Uganda Nile Buffalo, Sitatunga, PG Safari
Feb 27-March 18
Hunters- Kendall Kilbourne & Tim Herald
Booking Agent- Worldwide Trophy Adventures (Tim Herald)
Outfitter- Uganda Wildlife Safaris (PH and Owner Christian Weth)
Rifles: VC- .470NE (did not use), Jarrett .416 Rem, Gunwerks 7mm (we shared rifles)

After a 2 year wait, friend Kendall Kilbourne and I finally made it to Uganda to hunt with Christian Weth. Upon arrival, we had no rifles, so hung out in Kampala for an extra day until the guns caught up. We did get to have a braii at the UWS office, and it worked out well as good friends bwanamrm and bwanajay were ending their fantastic hunt, and we all got to hang out that evening. Jay and Russell gave us some pointers (mostly about holding out before we shot anything), and we had a great visit.



We drove up to Aswa Lolim (on the Nile River near Murchison Falls) to begin the hunt for Uganda Kob and Nile buff. Kendall shot a stud of a kob the first 10 minutes out of camp after short stalk. It was a great start.

We saw thousands of kob, lots and lots of buffalo, plenty of Jackson’s hartebeest, waterbuck, oribi, etc. To make a long story short, after looking over a lot of buffalo, Kendall finally found a super old and worn smooth bull, we did about 3 stalks, and he had his 1st Nile buffalo. It was a great trophy.





I looked over a bunch of bulls, and because there are so many, I was super picky, and ended up not shooting one at Aswa. I did shoot a really nice kob after a fun stalk where we looked over about 10 rams. These animals are larger in body and much more handsome than I thought they would be.


At this point we packed up and made the long 10.5 hour drive to Karamoja. This is the area I really wanted to see because of the obvious history. It was not to disappoint. This is an old school safari camp with tents and an open air thatch dining area, and that is basically it. It is fantastic!

We went for a drive in the evening for about 2 hours, and I counted 35 hard bossed bulls, and that was not counting any in herds. It truly is buffalo heaven. The next morning, we saw 65 hard bossed bulls. If you have a certain shape or look you like, you can look around and find a bull that fits it. Normally I would have shot a scrum cap as we saw a number of them, and a lot of ancient old bulls worn to nothing, but this was such a special place, I wanted to try to get a 40” Nile, and hopefully an old one.











The second morning, the first pair of bulls we saw had a perfect bull. Kendall was up first, so we did some maneuvering, and he finally got a shot at the big boy in the open, and he put him down with the .416. He was perfect…He was over 40” wide, old, gray-faced, worn tips and heavy. He was the type bull I wanted as well.


I guess I should mention that the buffalo I posted photos of a while back that is estimated at 48”-50” is in Karamoja. I was also really trying to spend some time looking for hm. I have no idea how many bulls we looked at over the next few days, but in the 100’s. Once I was up to bat, I just couldn’t find a bull that had it all.




Kendall killed a really nice 31.5” waterbuck one morning as we headed out for buff, and along the way he shot a reedbuck as well. I just kept passing on buffalo, and driving Christian crazy because I wouldn’t shoot.

One afternoon we went up in the hills, and I found an old bull I would shoot. He was ancient, really worn smooth and no tips. He was probably 38”, had a goliath body, and he acted like he couldn’t hold his head up he was so old. I got within double rifle range and wanted to shoot, but Christian called me off. He said the bull was only about ½ a KM from the boundary of Kidepo National Park, and he didn’t want to shoot there. I was a little aggravated as I was sure I could kill him cleanly, but we let him go, and it was OK.

The drought conditions in the Kafu River basin where we planned to go next were really bad, and Christian was worried about us getting a sitatunga, so he was really pushing to switch camps, but he also told me we were not going to just shoot a buff, just to get one on the ground. I agreed 100%. I would have been happy staying there another week looking for the huge bull or a perfect bull.

