Well, we're just back from the Caprivi where I was lucky enough to kill a nice old bull elephant with Vaughan Fulton.

Here are some pics just uploaded from the Nikon D70.







This elephant was a very old bull, at least 45 years of age and probably a fair bit older. He was on his last set of molars and those were well worn down.

He had long tusks. The longer one was 5 1/2 feet in length; however, because of his exceptionally large and long nerves, his tusks weighed in a bit light, at 42 and 35 pounds.

My Irish ancestors deserted me on that front. But the hunt itself was very exciting, and because of the 120+ degree Fahrenheit temperatures, very physical and demanding.

Overall, I was very happy with this safari, and especially so with my old, veteran bull. We really earned him, with a seven-plus hour stalk, blown twice by fickle winds, and with our final approach to inside 25 yards for the killing shots.

My dear wife trekked with us on every one of our many elephant expeditions, including the final one. All in all, she had as great a time as I did on this safari--even though a few close encounters with recalcitrant elephant bulls had her questioning her sanity from time to time.

My .500 A-Square did its job very well and so did the Woodleigh 600 grain solids I had hand loaded for this hunt.

Unfortunately, the weather, meaning the extraordinarily dry and hot conditions, and other factors, conspired to foil any hope of buffalo hunting.

Long stretches of the Chobe River, which forms the de facto boundary between Namibia and Botswana, were completely dry, and the highest temperature we recorded was 128 degrees Fahrenheit (53 degrees Celsius). The buff would not leave the confines of Chobe National Park in Botswana to feed in much greener Namibia until well after dark, and would return to the park well before the shooting light of dawn. It was very frustrating, but such are the vagaries of the chase.

Still, we saw hundreds of elephant, and tracked and observed many, many shootable trophy bulls.

On one evening alone, as the sun set in a red and darkening sky, we saw a herd of well over 200, and perhaps as many as 300, elephant. These elephant included bulls of all ages and sizes, and cows and calves by the dozens. They had been feeding in a dense forest, and as we approached them, they winded us. At first, some of them ran, but then, the vast bulk of them lumbered calmly away from us, across a wide plain to a farther feeding ground deep in the gathering dusk.

Elephant stretched from our left to our right, from the farthest reach of our sight on one side, to the farthest on the other. And they were sixes and sevens and tens and dozens deep. A solid wall and column of elephant from horizon to horizon.

It was a sight that none of us who witnessed it will ever forget.

I will go back. I do love it.

Excellent... Frontal brain shot?

Congradulations on the nice elephant!!!! It sounds like you had a great time.

Congratulations and thanks for the report. 120 degrees, I am afraid I would have melted.

Regards,

Terry

That's a very fine elephant and I like your shot placement!

Good Ele, good shot placement, good hunt, what more can be said. Congratulations

Congratulations on a nice bull!

Congratulations.

Terrific photos!

What do you have left for the Big 5? Just a rhino, right? It seems like I've seen photos of you with fine specimens of the others.

Thanks for sharing.

Kyler

What did that cost, if you don't mind sharing?

I want an ellie but man they are cost prohibitive.

In 2 years I get my last enlistment bonus it will be around $30K but I am pretty sure it won't be enough for an ellie.

Well done and well shot. Can you give details of the rifle and photos? I am right in the process of building a 500 A2 myself.

Thanks

Fergus

Congratulations on a great hunt and a great trophy! Great pics from your Nikon.
Elephant-hunting seems like a perfect hunt! Walking, stalking for endless hours under warm coniditions. It might be hard I guess, but the result even more pleasing..
I would also like to know the cost, if you don`t mind..

Congratulations! Great old elephant.

MrLexma: fantastic hunt and great perseverance under those conditions. When you get the chance, if you could further elaborate on the shot placement. I've never hunted elephant and to me it looks like the shot ranged upwards into the brain from a very acute angle (short distance)? thanks and well done. jorge

That's a great bull. Congratulations on a fine hunt! I hope you'll show us even more pictures of your hunt.

