Have you ever had or seen a complete pass through on a shot that wounded or killed a second buffalo on the other side? If so, please share the details, especially regarding the load and bullet used. Regards, AIU

It has not happened to us, but we suspect on at least two occasions, we have shot buffalo that had been shot previously, with bullets remainign inside them.

The reason we think it was a pass through is because the location of the wound, and where the bullet was found.

In one we found a Trophy Bonded 416 bullet, in a festering wound in the buffalos back, that had penetrated about 4 inches.

ON another, we found a Nosler 300 grain 375 caliber bullet lodged in the buffalos balls.

The only was we could explain this was that the bullets must have passed through anotrher animal - or something, before hitting these.

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Originally posted by Ackley Improved User:
Have you ever had or seen a complete pass through on a shot that wounded or killed a second buffalo on the other side? If so, please share the details, especially regarding the load and bullet used. Regards, AIU

Yes....

Guy shot a bull, muffed the shot (one of several on the same bull).. Solid went through high in the rib cage & hit a cow in the neck about 50yds behind it.. It was a 375H&H, IIRC ammo was Trophy Bonded Solid..

I hear poachers always shoot em in the balls!

In most cases I think the 375 and 416 to be the main culprits of over penetration....

.500 Jeffery- .235grn woodleigh solid. Through one buffs lungs and into the next.

.458 Win , Old (winchester?) solids. quatering on shot. Killed bull and killed cow beyond (broke neck) hell of a time explaining that one!

.416 rem - soft- throgh a buff cow behind the shoulder and gut shot calf beyond.

those are the personal experiences with clients, Know of many others.

About 5 to 10 years ago Brian Pearce did a safari using a 45-70 lever rifle and shot a buffalo bull with Cor-Bon cast bullets and killed a cow with a pass through. This was covered in an article in Rifle magazine at that time.

yes

typically as a result of the "solids crowd"

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Ganyana: .416 rem - soft- throgh a buff cow behind the shoulder and gut shot calf beyond.

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Will: typically as a result of the "solids crowd"

I have shot buff with rounds balls or pieces of steel rod in them.

I have not see a pass through on a buff. However, I did kill 2 zebras with a single shot once. I had no idea the second zebra was there when I shot.

Reason I ask, is that Kevin Robertson makes a big fuss about this, even with 375 rounds shot at 2750 fps, solids or premium softs.

Seems to me we shouldn't be shooting buffalo standing in the herd, no matter the caliber.

Is it common practice to shoot buffalo as they stand in the herd?

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Originally posted by Gerard:

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Ganyana: .416 rem - soft- throgh a buff cow behind the shoulder and gut shot calf beyond.

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Will: typically as a result of the "solids crowd"

Gerard, I think the solids Will is speaking of are the non-expanding silds like the Trophy Bonded solids. The mono-metal EXPANDING solids and those with a very flat meplat may not shoot through so often.

I shoot a lot of very large wild boar and purposefully line up two or three if I can when useing TB solids in a 470NE double rifle to kill three at a time sometimes, and two at a time quite offten. That bullet will shoot through three 200-300 lb boars and zing across the countryside. I've not seen it on Buffalo personally, but on two occasions it has happened to others hunting out of the same camp where I was hunting with another PH. So it does happen and as Will say usually with solids.

I haven't but a friend I was hunting with swacked a big bull with his .416 Rigby with a 400 Gr. Rhino soft point that went through and gut shot a cow.

Have never seen it on Buffalo but once did it deliberately on Impala. I was shooting Impala for bait for leopard and the PH said we could save a lot of time if I would let three of them line up and just make one shot do the trick. So we found a large herd and let them mill around till some lined up and took the shot. Two went down instantly and the third ran off and dropped and then got up. The tracker ran him down and cut his throat. Rifle was a 375H&H and bullet was a 270gr Nosler Partition. Don't know what would have happened if I had used a solid luckily I didn't have any.

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Originally posted by Saeed:

ON another, we found a Nosler 300 grain 375 caliber bullet lodged in the buffalos balls.

An obvious sign of a Mark Sullivan attempt at a charge.

When I was a kid I hunted buffalo in a place called Rufunsa near the Luangwa and Zambezi confluence. I had a scout in tow whose name I have forgotten but who was a good sort and as it turned out a hunter and tracker.

