In response to requests for details about my leopard hunt, I am posting excerpts from a story that I wrote for the Alabama Safari Club Journal.



The Professor of Sango

The third day of the hunt, June 3, began with the usual hunt for buffalo, but swirling winds kept us from having success with a herd of Dugga Boys. After giving up on buffalo, we checked baits. Checking eight baits takes time, so by the time we arrived at the final bait – one of the baits hung the day of our arrival – I was basically asleep on the back of the truck. I woke up pretty quick when I heard the excitement in the trackers’ voices. I dismounted the truck to see a decimated zebra quarter and plenty of large tom leopard tracks in the sand. I could not believe that we had a male on bait on the third day. Who is that lucky? As a bonus, a biologist living on Sango and doing his Ph.D. work on leopards placed an infrared camera on the bait and the camera had been triggered.

On the way back for lunch, Thierry told me that a client wounded a leopard last year in the same tree where we had the big cat feeding. The location of the hit was unknown, but the leopard bled profusely. After two days of tracking without ever seeing the cat, the hunters called for a dog handler. Chased by the dogs, the leopard took refuge in a cave and fought the dogs. When the dogs returned to the handler and hunters scared and bleeding, they decided the leopard was way too healthy to risk sending any human into the cave. Whatever became of the cat was unknown.

When we looked at the pictures on a laptop, we confirmed that the feeding cat was a large male leopard. He was feeding at midnight. Dusty, the biologist, came to the camp to see the pictures. One of Dusty’s areas of expertise is identification of leopards. Since every leopard has different rosettes and spots, much like human fingerprints though more easily distinguished, each leopard can be identified. When Dusty looked at the screen, he immediately recognized our leopard as the leopard that had been wounded in the same tree almost a year prior.



After lunch, we went into hunting mode. We built the blind and by 4:00 p.m. and we settled in for the evening’s hunt. By 10:00 p.m., I was struggling. I wondered if the leopard would ever show up. By 11:00 p.m., I was falling asleep. Only a series of regular elbow jabs from my PH kept me awake and not snoring. At 12:15 a.m., it happened. With a loud growl, the leopard charged up to the base of the bait tree to run off a civet. The civet almost ran through the blind and I almost jumped into Thierry’s lap. He whispered, “It’s the leopard.” As the sounds of tearing flesh and breaking bone began, we moved into our shooting positions.

By moonlight, I could just barely see the leopard moving on the bait branch. Thierry tapped me on the shoulder indicating that he was about the turn on the light. I gave him a thumbs up that I was ready. After the light came on, another tap would indicate that the cat was a male and that I could shoot. I can remember the light hitting the cat just long enough that I could see his yellow color. Then, instantly, the cat leapt from the branch, grunted, and ran off. I could not believe it. What happened? I sighed and laid flat on my back as the excitement of the situation began dissipating through heavy breathing and my shaking legs. Thierry said, “He will be back.”

Not twenty minutes later, we again heard the sounds of the leopard feeding. This time, however, he would go up the tree, get a bite or two, and retreat to the ground. For several minutes, we watched bits and pieces of this activity by moonlight before the leopard stopped, walked into the open, sat down in the bright moonlight, and looked up at the bait. I could see the cat well and, in hindsight, probably should have shot him. Instead, I whispered, “I can see him. I can kill him right there.” Before Thierry could respond, the leopard looked right in my direction and ran away. I cannot believe that he heard me whispering, but I know that he did. Three hours later, there were no other encounters with the leopard, so we called for the truck at 4:00 a.m. Of course, after we left, the leopard returned and ate the remainder of the bait.

The next day, we debriefed and went back over the previous night’s hunt. Thierry agreed that the leopard heard my whispers, and he emphasized the importance of our using hand signals. We also talked about the leopard, that he was big, and that he was smart. The leopard’s experience with being hunted and shot the previous year would make him a difficult cat to hunt. It would also be difficult to get the cat back to bait since he had eaten most of a zebra quarter in two days. Finally, our botched hunt from the previous night just served to further his formal education. Thierry figured that we would have to shoot the leopard, if at all, by moonlight. With all of these factors working for the leopard and against the hunters, this cat was appropriately named “The Professor.”

Fast forward four days, and our baits were starting to rot or had been completely devoured, and Thierry was starting to think about focusing our efforts on different cats in different parts of the concession. But before moving on, he wanted to try for The Professor one last time. As is typical when you need a bait, we could not find a zebra to shoot, so we borrowed a zebra quarter from our biologist friend, Dusty, and hurried to the bait site. Since The Professor had so much experience with the existing bait tree and blind site, we moved deeper into the bush and created a new set up between three rocky hills. We hung the bait where the leopard could eat from the ground. Thierry was so confident in this set up that he went ahead and built the blind without any cat having found the bait or fed on it. He felt so confident in the set up that we almost sat there that night.

View from the bait, toward the blind.


Day eight dawned with us on the tracks of buffalo. We enlisted Nevin Lees May, PH and Sango camp manager, to shoot a zebra bait for us, and we sent one of the trackers to see if The Professor had found the bait. The buffalo were uncooperative, but Nevin got our zebra and The Professor had fed during the night.