Congratulations, Lex, that's a great elephant.

Congratulations!!
I can't imagine the view of 300 elephants!! amazing !

53°Celsius????????

L

Congrat's on the ele and the shot, and he dropped just picture-perfect too!

I hunted the West Caprivi in Oct-2003, and had the same type of weather...dry and extremely hot. We didn't see any Buffalo either, but I did shoot a good Roan. April/May is a very nice time, at leat in West Caprivi.

Looking fwd to hearing more about the ele hunt!

Mike,

Welcome home and glad you had an exciting and successfull hunt...

Mike

Congratulations on your hunt and your elephant.

JPK

Congratulations and welcome back. It sounds like it was an arduous but rewarding hunt. That is getting to be a habit with you, isn't it?

Glad you enjoyed your hunt. Its good to see Vaughan is doing well.

mrlexma; Congratulations and well done. Boy, that ivory sure looks good! Regards, D. Nelson

Mighty Good Show, mrlexma!

Well done MR! What's the situation on the Caprivi now? I heard the government wasn't going to auction the hunting areas until next year.

Anyway, nice ele and thanks for the pics!

John

Congratulations on a fantastic trophy. Elephant hunting is the pinnacle of the sport in my opinion! But even a South Texas boy blanches at the thought of elephant jaunts in 100+ degree weather. Well tracked, well shot...congrats again!

Well done!

Good to see you made it out alive!

I'm glad we left when it was "only" 114.

Regardless of the weight of the tusks, I know you had a great hunt.

Joe

Very nicely done! I didn't recognize Vaughan with his beard and head shaved.

quote:

Originally posted by mikeh416Rigby:
Very nicely done! I didn't recognize Vaughan with his beard and head shaved.

Thank you. I was wondering what had happened to his hair but was afraid to ask!

quote:

the highest temperature we recorded was 128 degrees Fahrenheit (53 degrees Celsius).

HOLY CRAP! I am pretty sure I'd melt and/or die. I'd rather have -53 deg C!!

Congrats on a great hunt mrlexma! Great pics too!

Cheers,
Canuck

To put it simply; I am envious.
Congratlations on a great hunt and good shooting.

By the way were there any buffalo?

TerryR

Great pics, and congrats. Question: were you that tired, or maybe a bit somber about the kill? Reason is you don't look one bit happy in any of the pics. Maybe just camera shy? Just plain curious, as it was one of the things that I immediately thought, honestly, was a bit odd...

Or maybe fed up from holding up tusks and ears for someone taking a hundred pics?

Congrats to MR,
No finer gentleman is there here, and none more accurate with wit and bullet.
Bully good show!


And Vaughan delivers yet again.
Good on both of you.
But where are the sweat stains and grime in this photo op?

quote:

Originally posted by Kamo Gari:
Great pics, and congrats. Question: were you that tired, or maybe a bit somber about the kill? Reason is you don't look one bit happy in any of the pics. Maybe just camera shy? Just plain curious, as it was one of the things that I immediately thought, honestly, was a bit odd...

Or maybe fed up from holding up tusks and ears for someone taking a hundred pics?

I've never met MR, but I've got to believe that after hunting for days and days in that blistering heat, he's just plain wiped out.

Congratulations on your hunt and great looking Bull! Please post some additional pictures of the hunt, accommodations, etc.
Back in MA just in time for the upland and deer seasons. Just a slight change of pace.

Congratulations!

But how come you aren't smiling? Too hot, or were you still bummed about the BoSox?

George

Thanks to all for your congratulations.

I will provide more details in this post, and since I have had time to sort through some more photos this morning, I am also posting a few more of them.

Frontal Shot/Shot Placement: Yes, it was a frontal shot, taken at about 20 yards, plus or minus. I think my bullet must have hit his brain (probably on the underside of it), but we didn’t do a post mortem. The elephant was somewhere around 11+ feet tall, so I had to shoot upwards a bit.

