ZIMBABWE: Dande Buffalo With CMS August 2026

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Enjoying this read.

Thanks for taking us along on the hunt.

That sounds amazing. Picking up tracks and finding this lone bulls range.

I would of went back the next day 100% to find what it looked like. Very cool hunt

Ok, took me a while to write up Day 3, I'm not sure I did it justice.

Day 3

Once again “knock knock” started my day and we went through the process of getting ready for the day. When we set out on the truck, I was a little surprised that we headed a different direction that after the bull we had seen the afternoon before. But I trusted Gareth and figured we might return to that area in the afternoon.

As we drove down the road at the beginning of a little set of ridges the trackers pounded to rooftop. We got out and checked the track. It was fresh and this one looked different just huge, at least to my untrained eye.

The tracks lead through some open grassy areas and along some rocky ground that again had me marveling at the trackers. As we worked our way up a fairly steep rock face, we heard them run off in front of us. The wind was good, so we think they heard us on the rocky ground. We gave them some time to settle and moved on along the track.

As we got to the top of the ridge the trackers froze. They could see two bulls ahead looking back on their trail. We froze for I don’t know how long until they started to move again. As they did, they moved so that the wind wouldn’t be favorable and kept turning to check their trail.

Gareth and the trackers conferred through sign language a bit and then we started off to circle around to the left of the bulls. This allowed us to outflank them and get out of the area they kept checking. We could see them moving through the brush about 100 yards away. Steadily we crept closed with Gareth using his binos to try to check for hard bosses.

The bulls seemed to calm down a bit, and we slowly closed the difference. I couldn’t always see them as I was trying to stay as close and directly behind Gareth as possible. At this point he said “He’s a good bull, looking right at us. If we had a scoped rifle, it would be done but it is a little far for your double.” As we stood there frozen behind a small bush I began to think about all the choices in life that had led me to standing here 60 or so yards from my dream of shooting a buffalo while my scoped 375 was in the truck. It wasn’t enough to fly halfway around the world on the hunt of your life, no I had to be the guy that made it harder. It was a very introspective moment.

After a few minutes the bull moved a bit and wasn’t looking right at us. Gareth turned and asked, “Can you scoot?” I nodded and down on our rear ends we went.

So slowly one yard at a time with the rifle across my lap we scooted forward. Eventually we made it to a small bush that gave us cover as we stood up. Gareth put up the sticks and stepped to the side. He said the bull would be walking through a gap from the left but just wait so it can make sure it is the right one. The bull stepped out and I put the dot of my SRO right on his shoulder. Gareth said wait, then yes that’s the one. Then the bull disappeared behind a handful of trees.

Quickly Gareth grabbed the sticks and moved them to the right and said he’ll come out of this gap next. As I got the gun up, he appeared right there in a small gap quartering toward me with his head turned to look right at us at about 35 yards. Gareth asked if I could see the curve of his horn and I nodded, “Just below the curve of his horn when you’re ready.”

Truthfully, I don’t think I let him finish the word ready when I pulled the trigger.

This is where things are always a surprise. In my mind I had planned to fire the first barrel seeing the bull hit immediately give it the second anywhere in the boiler room. However, at the shot my bull (he’s mine now) humped up as expected but the grass in front of him exploded with the second bull that was bedded down unseen by us. So now I have two bulls turning to run in the same direction and don’t want to shoot the wrong one.

Gareth sprinted past me to my right and said, “This way,” I threw the sticks to the side and set off running. After about 30 yards Gareth stopped and indicated we would give them a minute. At that point I reloaded the right barrel. I wanted to be sure we were in a safe spot before breaking the gun open. Pretty soon we heard a soft bellow and then another. Not the loud death bellow you usually hear. We started following the blood trail and then saw the second younger bull standing on the high ground ahead of us for a short bit then the turned and ran off. Gareth said if anything happens, he’ll step to the left as he’s left-handed and I should move up to the right.

The blood trail was heavy with dark red blood. After just a minute of following it, the cameraman pointed to the left and said, “is that him or a rock?” Gareth said it was him and we started up the hill. The bull had run maybe 75 yards in a big semi-circle and fell over dead leaning against a lone tree, almost perfectly set up for pictures.

As we checked for signs of life, I knew this was a perfect bull before I ever looked at the horns. His tail was half the length it should have been and his flanks had deep scars from a lion fight. Between his shoulders was a crusty white scar the size of my palm where a lion had taken a ride with it’s teeth sunk in. His hair was thin with a grayish hue all over. And then I walked to the front. It won’t make Rowland Ward or SCI but the bosses big and hard and it has a nice bit of drop. If I had drawn my perfect buffalo, it would have looked a lot like this.

