Thursday, Feb 21
We meet Hans in the lobby at 6am. This will be our first day of hunting in Abu Dhabi. We arrive at the Telal resort about 6:30am and have breakfast. The spread is very impressive and the food is amazing. This is a five star resort and it shows. As the weekend is approaching, the lodge is fully booked and we are the first guests to arrive for breakfast. The buffet is both gorgeous and untouched, much like the pristine, unspoiled sand dunes we later drive though. For a moment, I regret not staying at the lodge. Then I remember the price and the realization that more money spent on lodging is less money to spend on hunting.
Speaking of spending money on hunting, I have purchased a lot of new gear for this hunt. I have some new arrows from GrizzlyStik. I was down to 5 arrows left from my prior batch and needed some more just in case. When they came in, I see they are now thinner than before. Victory is now custom manufacturing them and while I have not had enough time to check their tolerances, they look very good and I am excited to use them. I will need to adjust my sights though. Speaking of, I had purchased a Garmin Xero A1i sight for my monster safari bow and have been so happy with it, I wanted to put one on the Halon. I purchased one just the week before at the Vegas Shoot, but unfortunately, it did not arrive in time for this hunt. I decided to take the sight off the dangerous game bow and take it with me to put on the Mathews Halon 32-6. I feel bad for spending so much time dialing in my bow, taking well over an hour with the practice butt, but I would rather spend an hour fine tuning my sights than five hours walking. Hans told me in conversation that if you ever really want to see somebody’s property, wound an Oryx or wildebeest. You will see most of their ranch… on foot. I decide that I don’t want to walk through that much desert.
Once finished, we are ready to hunt and Hans drives us to one of the blinds. He is unsure of being able to walk and stalk a bow kill on Oryx, but I insist that even if it is not possible, I want to give it an honest effort so we put the bow butts back by the blind, drive around and find some Oryx. Then we park the truck and start working on the stalk.
As anybody who has bow hunted will attest, spot and stalk hunting is not easy. In the desert, to say it is more challenging is quite the understatement. There is literally zero effective cover. The vegetation is spread out and so small that one cannot really hide behind it anyway. Looking out 300 yards in all directions, there might be one single shrub thick enough for a man to hide behind. For two full grown men and a cameraperson, forget about it. Instead, we have to simply use the sand dunes and stay below the ridge crests. Sadly, the distances between are so great that I cannot even shoot from the top of one ridge to a target half way between. We will need to find an animal and ambush him from the top of the nearest ridge. Time and time again, these Oryx will spot us and as we attempt to move on them, they will head to the top of the highest ridge and all face opposing directions. It is only February and it is already warm here. More of a problem than the heat, though not noticed yet, is the sun is cooking my pale but soon to be red skin.
Finally, we catch a break and are able to get close to a herd. 47 yards out – certainly not ideal but inside my range that I am comfortable taking a shot on an animal. Sadly, no ideal bulls in the herd. There are a couple that could do. Hans says they are mature but still a bit young. While it was very hard to get a good shooting opportunity and not a lot of hope that the stars will align again, we elect to try and get one of the three largest bulls on the property. We do know now that it is possible to get close to these animals with a combination of hard work, a good plan and a lot of luck. Janine and I head towards a tree for some shade while Hans goes back and gets the truck. Since it isn’t a hotel, he is able to find it rather quickly and soon we are off to other parts of the property in search of some older Oryx.
We find the oldest bulls on the property. They fall into the same method of heading towards high ground and then scanning the horizon. Interestingly, they do not seem to have a strong herd mentality and are willing to split up. Watching them head in different directions, we take advantage of the spread and move between them, driving them further apart. Now, we are able to choose one and stalk it solo, effectively eliminating any help he had as a lookout.
We move around and around, trying to get close. Each time we see him, we drop behind a ridge and close the gap. When we come over the ridge, if he has moved away from us, we have generally the same distance, but occasionally, we are able to get closer and eventually, we are within 150 yards. Soon, we will be in bow range. Then, he does the unexpected. This oryx finds an somewhat flat area with good broad views and he decides to bed down. I think he is being rather smart. Hans refers to him as an asshole. I can sense the frustration, but if I can survive an international flight in coach with a broken seat, I can wait this guy out as well. After quite some time, he moves on and we continue the stalk.
