Nayala buck
We were going to hunt the same area as where we had shot the zebra, on prior stalks or while glassing we had seen a large male who had eluded us. Sleep eluded me the night before, a constant rerun in my head was the scope picture when I has shot and missed. So I was the first up, as I changed I ran the exact spot that I needed to hit to put the animal down instantly, the part where the center patch of khaki on its body ended in a point on its shoulder. Over breakfast the boys told me they wanted to hunt bush pig. It was a welcome diversion. We had not seen one but Clayton told me that they were more or less nocturnal and we could hunt them over a feed. He said he would light up the area with red lights connected to a rheostat and slowly increase the red light. He said the pigs could not tell the difference. He could then point out where and which one to shoot for the boys with a laser pointer. This was not to be as the next day the rain washed out any thoughts of a night hunt. Debbie, Clayton’s gracious wife, never hunted for several years after they were married and then one day went on a bush pig hunt and has been hooked ever since.
Anyways, I digress, the plan was to find a good impala ram and not repeat my past mistake. I went back to my room and took out my rifle, did a once over to make sure everything was as it is supposed to be. In the truck and off we went, was rainy, overcast and cold, thought RSA was in the southern hemisphere, wasn’t it supposed to be summer? We were at the ranch before we knew it. We slowly drove down into the valley, glassing near and far hillsides, saw kudu cows, more nyala and a family of very curious giraffes. The males had a darker color and both had tuffs of hairs on top of their horns. Clayton told us that the calf when born falls over a meter to the ground. Another interesting fact was that they had purple tongues and ate thorns and all. He told us that the males spar by lowering and turning their head to one side so they can hit their opponent along its side. We took a lot of pictures. As we moved further along we saw blesbuck does with their fawns. It was amazing to see these fawns outrun their mothers, same was true of the many piglets we saw of wart hogs. Both him and my wife joked about how slow and helpless human newborns are as compared to these animals that can run so fast a few hours after being born. In the distance were a couple of impala does. This went on all morning till late afternoon.
Warthog piglets
Blesbuck doe and fawns:
Giraffe
We then turned up the valley and started climbing up towards where we had hunted the zebra. Half way up Clayton slams on the brakes. Up high on the ridge was a silhouette of a wildebeest,to the right side of it was an impala. Not sure how he saw it with naked eyes, had a tough time finding it in my binoculars. It was a reasonable one, the hunt was on. We climbed out of the truck, and started climbing, up we went, carefully into the wind, keeping smaller ridges between us. Clayton went into his crouch and I followed, climbing uphill, half bent over, my back aching, the cold wind stinging my lungs, why did I not find some other reasonable sport like crocket instead of hunting?
We came up on a patch of flat rock, further up was a ledge around 3 feet high. Clayton muttered “looks like they have moved, maybe we lost them” I could see the tips of one’s horns, they had appeared like magic from nowhere. They are there I whispered urgently, see the horns. Immediately Clayton went into a crawl, I followed, you do not need to visit a doctor to find out if you are fit, just gram a 8 pond rifle in one hand and try to crawl with your other three limbs, it’s very interesting. We got to the ledge and peered over, we could just see the top of one, we turned and started crawling along the ledge for another vantage point. Slowly Clayton looked up, “ there are 4 there, one is bigger than the others, he is to the middle and the back, we should take him”, I nodded, Clayton slowly stood up and put up the shooting sticks, I slowly slid the rifle into the center, two of the impala were looking at us very intently, I could see the one we wanted, it was darker and was feeding and had not seen us. One was standing behind it as it moved slowly while grazing, one of the ones that sensed us had turned and had covered a part of the front. “Wait, wait” Clayton murmured “let them move”, in my mind I was thinking that maybe my ancestors who never knew the limits of natures boundaries and man’s ability to destroy may have shot the front one, wounding or killing all three with one shot and may have celebrated it. These are different times and for the good, our values have changed. We were going to wait, at the risk of flight of these fast animals, so we did not injure any and took just one, in a humane and quick manner. Suddenly the ones at the front got nervous and moved to our left, my eye was focused on the one behind and slowly the target area appeared, hope the one at the back moves, I thought, and suddenly it looked up and the nervous ones and moved up. The one we wanted was still with its head down, it never knew we were there, the safety was off the crosshairs settled, I squeezed all the time willing the bullet to go where I wanted, the trigger broke crisply, the gun recoiled into my shoulder, I immediately reloaded but I knew that I had redeemed myself. The animal had sprung and dashed 15 yards and then falling suddenly, we walked up to it. Its hooves were dainty, it still had a clump of glass in its mouth, it had died a sudden and clean death. We had our impala.
Pictures of us getting ready to shoot:
This wildebeest watched the entire stalk:
Success, finally
“You got him, huh”, it was my wife, she had gotten board and had followed us up taking pictures, she told me later that during the final moments of our stalk a wilderbeest had spotted us and had been watching us intently and had even moved closer to get a better look at us. We were so focused on the impala that we had never even seen him. I looked across the emerald valley and thanked the almighty for his bounties and entered a plea “may these animals be here forever, mine and other folks sons hunt them someday” and realize that however insignificant man is in terms of the size of the planet, we had the ability to impact it for better or worse and once these animals are gone, man will be the worse for it.
The sun was setting as we left the ranch, life was good!