The next day we were in bulls all morning. I don’t know how many we got in on in shooting range and turned down, but a lot. One bull we looked at for 10 minutes broadside at about 70 yards. Huge old body, gray face, worn horns with wide boss, but he never looked our way and we didn’t know if he was 32” wide or 42” wide. We could see 2 other groups of bulls in the distance, and finally Christian said, “let’s go look at the others”. Of course, we stepped out in the open, he turned and trotted actually closer to us, pulled up, and we saw he was a great bull. He was there at 45-50 yards for about 5 seconds, but since we had decided to move, my cameraman was not in position, and I couldn’t shoot. The bull took off for good.

We looked at a bunch more but nothing great …

That afternoon we decided to go to the same area and look for the one we should have shot since we knew there were a lot of buff around that general area. We got into bulls, made a nice stalk up to about 30 yards on a group of 5 bulls, but only one was old, and he wasn’t anything special.

We could see a small herd way in the distance, and then we saw 3 bulls out on an open plain walking our way. They were about 500 yards out, and Kendall looked at me and said, “the bull on the right is BIG! You need to check him out.” The problem was that it was as open as a football field, they were now at 400 yards and walking right at us, but we really couldn’t move on them.

It was getting late and we were running short on light, and then the bulls put the breaks on. I was afraid it was going to happen, and I heard the Land Cruiser approaching. When we left the last group of bulls, Christian sent our tracker Abu back to get the truck, and he was driving over to get us, and the bulls stopped.

We waited a while, and two of them started moving away to our left. We had nothing to lose, so we just walked right at them. I would have loved to have had a black umbrella! Things didn’t go well as the two bulls continued off to the left, and the biggest bull that we wanted to look at turned around and walked back the way he came. We just followed him, and we saw a big herd of 75-100 buff in the distance.

We kept following, but the bull we were after eventually got to the edge of the herd. Light was fading, and we only had a small group of trees to work with. We moved in as close as possible, and tried to find him in the herd. He stood out as his body was huge. His legs looked super short, he had a big dewlap, he was 100% covered in mud and his chest looked 3 feet wide.

The herd actually galloped toward us as they had a number of calves, and we kept trying to sort him out, but there was never a shot. We moved a bit more and the herd acted like they were all going to move off to the right and away from us. The big bull was the 3rd one in, and then he made a mistake. He decided to lead the group away, so he got out in front, broadside, and he gave me a shot. I hit him good (ended up being a middle heart shot) as he was walking, I shot him in the rear as he was running away, and I put a 3rd one in his neck as he spun around and was going down. In total he didn’t go 50 yards.

I knew he was a big old bull. I knew he had a huge body, big bosses, and he was fairly wide. I also knew he did not have worn off tips, and that was one reason I almost didn’t shoot. That was the only thing I didn’t like about him, but as I walked up to him, that didn’t matter any more. He was not a 15 year-old worn off bull, but he was old, 100%. He had chips as big as my hand knocked out of his bosses, he was all gray faced, he had really big bosses for a Nile buff, and he was over 40” wide. I was very happy with him, and it had been a great hunt. We snapped a couple of photos, but we had no light, so did the rest of pics the next morning.







That afternoon, we went and visited a local Karamojong village. They taught us of their culture, and it was a real eye opener when they told us that they and their enemies, the Takana tribe from Sudan, still raid each other’s villages and steal cattle and women. They fight to the death, and it is a serious issue in the area. Where we were hunting was less than 10 miles from Sudan, only a few miles from Kenya, and I think only about 100ish miles to the Omo Valley in Ethiopia.











We were finished in Karamoja, so packed again to move to the Kafu River basin for East African sitatunga, EA bushbuck, and Nile bushbuck. Again this is a tent camp, but the nicest safari tents I have ever been in with king sized beds, rock bathrooms, etc. The food is great, and you are sitting right on the Kafu River and papyrus swamp, but almost no insects.

