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Rifles
and Cartridges for Sambar | Know
your rifle | Firearms available
| Firearm licence | Firearm
safety
RIFLES AND
CARTRIDGES FOR SAMBAR
| Sambar
are the third largest member of the deer family, surpassed
only by moose and elk. They are big and strong
and their toughness is legendary.
Their nervous system seems to be impervious
to shock and they have a reputation for being hard to
put down with anything less than precise bullet placement
and appropriate bullet performance.
But precise bullet placement is not easy to achieve when
the target is ploughing through understorey as it weaves
between large eucalypts (he crashes straight through saplings)
like a runaway train.
And because they are so difficult to
hunt multiple opportunities on one safari are rare.
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Using a hide, Peter Blank takes
a shot
at an unalerted Sambar stag at dusk
on the first day of his Shikar.
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In other words, you can expect
just one opportunity at a really good trophy so you, your rifle,
scope and cartridge must be up to the task. And, furthermore,
you can expect to get off just one well aimed shot and if you
spook or wound him he will instinctively make for the thickest
escape cover which will swallow him up in seconds. This is why
I use strategies that give the client a clear shot at an unalarmed
standing stag.
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Peter Blank's
stag was killed instantly
with a neck shot from a 30/06 at 125 metres. |
The
minimum legal calibre for sambar in Victoria is .270 Winchester
but 7mm/08, 7 x 57, 280, .308, 30/06, 35 Whelen and larger
are all suitable legal calibres and will kill a large
sambar stag instantly with one precisely placed projectile.
(All of the preceding calibres are suitable for Hog, Fallow
and Rusa deer).
However,
due to their ability to take punishment, larger cartridges
from the 7mm magnums up through the .35 Whelen, the 9.3
x 62, .375 Holland & Holland right up to the venerable
404 Jeffery, regularly see service hunting sambar in Victoria's
eucalypt forests. |
Nevertheless, the
best calibre is the one you can shoot the most accurately for
bullet placement is not everything - it is the only thing.
It is not good enough to merely aim for the centre of the chest.
You must select a vital area such as the spine,
neck, or centre of the front half of the lungs.
My choice of rifle for a Sambar Shikar
would be a bolt action chambered for a relatively flat shooting
cartridge such as the .270 Win. .280, .308, 30/06 or any long
range magnum such as the .338 Winchester. The .35 Whelen, 9.3
x 62 and .375 H & H are also excellent choices. The calibre
chosen should be one the user can shoot accurately, for it is
poor bullet placement, not inadequate power that is the primary
reason animals are lost. In the .270Win. I would use 150gn projectiles,
165's in the .308 and 165's or 180's in the 30/06, 225 or 250gn
in the 35 Whelen and 250 or 285gn in the 9.3 x 62. I would use
whichever brand of hunting projectiles grouped the best in that
rifle and shoot it until I became a crack shot.
It would furnish a sporter weight (not featherweight)
56cm (22 inch) to 61cm (24inch) barrel and weigh 3.6 to 4.2kg
(8 to 9lb) all up. From the standpoint of accurate long-range
shooting as well as portability, it is preferable that the barrel
profile be sporter to medium rather than being too heavy to
carry or too light to hold steady for a long shot. The safety
catch should be capable of being disengaged quickly and silently
on any rifle intended for sambar.
The correct choice of telescopic sight
is vital. Often the shot is taken in very low light from a rest
at a standing unalarmed stag. The distance can vary from 50
to 350 metres. The ideal scope therefore is a high quality light
gathering variable such as a 2.5 to 10, 3 to 9 or 3 to 12 with
a 50 to 56mm objective lens. Ideally the reticle would have
the heavy European style bars with coarse cross hairs and an
illuminated version enables you to aim precisely in low light.
Projectiles for
Sambar
When selecting
bullets bear in mind that despite being impervious to shock,
sambar are comparatively thin-skinned so the projectile selected
should mushroom readily to twice the calibre diameter so as
to cause maximum tissue damage while holding together to facilitate
maximum penetration. Any premium bullet such as
Woodleigh Weldcore, Nosler/Winchester Partition Gold or Ballistic
Tip, Speer Grand Slam, Trophy Bonded Bear Claw or Barnes X will
kill swiftly if correctly placed. Having said
that, to be fair I should also make it clear that countless
sambar stags have been killed instantly with Hornady Interlock,
Remington Corelokt and Winchester Powerpoint just to mention
a few. The truth is almost any quality projectile
of modern design and construction will do the job if correctly
placed. The best choice is the projectile of hunting
design that shoots most accurately in your rifle.
KNOW YOUR RIFLE
Painstaking adherence
to all the preceding is a waste of time if you do not know your
rifle. Rifles should be sighted for a 180M zero
(200 yds) and shot from
a rest at 20m, 50m, 100m, 200m, 250m and 300m to determine
POI. Rifles should also be
shot offhand at various distances out to 80 to 100 metres
so that you can be confident at taking an offhand shot at the
stag of your dreams while walking-him-up. Often
there is no handy tree to lean against, but even if there were,
the very moment you attempted to move towards it the stag would
explode into action and disappear with such lightning speed
that you would scarcely believe that such a large bulky animal
could move so fast. This is just one aspect of
sambar athleticism that never ceases to amaze hunters.
FIREARM LICENCE
Australian residents
A
photocopy of your Firearm Licence must accompany your Booking
Form.
International
Hunters
When you book a hunt I will assist you in obtaining an International
Visitors Firearm Permit.
FIREARM SAFETY
Firearm safety will not be compromised
and the handling of firearms will not be permitted after consuming
alcohol. Any person who blatantly
breaches accepted firearm safety rules will forfeit the right
to use a firearm whilst on Shikar. These rules are for
the safety of all.
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