Spirits were high as we ate lunch and planned for the evening’s hunt. Since the new blind was deeper in the bush, we planned to arrive at 3:00 p.m. in case the cat arrived early. The plan was to shoot the cat by moonlight so, with the gun in the rest, I memorized the sight picture thinking anything that was not a rock or the bait tree would have to be the leopard. Again, hours passed and I drifted in and out of sleep until 10:15 p.m. Just at that time, Thierry nudged me and gave me the hand signal indicating where the cat was in relation to the tree. I sat up and looked through the scope and could not see anything. Clouds had moved in, and the bright moonlight that benefitted us on the previous nights was no longer there. After a few tense moments, the clouds parted just enough that I could make out the leopard. He was sitting like a dog and eating the bait. Of course, he was on the shady side of the tree!

I turned to Thierry and gave him a thumbs up, a head nod, and a trigger pull gesture all at the same time. He nodded back and I returned to the sight picture, made out the leopard’s moving head, slid the crosshair down into his body, and squeeeeeeezed.

Boom!

Growl!

(silence)

You got him!

Did I get him?

You got him!

Thierry turned on the light, but there was no dead leopard at the base of the tree. I saw nothing but fire when I pulled the trigger, but Thierry said that the shot definitely knocked the leopard down. Unfortunately, he lost sight of the leopard when he put down his binoculars and turned on the light.

After fifteen minutes, we decided to slowly approach the bait tree. With rifles and flashlights at the ready, we began the long walk to the bait. About fifteen yards away, Theirry took the lead and asked me to stay behind. After finally getting to the bait tree, he began unloading his gun and called to me, “Mr. Parks, come see your leopard.”

Incredibly, the leopard was perfectly shot and had died just eight feet from the tree. I put down my rifle and grabbed the leopard in the obligatory “bear hug” pose. It was completely dark and there was no camera anywhere, but I had been waiting a long time to hoist up a big tom leopard.

The truck arrived and all the trackers joined the celebration. After a power struggle as to which of them would get to carry the leopard to the truck, we made the short walk to the vehicle and took some pictures before heading back to the skinning room. On the way, the radio calls starting going out that The Professor had given his last lecture.

In response to the radio calls, just about everyone in the compound came to see The Professor. We arrived to a large crowd sometime before midnight and the party was well underway. Betsy was so excited about my getting the leopard that she made the trip in her robe and pajamas. After taking more pictures, reliving the story a dozen times, toasting The Professor, and toasting the hunters, we made the 20-minute trip back to the camp. It was, without a doubt, the highpoint of my hunting career.

The next day we learned that the leopard’s skull scored just under 17 inches and that he measured 7'3" nose to tail. Dusty had performed the post mortem and verified that this was the leopard that was wounded last year. In fact, he had a scar on both sides of his right arm and a mass of scar tissue in the right arm. Dusty also confirmed our belief that this was an old leopard. He estimated the cat was eight to ten years old and was likely nine. I understood The Professor to have been the oldest leopard taken in many years of hunting on the Sango property.

As I write this, I am one month removed from that night. A leopard is a special animal and I am thankful to have taken such a magnificent trophy in the company of my wife and many other special people. While a leopard, by itself, can make any safari a success, this safari was extremely successful since my leopard, at almost 17 inches, was the best trophy taken.

Two days after getting the leopard, we finally improved our luck with the buffalo and I shot a big bull. We followed the track, he charged, and Thierry and I stopped him at eight steps with a simultaneous dose of 500 grain charge stoppers from our .458s. It was way too close for comfort, but way too much fun to wish it had happened any other way.

Seven other record book trophies taken on Sango included: Livingstone Eland; Bush Pig; two Warthogs; Klipspringer; Bushbuck; and Waterbuck. Nothing, however, not even a charging buffalo, tops my experience with The Professor.

What a kitty... Congrats!

Great story and of course Leopard

Michael J

Sango seems to be the place for a big one...Amazing tom..

Will,

It does not get any better than that. Targeting one specific animal, and a magnificent one as well!

Fine hunt, great story. Thanks for sharing.

I can only hope to be able to hunt the Save- what an experience it must have been. I don't think there is another spot in Africa that I would rather hunt.
Congratulations on a fantastic cat!

Will Great cat, Did I read this right the blind was only 15 yard from the bait??

Why so close? I shot mine at 23 yard and I thought that was close

That Leopard is absolutely beautiful!

John

How did you work that out that set up with the trail camera, and did it record your kill??

Hello Will

Congratulations once again; that is a terrific cat, and thank you for posting the story, I enjoyed it very much.

Regards
Aziz

quote:

Originally posted by jeff h:
Will Great cat, Did I read this right the blind was only 15 yard from the bait??

Why so close? I shot mine at 23 yard and I thought that was close

40 to 45 yards.

quote:

Originally posted by Leopardtrack:
How did you work that out that set up with the trail camera, and did it record your kill??

Trail camera pic was taken at a bait tree a few hundred yards from the tree where we later shot the leopard. The trial camera was not used at the set up where we shot the cat.

Great story and a huge cat. Congratulations.

Wow, what a cat.

Great story! I too, agree, that shooting a monster cat is the highlight of African hunting! Congratulations again.