We had a full moon, worst drought in 5+ years, and everyone told us how hard the sitatunga were going to be. We did 4 sits with Kendall without seeing a bull. Then he saw one, and they passed him, but really second guessed the decision.

After that we split up, I saw nothing my first morning or afternoon, but the next morning out, I had a bull come out. My PH, Div, told me it wasn’t a monster, but it was a mature bull, and he thought I should take it considering the terrible conditions. I went back and forth, and the bull walked out of our opening. He came back, and we debated again, and again the bull left. We talked more, and finally I told Div if he showed up again, I would shoot. Third time’s a charm, right???





Of course he showed up, and I dropped him at about 200 yards. I was very happy as he was a beautiful animal, we had watched him a lot, he was mature and conditions were tough, but he was definitely not a huge trophy bull. I think the guys were a bit disappointed, but I was advised to shoot, he was mature, and all was well with me.



Getting him out of the papyrus swamp was a serious job, and hunting in that environment is just a really different and special experience.

Now we had heard from Russell and Jay how many bushbuck were in Kafu. They both took great rams. The deal is there are Nile bushbuck there that do not get huge. They are quite small in body, and look like harnessed bushbuck. They are beautiful. There are east African bushbuck, that are darker, not nearly as marked with spots and stripes, they are bigger in body and in horn.



Kendall took a bushbuck that should easily be the new world record with a bow, and that evening he had a great old sitatunga come out, and he made a great shot. What a day he had!




I was looking for a 16”+ ram. We literally looked over 100’s. I have never seen anything like it. A morning or evening drive could easily produce 50-75 bushbuck sightings. One evening we saw a ram that we thought was about 17”. He was a monster, but when we got close to a shot, there wasn’t enough light for the cameraman. I hated letting him walk! I passed a number of 15-15.5” rams over the next couple of days.

The last morning, I found a solid 16”+ EA ram, and I could have taken him a number of times, but it never worked out for the camera angles. I was frustrated to say the least. Kendall took another bushbuck this morning with a rifle that was over 15”.


So me shooting a bushbuck was all that was left. When we all went out that afternoon, I decided I would shoot a 15”+ EA ram if we saw one, or if I could find a really good, old Nile that was marked pretty but still had major horns, I would go for that. The more I looked at the pure Nile bushbuck, the more I liked them and was leaning that way. I didn’t want to shoot a 12” ram though.

I passed on 2-3 , 14.5” EA’s early in the afternoon, and I know I was stressing Christian out. The next bushbuck we saw was the largest Nile I had seen the whole time, and it was an instant decision.
I stopped the truck as the bushbuck walked off. Christian, Paul Wellock (my PH buddy from Zim) and I got down, made a stalk and got within about 80 yards of the ram that thought he was hidden on an anthill.

I popped him in the shoulder with the 7mm, and he jumped straight up and went down. Paul was taking photos the whole time with a 600mm lens I brought over for him, and he got some cool pix.
This is absolutely one of the most beautiful animals I have ever taken. His coat was just beautiful and he was a nice older ram. The trophy pix don’t do him justice as it began raining just as I shot him and his coat was wet.





We saw a lot of bushbuck rams posturing for each other and challenging. They puff all their hair up, curl their tails, and try to look as large as possible, just like nyala.

So our hunt was over, but we still had a few days left, so Kendall and I decided to go back to Aswa and go Nile perch fishing near Murchison Falls. We drove there and were able to fish the next afternoon, and the only hit we had was a really big one that I fought for a long time, and he pulled off quite close to the boat. We saw lots of wildlife from the boat and in the park as well including a nice old bull ele, an 18’ croc that looked to have had an old back injury, and many more.








The next morning, we went up to the falls and Kendall caught a Nile perch on a big rapala in the current. We saw a lot more animals along the shores, but no other fish. We decided we would give it another shot in the afternoon as it was that or a game drive in the park.






