I’m sometimes asked the best way to hunt dangerous game — specifically in Africa, where there are lots of things with teeth and claws and such, waiting for an opportunity to turn the next easy target into dinner.
Let me be perfectly clear about this: human beings are the ultimate prey for hunters like lions. We can’t run very fast nor very far, we have no sense of smell compared to, say, lions or leopards let alone antelopes, we don’t have sharp horns or hooves to protect ourselves or cause some kind of defensive injury to a predator, and we sure as hell can’t swim like a damn crocodile.
We are, in the animal kingdom, like marshmallows. Pork-flavored marshmallows, to be precise, just the thing to make lions sharpen their claws before putting on a dinner napkin.
So why do these dangerous animals think that we are the apex predators?
Because we don’t fight fair. As though fighting for one’s life, or hunting down food requires us to be all Marquis-of-Queensbury types; what foolishness.
Fuck that. If a pride of lions wants to target a few humans for brekkie, well… say hello to an A-10 Warthog or an Apache attack helicopter, and let’s see who’s really the apex predator, Fluffy.
The only reasons we don’t use our peak powers to hunt game are because the stupid government won’t let us, the weapons are a little on the pricey side (if you think .50 Browning ammo is spendy, try a depleted-uranium 20mm boolet). And lastly, we don’t use all that cool wizardry because it kind of messes up the trophy hides and meat somewhat. (Not much market for half-inch-sized hides and bloody slurry instead of steaks.)
So we’re stuck with rifles like this rather pretty Chapuis Elan Classique double rifle, in .470 Nitro Express:
For those unfamiliar with this beast of a cartridge, here’s a comparison to the 8x57mm Mauser (itself no slouch in the “killin’ things” business):
And speaking of hammer blows:
Of course, if you know what you’re doing, you’ll only need one or two blows to your wallet for that Cape buff or 600-lb Kalahari lion.
If you don’t know what you’re doing, refer to my “pork-flavored marshmallow” description above.
People are like wimpy baboons. Anyone individual is dinner for a lion or leopard. Also for tigers in Asia.
Like baboons, put a troop together and suddenly they may not be worth the effort.
Instead of the big canine teeth and strength of a big male , humans came up with pointy sticks and sharp rocks.
I did watch a show the other day were a hyena took on three people with ease. They were trying to defend their goats and the hyena was unimpressed enough to send all to hospital, minus some hands and scalp.
No spears?
Pointy sticks first, then spears, then bows and arrows.
Rocks, then slings, then boomsticks.
Sorry brain fart. No they only had a piece of corrugated steel to make noise. Hyena was unimpressed..
Capstick wrote about that in one of hs “Death in the …..” books. Specifically the Tsavo Lions and how generally predators avoid humans out of reputation rather than reality.
I was surprised to hear that. He then spent the rest of the book detailing Lion/Elephant/Rhino attacks on people. Rhino’s were more along the lines of being surprised and charging anything that moved, whilst the Elephants came looking for you. The lions & tigers were more circumspect but once they got a taste for you….well.
Then he detailed how he tried to kill a Cape Buffalo with a spear, and double-lunged it. But apparently that wasnt enough and only an available tree to climb kept his author career from running a lot shorter than it was.
Humans have been fending off lions for millions of years. We have spears, we act in groups, and we have a penchant for revenge.
There was a far side cartoon back in the day with two crocs lying on a river bank, post meal, picking their teeth with a toothpick, with all the humans stuff around – hat, jacket, etc. The caption was “That was great! soft and pink, no horns, claws or fur…”
Kim,
I’f my memory isn’t faulty I believe I read tears back that some of the tour guides and others who spent quite a bit of time in bush were fond of the 1911 in .45ACP as well as 12G pump shotguns for lion defense.
So while I fully understand why the “big game” cartridges exists (using a sledgehammer to kill a fly makes it easy to kill the fly and very rarely harms the sledgehammer), would I be entirely incorrect to suggest that a reliable semi-auto in .308 Winchester loaded with heavy solids (say some of the offerings from Peregrine Bullets in Pretoria) would be able to manage plains game, and possibly as backup for Dangerous Game?
Not suggesting they’d be optimal.
When I was in the Boy Scouts there was a joke about a man who hunted Lions in Africa with only a club.
When the inevitable “A club” was spoken, the punchline was “Yes, twenty men armed with Weatherbys in 340 Weatherby Magnum.