Dinsdale

I like the white look over the dated yellowed appearance. Black can be tough to look smooth without lap marks that show in various light angles. Try adding Floetrol or M 1 to paint and it will level out and give you more working time to cover the flats. Dont treat the whole can, use a paint cup and make a batch. Another tip is to do flats with a 4” foam roller lightly filled and roll on and then brush out after cutting edges. Faster to get paint on and easier then constantly dipping brush and get a consistent appearance.

I think location, company present, preparation; can all play a part in memorable game meals and might skew my answer, but; Caribou my experience has always been near the top. Moose always seems to be terrific. But then theres individual meals that are very memorable. Shot an Iberian Mouflon sheep in N. Spain, and the little hotel of like 8 rooms with a pub and restaurant on the first floor cooked half the loin whole bone in and the other side as grilled stuffed chops with goat cheese, herbs and a wine sauce. White beans in olive oil, onion, garlic as a side. There was maybe 2 dozen locals, and that was just awesome. Local band,bit of drinking,some dancing well into the night. Barcelona and N.Spain> best food anywhere I have travelled, across the board awesome. Go out of my way for a Zebra steak, have had that several times and rates in top 5. Red Deer pastrami made from a whole loin, rolled in cracked pepper. Cape Buffalo tenderloin grilled over a mopane fire. “Mo-paan-ee” is to braai in southern Africa as mesquite is to a beef steak in Texas; after like a 18 hr day in temps never below 90* even at night, dinner never tasted better. Ground Gemsbok , served into fist sized split sweet roll like a pocket, topped with goat cheese,green onion, and a sauce from a local berry. I shot a second animal to make sure we could have that again as a final meal in camp when asked what I’d like to have a second time. I would have used the meat off a week old rib cage hanging as leopard bait to have that again. Same camp had a Klipspringer stew, made with a burgundy wine,rosemary sauce served over basmati rice.Klipspringer is a small antelope, about 15-20 lbs, quills for hair, hops from rock to rock, rarely found on soil, eats grass growing between the boulders. Anything Enigma that posts on here would make. That boy knows good eats and how to cook.

Blaser sold more strait pull R8's in the US then the prior R93 did for its entire 15year production run worldwide.(100K). So a few folks like strait pull. This is being marketed as alternative in fixed barrel dedicated chamber for driven hunts to compete with other manufacturers. So I also don't see it gain much traction here. Personally I love my Blaser and interchangeable barrels and with amazing scope mounting its well worth the price for a travel gun.

There are many bills each legislative session that are introduced and some make it past committee for floor votes. So you are correct, this law wont be the last. Eventually they’ll whittle around the edges of hunting its inevitable. Theres a few efforts to limit even personal possession of certain trophies, similar to California. I expect that to pass at some point .Big five, and assorted others species including giraffe/hippo/some antelope have been written and in committee several times in addition to other big cats from around the world. The only thing thats stopped current efforts is the importation hub at JFK and writing a comprehensive enough bill that regulates transiting through there versus remaining in NY and thats a Federal jurisdiction. And general deer hunters wont care about any of that either as it wont affect them, no surprise there.

Skinner sights rear aperture and a fiber optic replacement front sight IF you need it. If you have never shot an aperture sight, your eye automatically centers on the opening and you use only the front sight to align the shot. Advantage for older eyes is you dont have to align a rear and front sight and pick up target, just front blade and target. I have 2 identical CZ 452 22lr’s…..one with a VX3 1.5-5.5 and one with an aperture. I can match shot for shot for accuracy. Keep the clean lines with no scope. http://skinnersights.com/winchester_26.html

Thanks for posting that book. I browse a couple forums where African hunting and books are posted and I have never seen that before. I hardly read any newer hunting books but like the older ones. So not a couple pages in and the company Newland. & Tarlton was the outfitter mentioned. They were synonymous with places like Holland&Holland are to guns, as thee go to in Nairobi to get supplied. Theres a cool old flyer here; https://ouramazinghistory.newlandtarltonsafaris.com/ I have a book about the same period for collecting taxidermy specimens for the Natural History Museum and Carl Akely who was a pioneer in modern taxidermy and he used Newland &Tarlton also. If you want that book PM me an address and I’ll send it along. Here’s a pic of the Dunvegan Castle used for the trip from Marseille to East Africa with the dogs.

This is a Boerboel (bore-bull); protection dog from Namibia, what a ham and goofball. Just a puppy in these pics that will eventually tip the scales at close to 200lbs. Used to keep Leopard and the occasional transient male Lion away from livestock around the farmhouse where I stayed, its very remote there. It’s in the Mastiff family of dogs. Bred to be socialized around humans and very protective about intruders both animal and human. Theres a security video on line taken in SA where several home invaders met a grim fate from one dog. When the police come he sits down and wags his tail; look what I did….. These guys are a crew from northern Spain. And that little dog in the barrel is the one that I truly needed. I bungered up a shot on a fallow deer and plain screwed up. Missed on 2 different chances to follow up……just a real low point in any hunting I have ever done, and frankly dont know what happened. But ran that girl for a full day and finally found the deer stone dead, hit low and too far back. Did fine rest of hunt on sheep and pig. The bigger hound was what he looks like, not very personable, and he came along for a driven boar hunt to join the beaters. Gotta love a good working dog.

