Dates: April 17-May 1, 2006

Professional Hunter: Myles McCallum of Charlton-McCallum Safaris CMSAFARIS

Location: Chewore South (elephant)
Chewore North (hippo and tigerfishing)

Equipment: Elephant;Winchester model 70 custom .416 Rem. Mag custom built by Lex Webernick of Rifles, Inc.Leupold Var X III 1.5x5
Hippo;Interarms Mark X .375 H&H Mag custom built by Henrickson's Gun Works. Leupold 1.5x5 Vari X III

Loads: .416 - 82.0 gr. Reloader 15 w/ Federal 215 primers and 410 gr GSCustom flatnose solids
chronographed @ 2415 fps
.375-71.0 gr IMR 4320 w/ Federal 215 primers and 300 gr GSCustom flatnose solids
chronographed @ 2520 fps

The Hunt: I arrived in Harare on the evening of April 16 after missing the noon flight from Jo'berg due to a security delay at Dulles.Buzz Charlton met me and put me up that night at his home. I was concerned about missing a day of hunting, but needn't have been. After an early morning charter to Roger Whittal's camp in Chewore South, I was tracking elephants by 10:00 A.M.!Myles had been informed of my delay, and expedited our start.
Each day was similar for the next week. Up early and driving out at first light looking for old bull tracks.Once spoor was found, we loaded water in the trackers' backpacks, and off we'd go for the next 5 to 9 hours, covering 8 to 12 miles daily.The rains had just ended, and the country was lush and thick.We were in elephants every day, and in the course of 9 days, we tracked or saw over 30 mature bulls.We also saw lions fairly frequently, and walked up on 4 different Dagga boys.We returned to camp each evening, tired and thirsty and happy to have hunted!
We were charged 3 times by elephant bulls and once by a buffalo cow.They happened quickly and without warning in jesse so thick you couldn't see more than 5 to 10 yards!One of the charges came from a bull that had been wounded on a crop raiding foray.We reported him to National Parks on the morning of day 8.
After leaving the Parks HQ that day, we headed towards the Chewore River. After about 15 km, we found some tracks in the main road from the night before. Morgan, our head tracker , said we'd be fools not to follow this track even though it wasn't real fresh. The droppings were very coarse and loose, and the footprints well worn.We all fell into our long march routine, only to come upon the 4 bulls in less than 30 minutes!They had camped on a Baobab tree, stripping bark all night and had just finished.We circled down wind, passing on a 30 pounder and a 40 pounder. Bull #3 walked into view and we all knew that this was the ONE!He was walking at a steady pace and I had all of 8 seconds to decide he was it and make the shot. I had no opportunity for a brain shot as his head was obscured. I shot him with my .416 at 15 paces through the top of the heart with 2 follow up shots in each hip. He travelled 25 yards from the first shot and was down for the count. I put a finisher in the ventral chest and then a frontal brain shot. What A Rush!!
The old bull was well down on his last set of molars. Truly an old monarch.My first shot penetrated the chest completely and exited. We measured the frontal brain shot and recovered the GSCustom flatnose bullet from the backstrap after 60 inches of penetration.Pictures can be viewed on CM's websight under Trophy Gallery , John Clader's hunt CM Safaris Photo Gallery.
On day 9, we were accompanied by Parks personnel as we hunted the wounded bull that had charged us 2 days before.Myles and Morgan found fresh spoor, and located the bull in dense river jesse within 2 hours.The apprentice PH was to have first shot, backed up by some of the Park rangers.I stayed a safe distance off to the side. After the opening "fussilade", the bull did not go down as all the initial shots had missed the brain. I put my first backup round completely through his chest from right to left, and then got to side brain shoot him when his head came into view!This round also exited.Icing on the cake!!
Day 10 had us travelling to Big 5 Safaris' Chewore North camp on the Zambezi River.We hunted hippo the next day and I was fortunate to kill an old bull that had an odd lower right tusk that measured over 12" .
He was shot with my .375 H&H and a 300 gr GSCustom flatnose solid.
Tigerfishing on the Zambezi rounded out the trip. I caught lots of fish, with 3 going 11 1/2, 12 and 13 pounds.We drove back to Harare to finish out a wonderful adventure.The only down side was having to fly for 24 hours to get home!
I feel very fortunate to have had such a good hunt. It certainly pays to be in good shape and to do your homework. Myles and Buzz are first rate in every aspect of their operation. I count them as good friends that I will hunt with again(LORD WILLING!).Before this hunt I had figured on one elephant hunt in my lifetime. Now I want to do it again!!!

