Post by: Rob on April 07, 2009, 11:59:28 AM
On the dawn of September 4th, 2007 both Steve and I headed out for Hartman Mountain zebra in separate parties. I, having only recently added it to my list, and Steve, who had been looking forward to it for over a year. Since the zebra mountains were a bit further away from the lodge we started about 30 minutes earlier than usual. It took us about an hour to make the drive. On the way we stopped off at a water hole because one of the trackers saw some leopard tracks from the truck. Jaco (our PH) said they were made by a large male. As we walked around the water tank we came across a kudu cow kill the leopard had recently made! About 20 yards from the kudu was a much older zebra colt kill.
After looking over the waterhole we loaded up and drove about 10 more minutes. We were now up in the high territory and driving up a narrow canyon. A troop of baboon was on a distant hill watching our approach. It was very quiet and pretty, however after having just left the leopard kill I couldn’t shake the feeing I was being watched. It was almost like watching an old western movie. You know, where 2-3 cowboys ride up a canyon and you just know that any moment 1,000 Indians are going to appear on every ridge line and rock? It felt like we were heading into an ambush. Often while walking around in the bush I thought about how much the landscape was like parts of the US. Then I would recall that land in the US does not have leopards, cheetahs, and cobras lurking around. Truly we were “not in Kansas” anymore!
Anyway, we finally arrived at the zebra grounds without being attacked along the way. The zebra grounds were a set of mountains that I would guess were between 6500 and 7500 feet high. In the distance you could see the sand dunes of the Great Namib Desert. Jaco and I left Dad and Thomas in the truck, and with David and Eric in tow we started up some game trails. According to Jaco the zebra like to start the day in the valleys near water and then as the heat of the day builds they work their way up to the higher altitudes. They do not typically travel in large herds like their plains cousins but prefer to travel in family groups of 4-8. We started out walking at a pretty high altitude so we spent most of our time scanning the ground below us for groups of animals. As we walked along we needed to watch our step to avoid slipping in the large quantities of zebra poop! Too much game sign is not a problem I am accustomed to having when hunting!
We walked for 45 min to an hour. As we rounded each corner we scanned around for zebra. Finally, as we worked around a hillside, Eric pointed across a valley behind and above us and said what I had been waiting to hear:
“Zebra”
I scanned but didn’t see any. After looking a little harder I finally made them out. It really is amazing how such an ostentatiously patterned animal can be so hard to see! They were trotting along in single file on a parallel course to us and were about to crest the far hill. The mare was in front followed by two medium sized colts and a stallion bringing up the rear. I understand from Jaco, that the dominate stallion is usually found in the rear of family groups. Jaco got the sticks out and set them up. He told me the distance was about 230 yards. There was an open patch ahead of them that they were approaching. I held on this spot and watched the first three pass through. Then the stallion came through the gap. He paused and looked over at us and I immediately squeezed the trigger. In the shock of the report I had trouble telling if I had hit him or if he had taken off, as he seemed to have been vaporized! I could not see him anywhere. A moment later Jaco shouted out that I had got him! I scanned around the area and finally thought I could see it lying down behind a set of rocks. It was moving a little bit. I suggested putting a second round in him but Jaco told me to cover him while he sent Eric and David (our trackers) over. After a 5 minute walk they arrived to a dead zebra. The time was 10 am. As we were setting it up for photos, Jaco pointed out that they have canine teeth. That was pretty cool. The teeth are quite large and by looking at them Jaco estimated he was about 25 years old. He also estimated that it weighed between 800 and 1,000 pounds. This was the largest animal I had ever shot!
Hartman’s zebra look different than burchell zebra (the kind found in the open plains). Some of the differences include a very unique pattern of stripes on the butts, stripes that do not meet on the stomach, and black stripes on their cheeks that turn to brown when they reach the muzzle giving them brown faces. They are also lacking shadow stripes on their rumps like the burchell have.As we were finishing up photos Thomas walked up. Jaco had called him on the radio. He had moved the truck to a closer spot, which I later marked on the GPS as ¾ of a mile away, and walked over. With the photos taken, it was time for the real work to begin. Most animals are pretty easy to skin; you can pull off large pieces of skin with little effort. Not the case with zebra. You need to cut off every square inch of skin with a knife. Jaco said the guys usually need to sharpen their knives multiple times while skinning one out.
After they removed about half of the skin they “unzipped” the body cavity. Up to this point in my life, as far as large game goes, I had only cleaned ruminants. I am pretty use to seeing what is inside a ruminant. Large round grass filled stomachs, etc. If you have ever seen the movie Alien, or opened one of those spring loaded can ‘o’ worms you will be able to visualize what I saw as they opened the body cavity of the zebra. What I can only describe as… this “thing”… started pouring out of the body. It was grey, about 12 inches in diameter, and heaven only knows how long. Foot after foot came out of the small incision they made. It kept coming and coming. After about 7 feet of it came out, it finally stopped. My assumption was that this was some kind of large intestine, yet it just did not look right. I did some research on the web after I got home and found the following:
THE LARGE INTESTINE (hindgut)
The horse has the largest and most complex large intestine of any domestic animal. Its large intestine is made up of two large organs: the cecum and the colon. Together they represent about 60% of the horse's digestive tract. The cecum makes up about 25-30% of the large intestine.