These are super specialist Beagles. They only hunt one animal, blue duiker; blue duiker is smallest antelope in southern africa size of an house cat; only the Royale antelope in western Africa is smaller. This is a boutique animal to hunt, quota is low and hunt is specialized. I was fortunate my PH hooked us up with one of the most sought after set of dogs from a family of some note in hunting dog circles. Shotgun hunt by posting a station and the dogs pushing vegetation clumps towards the hunter to snap shoot. I went to sporting clays course and had them throw only rabbit station to prepare for this trip. 12ga O/U, #5’s. This a pretty good one, its typical 1 1/2” horns worn right to the nubs. Behind the vegetation the Indian ocean is close enough to hear the breakers and smell the salt, truly a unique place to visit. The older dog is blind in one eye, tangled with a bushbuck at one point. Rigby and Flex, Rigby the younger dog was here to learn the ropes on a management hunt where several each of Black Wildebeest and Blesbok were selected and they ran every track for a week. Very well mannered, better than any Jack Russell I have been around. The lodge dog didnt go with us and was killed a few months after my hunt, run through by a wounded bushbuck; hard life for working dogs there. Best set of shooting sticks I have used in this pic, swivel top so orientation never mattered, get em’ up and get shooting.

Here’s some dogs from Africa and elsewhere that I have hunted around….. Been fortunate to make more then a few clean kills and could have used a dog only once in many trips but the outfitter was kind of a jerk and didnt get one for one animal and I’m still pissed 20 years later as its one of the very few lost in all the hunting I have ever done that was not recovered. Most of the time follow ups are pretty short and dont require much extra effort. One thing in South Africa and Namibia is many outfits run a dog on every kill to constantly train for when it really matters, A couple hundred animals a year over a 10 month season. So dogs get very proficient for finding game, wounded and lost happen, but more often then not things get sorted out. Hounds are used but are more common for Leopard hunts where legal, Mozambique and Zimbabwe currently. Some hounds also get run for Caracal (a smaller cat) in South Africa. Plenty of bird hunts over crops in agricultural areas and pointers are common. I’ve never noticed a lab working, but I,ve only done some day hunts for bird with pointers. Anyway….. This was Tara, wire hair Jack Russell. Super high energy, smart as a whip. Learned to kill cobras in the rainy season by having her litter mate to distract the snake and pounce on it from behind; but it was her downfall and she made a mistake about 4 mos. after these pics. Brian the PH and her owner is a former rugby player of note in SA. These two are wire hair Griffon crosses. They were yard protection dogs used to keep baboon troops at bay around dwellings and in local crop fields. For hunting we drove the edges of harvested fields and set them off to tree a couple of troops to thin down the numbers. Could be one of the best hunts ever, break neck speeds in a truck across a huge field to bail out, chase and shoot. Really good PH too, really let his hunter set the day and hunt not just tag along. His partner I also was with was same way. Namibia is a really good destination for that tone.

Sometimes filming is a bit deceiving as it compresses the image we view on the screen. What looks like wisps of grass to the hunter in person is a wall of vegetation to the camera. Also some of the time the view of the camera,even when really close over a shoulder, is still not the same as the hunter having a really small window that only they can see. Tagged along on a filmed hunt for a day, when you review the footage it’s really interesting what the camera footage looks like on screen and the actual environment. I notice even in my still pics, it doesnt really capture what it feels like walking through an area. I have had maybe 10 PH’s in Africa, none would encourage a “just hope for the best” shot into brush where the vitals are obscured. That said there are places and times where some grass or a few leaves are not always a reason to wait for a better shot that may never develop. Some game and areas just dont give an option but to pick a really small window IF the hunter is comfortable with it and take a shot. I’ve passed on a couple shots where I’m guessing maybe another hunter would shoot; but you just keep working and try and get another opportunity and nobody really gets all that bothered by those instances. Looking back I maybe a couple times where we went on and never did get another chance; eh, it’s hunting.

Those 235’s I loaded with R-15 and they are zipping right along, accounts for good expansion. Big fan of driving solid copper fast. Like the idea of tipped to promote initial expansion on those 250’s. Recovered only one from a good sized warthog on a severe quarter away; in just in front of the ham and stuck in the shield of that pig between the shoulder and breastbone. Textbook tsx look with 4 peeled petals. Everything else was pass throughs. 375 rifle I’m using is heavy too; fat barrel profile keeps the muzzle down, so it shoots easy with any load really, but the 235’s are a nice alternative and I notice the difference at the bench. My standard 375hh load is 300gr Aframes for expanding and 300gr Woodliegh’s for solids. Nothing too crazy there on speed; use IMR 4064 for accuracy but just average on fps. Haven’t recovered too many of those either frankly and have taken a fair sized sample with the Aframes. A couple recovered under off side skin on 400 lb + sized game; again text book performance and high weigh retention even after breaking bones if they have been found. Times are good; more great bullet choices now than ever……

Kind of a curious bullet weight for a 375 offering. Typical mono metals are 235,270,300,350; but theres not much ogive there so I bet the shank length is about the same as a Barnes 270 TSX. I loaded Barnes 235 tsx for a light bullet and less recoil load. Terminal I think is good, I’ve never recovered one in the field, and thats fine by me. I’m a 2 holes are desired guy and dont believe in energy dump by losing bullet weight. I need to load some as I left all mine in a camp for a guides loaner rifle. Although I have a ton of bonded lead ammo loaded for various rifles, I like all copper bullets and have no reluctance to use it compared to some. Stupid accurate, I have never had an issue there. I know someone shoots 200g Peregrine mono metals from a 375 HH; they really zip along…..woooosh! Exit side around 60 yds, impala about the size of a whitetail doe with a 235 tsx mono metal, 375HH, plenty of exit hole, pretty much bang-flop; I would think the Hornady would do about the same.

That there is going to be some really good eating, terrific moose.

Hey that came out pretty cool, really like the bird mounts. Check your PM’s

SPF