15 minutes into the afternoon session, Kendall hooked up. He fought the fish for 10 minutes or so, and it broke off. I think it was also a very big one. A bit later he had a run, but the fish spit out the bait (nearly a 2 pound waka). An hour or so before dark, I got a hard run, and got the fish hooked. It went toward the middle and after a while it came up and shook its head. We could see it was a good perch, and everyone was excited. It made a couple more runs, and I finally got the fish to the boat and bank for photos. We measured length and girth, and by our guide’s chart, the fish was a 70-pounder. By Nile perch standards, that is a nice one, but not nearly a monster. The owner of the lodging we used in Aswa caught a 150 pounder in a tournament when we were there the first time.


This was a bucket list thing for me as I have wanted to catch a Nile perch since I have ever known about the species, and we worked hard and had a great time fishing for them. I was honestly just about as excited about the perch as I was any of the animals I hunted. Sunset came, we got off the water, and the fun was over.

The next day we drove back to Kampala, had one more meal of Nile perch at the Speke resort, and got on the 11:30PM flight to start home.

A few things of note…
1) I can’t imagine being able to hunt buffalo where you can look over more bulls. If you want to see absolutely incredible amounts of buffalo, you need to do this hunt.
2) This is not a tracking buffalo hunt. It isn’t practical as you can see so many from the truck or just walking, and the more you look over, the better chance you have to find that special bull. It is spot and stalk.
3) This is a tough place to take a buffalo with a double or open sighted rifle if you want to be selective. You certainly can kill a hard bossed bull at 30-50 yards, but you won’t have many opportunities, and you will not be able to pass on many. This is quite open country, and against more traditional buffalo hunting norms, you need to be prepared to shoot at 100 yards. I think a 2.5x10 power scope on a .416 or similar is perfect.
4) I could tell no difference in Nile and Cape buff. They consider a buff with drop below the jaw a Cape buffalo, but I believe all buffalo from Uganda are considered Nile by SCI.
5) I can’t imagine a place with more bushbuck that Kafu. I believe there are east African, Nile, and a hybrid there. The main 2 subspecies are very different, and it sure looks like there are a number of hybrid mixes as well.
6) I felt very safe in Uganda. The people were friendly and helpful.
7) Christian’s camps were organized, his staff was top notch, the food was very good, etc. Zero complaints.

I hope to go back maybe in 2019, possibly a small group. I would really like to go see the Lake Mburu area with 28-30” impala, Patterson’s eland, topi, etc. I also want to go back to Karamoja and spend some time and maybe try to take 2 super old bulls (and not look for size at all), maybe a scrum cap.

Things seem to be on the upswing in Uganda for hunting, and I think anyone who loves Africa will fall in love with this country. It is obviously not a cheap destination, but there are much higher, and the experience is completely unique and highly recommended. If anyone is interested in a hunt there in the future, please feel free to contact me as I am working closely with Christian and UWS going forward…

Great reports of an amazing trip, and truly excellent photos as well. So many wonderful buffalo bulls!

Congratulations.

Nice report Tim.

Breath of fresh air to read about such quality. Being able to look over so many animals of a particular species and select as you did, shows a quality area! Well done to those managing the concession.

Cheers
Brent

Some Great Dagga Boys There tim. Great report

Incredible amount of old bulls and you both took terrific trophies of Buffalo and Kob.

Great to see Uganda back on track and that hunting is flourishing.

Just out of interest what is the cost of a Buff hunt?

Great safari and well done report as usual Tim. Uganda really should be on the list of every seasoned safari hunter who wants to experience a hunt with incredible amounts of game and a truly beautiful and welcoming country. One can easily see why Churchill was so enamored with Uganda and Herne wrote so fondly of her.

Well done. Thanks for the great write up!!!