The horse's large intestine is designed to utilize plant fiber. Insoluble carbohydrates such as cellulose and hemicellulose from forages, as well as starch and other soluble carbohydrates that were not digested in the small intestine, flow into the large intestine. As feed leaves the small intestine it first enters the cecum. Here the undigested nutrients are fermented in a process similar to that which occurs in the forestomach of ruminants. After fermentation, feed enters the colon for further digestion and absorption. Microbial fermentation in the hindgut results in the production of volatile fatty acids which are an important nutrient source for the horse. The hindgut also serves as a reservoir of water and electrolytes which are vital to sustain exercise performance.
This is also mentioned in The Perfect Shot book:
Zebra are extremely efficient grazers. They have both upper and lower front teeth and sensitive supple lips for nibbling, as well as a small, simple stomach and a large, voluminous hind gut for roughage fermentation, breakdown and utilization, all of which makes them ideally adapted to their grazing diet.
Kevin Robertson – the Perfect Shot, Shot Placement for African Game.
So what I had seen was the cecum. It should only have been 4 feet long or so, but I am guessing it was bloated up with gasses and that is why it was nearly seven feet long. The spleen was also very large and kind of a purple/green color with the texture of a basketball. It was very interesting to watch the processing of the zebra; I learned a lot!
Since it takes so much time to clean the zebras, and they ended up needing to re-sharpen knifes so many times, I lent the trackers my knife. This knife was hand made. It has a Damascus steel blade with an antler handle that has a very detailed quail head carved into it. It is a beautiful knife that Mom and Dad bought for me in an auction last February. I have started bringing it on all my hunts! They used my knife to cut off the zebra head so that marked the first practical application of the quail knife.
There was no exit wound from the bullet I shot, but we could not find it. My guess is that it got poured out onto the ground withall of the blood when the gut pile was removed. I dug around for it but could not find it; after all - one can only paw through piles of coagulated blood for so long before it looses its glamour...
The trackers had set the heart and lungs aside and I took a look at them. The shot I made had gone right through the heart. The entrance hole was large however the exit hole was bigger; three large holes, and 2-4 small holes. Since the bullet only had to penetrate the ribs there is really no reason the bullet should have broken up on impact. My guess is that the “milk bottle” effect described in the perfect shot was what caused the extensive damage. Either that or some bone fragments were carried through the heart with the bullet.
It took three trackers working full time and Jaco and I working part time over an hour to clean the zebra. When we were done, there were four legs, the spine, the head, the cape, many of the internal organs, and the backskin to carry out. I took a back leg and started walking. I carried it back to the truck. The trip back was not too bad but given the altitude, heat and my general lack of fitness, I was pretty out of breath by the time I got back to the truck. It was mostly downhill but as always, there was a lot of up and down travel. It took the five of us about an hour to pack out all the parts. We loaded it into the truck and headed back. On the way we stopped off at the leopard kill location and dropped a front quarter of the zebra off for bait. We arrived back at the lodge at 2:30. It took us 4.5 hours from the time I pulled the trigger to the time we got back to camp.
Post by: Rob on April 07, 2009, 12:06:32 PM
Post by: jackelope on April 07, 2009, 12:08:27 PM
Post by: boneaddict on April 07, 2009, 12:10:51 PM
Post by: Michelle_Nelson on April 07, 2009, 12:14:46 PM
Post by: oneezreiter on April 07, 2009, 12:19:33 PM
Post by: Rob on April 07, 2009, 12:41:40 PM
Post by: wazzuhunter on April 07, 2009, 06:56:33 PM
Post by: robb92 on April 08, 2009, 12:26:23 AM
Post by: farmin4u_98948 on April 08, 2009, 01:43:00 PM
Post by: Machias on April 08, 2009, 02:04:03 PM
Thanks for sharing!!!!
Post by: Rob on April 08, 2009, 02:30:51 PM
Awesome, someday...someday!!!
Thanks for sharing!!!!
Why wait? Plains game trips cost less than most people think. My trip was under 10K. That included everything. airfare, first class food and lodging, transport, guides, trackers, and trophy fees for NINE (yes nine) animals. All the animals were high quality. It also included a side trip to Cape Town for cage diving. Taxidermy of course was not included in these costs and can be as little or as much as you want to spend.
Imagine you are hunting mulies and a massive Elk walks by. And your guide asks you, if you would you like to shoot that animal. You respond, "As a matter of fact yes. Yes I would. Thank you very much." Bang. (or in my case Bang... Bang... bangbangbangbang...)
That is what it is like over there. You buy tags after the animal bleeds, not before. So you can adjust what you hunt based on what you come across. Not that it is an issue to come across animals. In a typical afternoon, we would see 4-5 different species of large game.
Below are two more pictures, one of the valley I described prior to reaching the mountains, and one of the Cecum which I found very interesting.
Post by: WaltHenry on April 08, 2009, 02:48:07 PM
Post by: Redstar on April 08, 2009, 03:15:14 PM