We tailed a heard of buffalo in dense mopani during the rains and I remember clearly there were a couple of bulls bringing up the rear. One bull caught our scent and wheeled around offering a perfect broadside shot which I took. Then my big gun was a 9.3 by 62 and I was using a RWS, a silver full metal jacket.

To my dismay and after the shot the scout claimed the bullet had gone through and hit another buffalo which had broken to our right. My intended target however veered left into a mass of scrub and leaves.

Note I was young and not very experienced but had been taught how to make my own bed and to clean up my mess. This was to be my first wounding and unbeknown to me I had two wounded buffalo to deal with.

I was shitting bricks as we walked forward to examine the blood spoor and the evidence of the second buffalo. Arriving at the scene of the crime we were immediately charged from the right. It was vicious and fast but fortunately for us the buffalo ran into a fallen tree and we both fired as it tried to round this obstacle. I was sweating bricks but will always remember how that animal easily absorbed AK fire. A better placed bullet from my 9.3 bought the young bull to his knees.

I had little time to recover as the scout egged me on to the other, my intended target, and this was a big black bull who had crashed through the bush into the tall trees. There was no death bellow, there was no sound. No blood just a large slippery track heading into the haunted forest.

It took a lot of courage to walk into to the morass of green and the scout was my mentor that day. We ventured forward with much caution my heart thumping against my sodden shirt. The scout softly put his hand on my shoulder which halted me as he had heard the buffalo breathing, but I could not and I noticed my hands were sweating which is not normal. The concerned scout rested his gun on the ground and carefully ascended into the leaves to get a better look. He had only gone up a few feet when he stiffened and his look was directly in front of me. He motioned for me to step back as the bush moved in front of me. I shot at nothing and in desperation but it was not needed as the buffalo had died on his feet.

This incident made sex seem positively mundane.

Why would you shoot without a clear shot? I can understand a matter of life or death, but shooting an animal with ANY chance of the bullet penetrating and hitting another animal behind it is unethical (of course except for feral hogs).

Maybe these shots were pass throughs that came out at angle; not directly behind the target animal, but at an angle to an adjacent animal?

Another vote for well constructed soft points.

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Originally posted by Austin Hunter:
Why would you shoot without a clear shot? I can understand a matter of life or death, but shooting an animal with ANY chance of the bullet penetrating and hitting another animal behind it is unethical (of course except for feral hogs).

Maybe these shots were pass throughs that came out at angle; not directly behind the target animal, but at an angle to an adjacent animal?

Another vote for well constructed soft points.

I thought it was clear and did not see the other animal.

I honestly don't know. I've only had a couple pass throughs though. Buggers are tough.

quote:

Originally posted by Austin Hunter:
Why would you shoot without a clear shot? I can understand a matter of life or death, but shooting an animal with ANY chance of the bullet penetrating and hitting another animal behind it is unethical (of course except for feral hogs).

Maybe these shots were pass throughs that came out at angle; not directly behind the target animal, but at an angle to an adjacent animal?

Another vote for well constructed soft points.

Austin H shooting an animal when you intend shooting only one with another behind that "YOU CAN SEE" is unethical. However as fairgame says he didn't see the other animal at all. In my case I purposely lined the hog up intending to kill all three, and there is the difference!

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Originally posted by MacD37:

quote:

Originally posted by Austin Hunter:
Why would you shoot without a clear shot? I can understand a matter of life or death, but shooting an animal with ANY chance of the bullet penetrating and hitting another animal behind it is unethical (of course except for feral hogs).

Maybe these shots were pass throughs that came out at angle; not directly behind the target animal, but at an angle to an adjacent animal?

Another vote for well constructed soft points.

Austin H shooting an animal when you intend shooting only one with another behind that "YOU CAN SEE" is unethical. However as fairgame says he didn't see the other animal at all. In my case I purposely lined the hog up intending to kill all three, and there is the difference!

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I was replying to the thread in general, not specifically fairgame's story. But, I can only assume that fairgame's other unseen buff was in the brush and the bullet passed through the intended target, through the dense brush, and into the buffalo. That is the only explanation.