Help Me Learn About Water Buffalo

[TOBY458]

I hunted Australia in 2015. It was a very fun hunt, with hundreds of buffalo on the place. I shot 3 bulls and a cow buffalo. They’re nowhere near as hard to hunt as free range Cape Buffalo, but it’s still a great hunt. These are the bulls I shot.
Like @375Fox said, the trip from the USA is very long. I’d love to go back, but it’s such a rough trip to get there, I just haven’t been able to talk myself into it. Africa is much easier to get to, even though anywhere except SA is still quite a daunting thing at times. That said, if you want a bunch of buffalo shooting experience, it’s hard to beat Australia.

 

[Sabre]

One person said around $12,500 for cost. Is that what to expect to pay, or others who have gone, can you offer insight on what is reasonable to expect to pay?

 

[375Fox]

What outfitter did you hunt with?

Same as you! Matt Kelman

 

[grand veneur]

I don't like to hunt species outside of their natural habitat. For that reason, I never hunted buffalo in Australia. In Malaysia, I also was not absolutely sure where all those water buffalo came from. These areas are mostly jungle, unfortunately increasingly replaced by oil palm plantations, and farming with buffalos was never practiced there. Since I also spotted a Seladang in the mountain rainforest of the area, I assumed I was dealing with a more or less original population of water buffalo in the swamp areas, but absolutely sure of that I was not.

 

[grand veneur]

Otherwise, the ecosystem was still more or less intact back then in central Malaysia. Biodiversity was high, but unfortunately, in the dense jungle, you often only see the tracks. For example, I only saw a tiger tracks, no the animal, but I saw a black panther and another time I had to chase away in a late afternoon a clouded leopard from my Machan. Scratch marks from various bears species were also evident on trees. Unfortunately, all of this, especially the predators, are often missing in areas where species have been introduced.

 

[grand veneur]

There was quite a lot going on in the water, too. I once went fishing with the local Chinese fishing club on the Sungai Pahang River. Besides the Gharial, which is not so dangerous to humans, saltwater crocodiles can also appear at times, the same very dangerous species as in Australia.

 

[TOBY458]

Same as you! Matt Kelman

I was thinking that. Hard to beat that place back then. I wonder what it’s like now that it was sold several years ago?

 

[UpNorthMI]

In my experience, the Australian buffalo are real tough animals, they would often take several rounds of .375 H&H to knock them down and often required finishing shots! My son and I did a cull hunt this year and shot a total of 32 buffalo. Here is a short video of a nice bull being taken by my son.

 

[fourfive8]

“Mind over matter”- Crocodile Dundee movie. I couldn’t help it

Nephew and I drove up to this one standing in the road, middle of nowhere Mindanao a couple years ago. I was going to do the “Dundee”. I got out of the vehicle and walked over to it but it just turned around and walked away.