At the shot, the elephant turned slightly away to his right and sank to his knees into the upright position you see in the photos. Then I put several more bullets into and behind his shoulder and one more in his ear. I really killed him, which is good policy on DG, I think.

All of this was being done while nine or ten other bulls from the herd we had been tracking screamed and roared and milled around very close by and finally bolted off, to our great relief.

Heat/Sweat: It was HOT! Here is a photo of our "official" camp thermometer, taken on one of the hotter days--but NOT the hottest (as you can see, we had some fun with it):



But it was also unbelievably dry. I normally sweat rivers when it’s hot, but on this safari, as soon as I started sweating and spots would show on my shirt and hat, the sweat would evaporate leaving me bone dry.

We drank gallons of water and Power Ade each day. Dehydration was a real risk. Imagine drinking two liters of water in a matter of seconds and still feeling thirsty. I did that more than once.

Not Smiling: I just don’t smile much after I’ve killed an animal—at least not in photos. It’s not that I’m not happy, because I am. It’s more that it’s a pretty somber and sad thing and a photograph is meant to memorialize it.

I guess that I mostly just feel enormous respect for the animal in that situation. Especially in the case of this elephant. My wife cried her eyes out. And I’m not embarrassed to say that I shed a tear or two as well.

And yes, Mike, I was pretty wiped out to boot!

But I did manage to smile a little bit in the group photo:



Kyler: You are right. I have killed all of the Big 5 now but rhino. I don’t think I will ever kill one of those. But I will definitely hunt elephant again, God willing.

D99/Anders: Costs. All costs for a hunt like this one are posted on Vaughan Fulton’s website:

http://www.fultonclassicsafaris.com.

Fergus: Details of rifle and photos: My rifle was built by American Hunting Rifles, Inc. Here’s a link to a thread, including photos, that I started when I got the rifle earlier this year:

AHR .500 A-Square

Charles_Helm: Now that I’ve done them, I have to say that tracking lion and buffalo hunts, and elephant hunting, which almost always involves long treks tracking the big bulls, are the most difficult, tense, exciting and physically demanding kinds of African DG hunting. All African hunting is fun, but nothing else quite measures up to these, IMO. I can only hope to make a habit of it!

30ott6: Government concessions: The MET have decided not to auction the government concessions this year, so they will not be hunted in 2006. That was a stupid decision, IMO, especially since Namibia is in such difficult economic straits, but there it is.

GeorgeS: BoSox: They were swept before I left. But I thought I heard that the Yanks had had some first round trouble of their own, no?

Here are a few more elephant photos, and also one of the scarred old zebra stallion I killed with my .416 Rigby less than 150 yards from Botswana.

Full Length:



The Obligatory Tail-Cutting:



Eye:



Tip of Trunk:



Tip of Tail and Right Rear Leg:



Trunk and Left Tusk (he was a southpaw):



Zebra Stallion (you can see some of his cousins hanging around in the background):



And Joe, here's one last photo for you that I know will "warm" your heart :

Thanks for the additional details and photos. That bull is a hard-won trophy, no doubt about it.

Great report and pics! I think you need a better hat....perhaps a blue one with a red B? And don’t worry about the Sox being swept; the real bad stuff just happened this week.

Congratulations again from another hunter in Red Sox Nation.

"Not Smiling: I just don’t smile much after I’ve killed an animal—at least not in photos. It’s not that I’m not happy, because I am. It’s more that it’s a pretty somber and sad thing and a photograph is meant to memorialize it.

I guess that I mostly just feel enormous respect for the animal in that situation. Especially in the case of this elephant. My wife cried her eyes out. And I’m not embarrassed to say that I shed a tear or two as well."

I thought that might have been the case. Classy, and a sentiment you don't own alone, I assure you.

Thanks for sharing!