We had been slowly tracking for almost two and a half hours when we finally found the bull lying down in thick green foliage. I hadn’t quite gotten on the sticks when he stood up and stared me down. I flipped the safety off on the .416 Rigby and focused on his left shoulder. The bull was quartering towards me at roughly a 45 degree angle and, with inexplicable lack of foresight, I failed to adjust for the quartering angle and sent the big 400-grain Barnes TSX bullet into his shoulder at the back of his front leg instead of moving it more towards his chest. The black form disappeared from sight into the thick foliage, and all I could hear were his hooves pounding the red dirt and my own heartbeat drumming in sync! As bad as that was, I had no idea what kind of stress lay ahead of me, but I did know that I had a case of rattled nerves.
My first encounter with a Cape buffalo was much earlier in life. I had just gotten my very first job mowing a lady neighbor’s lawns, and started my weekly effort. As I mowed around to her side of the yard, I came face to face with a huge black animal that was mounted on the
