.

I shot this eland from about 60 yards. I was elevated and he was feeding in some brush below us. He was facing me with his head slightly to my right and his back end slightly to my left. I shot him in the upper left hand portion of his chest (my left, his right) and angled the bullet from left to right thru the chest cavity.

At the shot, I came out of recoil to see the eland roll over with all four feet in the air. He never took a step. He seemed to die immediately.

I have some additional photos at home that I will try to post later. Those photos show the bullet entrance. I guess if you make the first shot count (which I don't always do unfortunately) what you use, within reason, doesn't matter as much.

Tim

Here's my first Eland Bull, Yes Eland are tough, but the old saying goes, "It's all where you hit'em, not how big the gun!"

Took this with a Interarms .270, at about thirty yards, 150 grain Federal "Hi-shok"

He was following a cow, I mean right benid her!(she was very much in season). She walked within 20 yards of us before she noticed something not right in the bushes, as she turned and started to trot away, there he stood quartering towards me, at no more then 25 yards!
with the shot he went down on his knees, got up and took off, it was very heavy brush but as long as I could see him I kept firing! Never did touch him with the hail of lead, me and the PH took off after him, found him on his last legs about 150 yards away.


One shot One kill!