Well done and thanks for the report.

Regards,

Terry

P.S.
I fixed the links in your report.

Thanks for the report on your great hunt. Here is the link to your hunt summary on the Charlton-McCallum website.

You mentiomed the size of some of the other bulls. What is the size of the tusks on the bull you took? Outstanding report and everyone reading wishs we were there. Thanks

RM007 The tusks were 16 1/2 " in circumference at the lip. One tusk was 42" and the shorter was 38" from the lip.Official weights have not been sent to me yet.Myles said they should go 55# and51#.

Great hunt report!

Thanks for posting.

JPK

Great hunt report, and thanks for the links to the photos!

Congratulations on an excellent old elephant, and a most successful trip!

From CM's Website:

Bill C- Thanks for your comments and especially for your helpful info before my hunt.It really meant a lot!Myles and Buzz were everything you said they'd be! John (Bwana Dogo)

Nice Nzou!

465H&H

Nice jumbo. Congrats.

Congratulations on a fine elephant, your bonus elephant and a toad of a hippo bull! Where in South Texas do you hail from? If you are close to Victoria, pm me sometime and come have lunch with a few Africanophiles that have hunted with Buzz and habituate this part of Texas!

Fantastic hunt. Thank you for the report and great pictures. I guess Lex's rifle shoots straight?

Way to go...nice elephant and up close as you said, " What a rush..."

Mike

excellent report nice photos tank you .Juan

Congratulations on your hunt and nice Elephant and a Hippo.


hamdeni

Bwana; I just returned from a 21 day lion hunt in Chewore South At Whittall's camp and saw your tusks in the camp and later at the office in Harare. Very nice. Just thought you might like to know they made it to the office safely and have been registered. Chuck Swenson

Thanks for the report. Sounds like you had a wonderful time and you certainly picked a great PH. I look forward to seeing those guys in 1 year.

Also, very courteous of Chuck to update you on the tusks.

Your report is wonderful and so is your nickname you choose it for our national dog the dogo argentino if its rigth congratulations again my friend.juan

Juan,
i think his "nickname" if mean tot be kiswahili. Literally translated it means "small Mister". commonly used to mean "junior boss" or "small sir" as in the "boss' son"

You're both right. I intended my AR moniker to be Swahili in reference to a highly successful buffalo foray in the Rungwa 2 years ago. My hunting companion was Bwana kubwa (6" 7", 280#), so at 5'10", I was Bwana dogo.
However, I'm a veterinarian by trade and take care of some Dogos that some of our local hog hunters run...como quieres, no le hace...(whatever you like, it doesn't make any difference!) Bwana dogo

Excuse me but i need to ask you your opinion about the dogos did you see photos of my dogos here ,do you know that they were created by a surgeon fan of hunting ,im a surgeon and i have had to operated my dogs a lot of times .Juan

Juan- You have some nice looking dogs.

As we are in The A frican forum ill kike to tell you that the dogos were used in Africa even for hunting lions thats was told to me by one of the Nores family ,i belive in SA there are some dogo breeders, one of the Nores brothers was a diplomatic so he took the dogos to a lot of different countries to test them even with bears ,and in Japan for hunting wild boars there .I m invited to hunt in SA bushpigs with dogs ,ill try to make some time to go ,they use boerboels and rhodesians.Juan