We are now inside bow range and are set with some additional challenges. The wind has picked up. Additionally, it will take a few seconds for me to draw, range, air and fire. What felt like a great idea with the Garmin sight now might be tested a bit. Even just the one second it would take me to range him might be too much time as we really do not have even a hint of cover when we pop up over the ridge to shoot. I can shoot quickly, but I don’t want to feel rushed in my shot and it is hard not to feel rushed. I hit the sight trigger a second time and bring up fixed pins. I ask Hans to range him and I fire off a shot – 54 yards. It felt good, but just as I released, I felt a strong gust of wind. Maybe it just came on and maybe was there all along and in the moment, I didn’t notice it, but my arrow certainly did and 54 yards is a long distance to travel through strong horizontal winds. My arrow hits, perfect elevation, but left of the vitals. For a split second, I was fearing I hit him in the gut, but very soon realized I hit him in the hind quarters. The arrow is sticking out about 8” out the other side and his profile looks like that old arrow hat that Steve Martin used to wear in his comedy routines. This is far better than a gut shot as my oryx is now somewhat hobbled.
I don’t see any chance of losing this animal. Even I can track him in this sand. Still, I feel that I must find a way to get close enough for a follow up shot quickly. Hans suggests getting the rifle from the truck. He says he won’t have to shoot my animal, but if it charges, we will need a gun. He heads back to the truck while I watch the area to see if the Oryx heads over the ridge. When he returns, I find that our backup is a .223 – obviously a very small caliber for a backup but better than nothing and hopefully something unneeded. We head in, following the tracks. There is some blood but not enough to suggest I hit a femoral artery and this will require a follow up shot.
Hans is amazed that the arrow has not broken off somewhere. There seems to be too much arrow on each side of the animal for it to come out either side and yet the shaft looks like it is holding up to the strain of the animal walking while an arrow is lodged through its hips. We can see that he does not want to climb to a higher elevation and also does not want to run. It only takes a few minutes to close the distance and line up for a follow up shot. He is moving, but slowly. At 46 yards, I have a good quartering angle and he seems to have stop moving for a second and I let another arrow loose. It hits him on the right side behind the ribs and exits the left side in front of the ribs. It takes less than a second to see blood coming out of his mouth and nose. There is no doubt that I got both his lungs and he will be dead in just a few seconds – or at least he should have been.
Perhaps it is the adrenalin from being shot already and perhaps the oryx are just damn tough and stubborn animals, but this guy is refusing to die. He goes down but wants to get up and keeps trying. I do not want him to suffer, but I am unsure about putting a third arrow into him and potentially getting his adrenalin going even more. We leave him in peace and head back to the lodge, drop off some gear and come back to retrieve the animal. Thankfully, Hans is able to find the oryx. I guess I am lucky that I didn’t shoot him in town or we might have been looking for hours.
When we got close to him, I noticed several things. First was the amount of scarring on his body. They guy has been in a lot of fights. The hair was short and not very soft and he had a blue tinge to his coloring. I have noticed that on many of the older bulls I have seen, but not on the younger ones.
I don’t carry a tape measure when I hunt, but I place my arrow at the tip of his horn. The arrow is 28.5” long and the shaft ends before it reaches the base of the horns. The Safari Club International keeps a record book of animals. Although some people use it for bragging rights, it serves as a useful historical document to track the quality of wild herds. If they are being overhunted or mismanaged, it stands to reason that the genetics will become depleted and measured statistics will get worse over time. As this is actually the very first Arabian oryx hunted in its home range since they have been reintroduced as a returning indigenous species, I believe this will be something important to track. This would be a “world record” animal regardless of score. That said, it appears that it scores better than any Arabian oryx ever shot in Africa (as an introduced species on private game ranches). Both horns exceed 30”. Hans believe he was 6 ½ to 7 years old.
We take some photos and video and then bring the animal back to the skinning shed. This is a magnificent animal and as much as I would love a shoulder mount of him sitting in my living room over the fireplace, I want more people to learn about the ongoing efforts to restore these animals the ranges from which they had been extirpated. I tell the guys to skin him for a full body mount. Hopefully we can get US Fish and Wildlife to approve bringing him back into the States and I will try and find a good location for him to be seen by the public with some information about Arabian oryx.
I now start to fully feel the pain of the sunburn and we look for some medicine to apply and head back to the hotel. Janine and I agree to go wash up and meet back in the lobby for dinner in about half an hour. It is seafood night and we eat quite a lot. At this point, we realize we didn’t have lunch. I answer as many emails and messages from work as I can and then get some well needed rest.