After the pictures and recovery which is amazing to watch we headed to camp for lunch and what would be a special surprise.

Once at camp I told Owen that, if possible, I’d like to recover the bullet. He said it would take a bit to get the skin off, but they would look for it. After a quick lunch I went out to watch the process. Once we could see into the rib cage it was obvious the 400 grain A-Frame had done exactly what it was supposed to. The entry wound was clear, and it had gone through both lungs and the plumbing above the heart and lodged in the ribs on the opposite side. Owen fished around in the pooled blood and came out with my bullet. As we were cleaning it off with the hose the tracker said something to Owen who went back to the rib cage. He fished around in the blood pooled at the front and asked me how many times I fired. Then he held up a perfectly mushroomed 375 bullet. It was a Trophy Bonded Bear Claw—the only bullet company that puts their logo on the base of their bullet.

So not only had the warrior survived lions, he survived a hunter as well.

That night we were talking it over and Gareth and Owen were trying to remember who had lost a bull. Owen said something to Daniel about a hunt with Len and Daniel took off to his room. There on his laptop is footage from over two years ago of a bull that looks a lot like mine and a guy hitting it with a 375 a little too far back. The horns had a similar shape but mine were definitely more worn down than the bull in the video. Then, when the bull on the screen turns to run off it has half a tail.

No one can swear it is the same bull but how many tailless bulls have taken a 375 in the guts and not been recovered in that area? If it is more than one, I would be pretty surprised.

Here he is scars and all.

My A-Frame which retained 353.6 grains of weight and the TBBC from the previous hunter which retained 296.1 grains. Of course the TBBC didn’t hit any bone at all. The A-Frame smashed through the top of the shoulder and broke the offside ribs.

Fantastic bull! Great story too!

Russ16 said:

My A-Frame which retained 353.6 grains of weight and the TBBC from the previous hunter which retained 296.1 grains. Of course the TBBC didn’t hit any bone at all. The A-Frame smashed through the top of the shoulder and broke the offside ribs.

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Good Bull congratulations!

Russ16 said:

Here he is scars and all.

Click to expand...

Love the bosses!!

A true old warrior. Well done, and congratulations.

Day 3 Afternoon

After the excitement of the buffalo, we went for a late afternoon drive with little expectations. Suddenly all the trackers start hollering and Gareth slams on the breaks. To our right is an enormous kudu bull. We all pile out and quickly set out in pursuit.

At the top of a ridge, he stops and looks back, and I get on the sticks. All I can see is his neck and head and giant spiraling horns. Just as Gareth is asking if I can shoot him in the neck, he disappears. We follow the tracks for the rest of the day and feel like we get close but never get a shot.

I’m not sure my heart could have handled a giant kudu on the same day as my buff.

That night at the fire Gareth informs me that the parks department needs meat for a party they are having and we need to shoot a buffalo cow by Friday. What a pleasant bonus!

Day 4

“Knock knock” and once again we are off, in pursuit of sable now.

We head to a different part of the concession and start checking pans. Most of the day we check different water holes to try and see what the sable are using. We wind up all to way back up by the Matombo fishing camp and have lunch there. We follow a couple of tracks but never get really close to anything.

We did see caracal and jackal in the morning and evening which was pretty cool.

Day 5

We headed back to the east side of the concession near the Mozambique border. At the first pan we found the tracks of a lone bull sable and set off. We followed them all morning. He was clearly following a pattern with several middens where he was marking his territory. We felt like we were getting close as the dung was quite fresh. Then he moved into a grassy area where the tracking became tougher. It became impossible when we reached a spot where a herd of eland had crossed the tracks. As good as the team is they couldn’t decipher that jumble.

After lunch we checked some pans for tracks as we were about to leave one pan, we heard zebra calling and decided to try to close on them. We quickly found their tracks and followed them. After about 30 minutes Owen spotted them. Gareth set up the sticks and had me get on them. We had a bit of a miscommunication as I thought he was telling me to shoot it on the shoulder when he was telling me to get on the shoulder and let him double check it was the right one. I shot before he was ready and it was my fault, but it all worked out as the it was the stallion as we originally thought. Regardless of the miscommunication I was pretty happy with the shooting as I hit it right on the point of the shoulder from about 130 yards.

I think it will look good when I get it home.

Awesome

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It`s a great part of Zim & the two camps are great. My wife & I hunted our of Matombo late season with Buzz before they put the pool in. Awesome views & wonderful fishing.

Enjoying your report & congrats on a solid buff. Well done.

Charlie

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Beautiful old Buffalo and great story!!! I love hunting zebra!!!! Congrats!

That’s a right proper buffalo! Congrats!