oldhunter

HI Michael, I live in Victoria, Australia and mainly hunt sambar (deer), which average 250kg (stags). I use an "African" calibre - 375H&H, and it flattens them. The 375 is the result of reading too many books on African hunting, mainly Peter Hathaway Capstick, so I ended up sort of collecting Brno 602's. You probably know about these rifles; they are a reasonably priced version of a magnum Mauser. I had 3x 375's at one stage, one went some time ago, one in waiting for the new owner to turn up with the rest of the sale price, and the last I'm keeping. That one is one of the early production, with the pop-up aperature sight in the rear receiver/action bridge. I have 2 others, an 8x68S and a 458Lott. I hope to bring at least one of these rifles to southern africa within 5 years. My deer hunting is vastly different to the Kalahari. Sambar are usually found in (usually) damp eucalypt (gum) forest, with thick understory. Visiblity is sometimes down to 10yds (or less), but occasionally cross gully shots (200yds) can be taken. The terrain is at best rolling hills, to very steep mountains, the weather often wet and cold (10 deg C) and occasionally, snow. As for Namibia, I hope to hunt Greater Kudu, Impala, Wart Hog and (if I can afford it) Cape Buffalo. Are any of these available in Namibia? What would you consider to be adequate/recommended rifles or cartridges for these species? I believe the 458 Lott would be the medicine for the buffalo, and the 375 for kudu. Does that sound right? Look forward to talking again. Regards, Randell

Hello everybody, I'm Randell, from Victoria. I've been hunting, off and on for about 35 years, but started to get serious about deer hunting about 6 years ago. I've managed to get 2 sambar, 2 rusa (in New Caledonia) and administered the coup-de-grace on a fallow for a hunting mate of mine. I hunt sambar with a 375 H&H or a 45-70. We're off to north central NSW next week to hunt pigs and chital. I also shoot pistols competitively, dabble in skeet and have shot full bore. I also like to experiment with handloading, and I'm a bit of an accuracy nut, so any info in this area will be gratefully received. On that note, I have an InterArms 243 (Zastava commercial Mauser 98 action, sporter weight barrel) which wouldn't group as well as I liked. Bedded the action and floated the barrel, and went to the range. No improvement, in fact groups were worse. Then, checked the gun bag, a box of ammo, loaded with 60gn sierra HP's/AR2206. 3 shots in 0.305"/7.7mm. The rifle obviously doesn't like win 785 powder (load I tried earlier). Checked the records when I got home, the 60gnHP/AR2206 load had been tested and shot around 0.6" to 0.7". The moral here: keep records, check your records and and keep experimenting. Does anyone have experience hunting medium game (pigs, fallow, chital) with a 243 and can reccommend a good, controlled expansion bullet? One that penetrates and expands, does break up on heavy bone or mud encrusted hide? Look forward to talking about hunting, shooting, ballistics, reloading and the whole deal. Regards, Randell