Andrew- the Karamoja buff and PG package at 9 days- 7 hunt days is $17,950 (about $5000 in govt fees) for 1x1 and $15,750 2x1. That is everything except trophy fees and tips. Nile buff are $4000 and cape buff $3500.

In Karamoja and Aswa, hunters can feel very confident in hunting 2x1 without giving up any quality. I am really glad we hunted that way. Honestly, if you had 7 days, they probably average 2-3 days to get everything shot with quality animals.

Ross- you will love the bird life. I am no birder, but there is an incredible number of species, and Kafu in particular around the swamps is really special.

WOW! What a trip! Congrats!

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Tim great report, pictures and trophies ! Well done to all.

Really enjoyed reading it. Thanks.

Charlie

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Wow, what a report.

Looks like beautiful areas to hunt.

Love all the old buffalo and the one you shot is a dream buffalo for me.

Congrats and you have really piqued my interest in Uganda.

Thanks for the great report and amazing photos.

Amazing !

Tim;

Fantastic report! Great pics and read! Loved your trophies. All around well done!

I bet you'll have lots of takers on your group hunt!

Best regards, D. Nelson

Wow! One of the best reports in a long time.

Sounds like very low hunting pressure - with so many old worn down bulls around.

Any cats around?

What an Adventure. Excellent Trophies also!!!

Naki- we saw lions and heard them regularly in Karamoja. I think Russell saw a leopard in Kafu. There are no cats on quota. Actually there is no DG except buff on quota...

Excellent report and wonderful trophies! Always nice to hear of a country's wildlife conservation and hunting on an upswing!

Awesome!

Ditto on an African hunting country on the upswing!!
Great job by all involved.

Awesome trip Tim! I enjoyed following your FB updates as well.

Looks like you saw and took some nice trophies. The country looks really great too. Thanks for the report.

Congrats to both of you.
Looks like a buffalo hunting paradise!!!

Especially if you like them old, mean and ugly.

Love those OLD buffalo, it would be a blast to look over that many bulls, looking for a particular ancient warrior.

Just Awesome!!

Fantastic hunt Tim & Kendall well done on some excellent trophies

I have family in Uganda - wife's sister & BIL are doctors working with a Christian mission training primary health workers from villages in South Sudan.

May be I should just visit them and see the game. A French PH there has even offer to let me shoot a few of the tiny antelope end season - but not cheap! I think there is a minimum $600 Govt fees even for Oribi, Duiker etc.

My SIL keeps posting pictures of amazing birds from around their house.

The climate is very moderate throughout the year I am told.

Congrats again Tim & Kendall on a super Safari!

Ill get around to generating my Uganda hunt report around Christmas. I might even beat bwanamrm to it.

Russ and Jay.....

Look forward to reading your experience! A good surprise to see that pic of 'you all' (lol) in the pic.

All three of you in Same place again....watch out!

Great report Tim. Beautiful old Buff and a stud of a bushbuck!

God's own country! Fantastic.

Tim,
Did you meet my old friend Patrick Devy when you were in Karenga area? His camp not too far from the cell tower you had in your pic.

If you did...probably shared a Club beer with him.

Great report! I will post a pic that I have posted before of a huge buff cow east of Kidepo in the northern Karamoja Valley.

There are lots of old bulls due to not many lions.

Karamoja 2010

wow Lane! I did meet Patrick one evening. Very nice guy...

Really enjoyed the report and pictures.

Don

Outstanding! Talked to these folks at DSC and it went on my bucket list, but your report moved it up a few notches.

What a joy to read I can only dream of such things thank you

Shawn

WOW. That was an awesome report. Thanks for sharing

quote:

4) I could tell no difference in Nile and Cape buff. They consider a buff with drop below the jaw a Cape buffalo, but I believe all buffalo from Uganda are considered Nile by SCI.

Have you some photos of buff skulls
?

Great report. Love the old buff pics, but I too share your fascination with Nile Perch! Well done. If I ever get over my Tiger Fish obsession ....