Sports Afield: King of the mountain

Tracking Ethiopia's elusive mountain nyala

Ethiopia is extraordinary. The only country in the world where you can find mountain nyala, it is a huge, 9,000-foot-high plateau surrounded by deserts and steamy, hot, lowlying savanna-a landlocked island. Hunting in Ethiopia can be extraordinary, too. The country has undergone huge radical political, social, and cultural change in the last twenty years-from an imperial dynasty to a communist dictatorship to a tentative democracy.

Corrupt bureaucracies are widespread in Ethiopia. The older people that I met, many of whom had been incarcerated by the communists, said it was a comparatively new phenomenon-created, nurtured, and fostered by the brutal and merciless regime of Mengistu Haile Mariam. The communist dictator ruled Ethiopia with a titanium fist, a murderous heart, and a baffled brain from the mid-1970s to the early 1990s. Citizens were required to get written permission from a number of different ministries to travel abroad, a process that took from three to six weeks. In Africa, wherever the cloven hoof of bureaucracy requires ordinary people to obtain permits to do ordinary, everyday things, bribery is sure to follow.

During my first hunting trip to Ethiopia in 1998, I had to deliver my two rifles to customs a day before my departure in order to clear them. The next day, I was called from the airport departure lounge and confronted by eight customs officials. I had my rifle licenses, my export license from South Africa, my import license to Ethiopia, and my customs clearance from Ethiopia. "Where is the other paper?" I was asked.

"What other paper?" I replied.

"You know the other paper. You can't take these rifles without the other paper."

It was clear that these officials were trying to steal my rifles, so I asked the airline staff to call the police. This had the desired effect, and I was able to leave. What a pity, considering the Ethiopians I got to know on safari were intelligent, friendly, and hardworking.

My next two mountain nyala hunts were much better experiences. I hunted with Nassos Roussos and his Ethiopian Rift Valley Safaris. Everything was much better-the organization and logistics, the equipment and staff, the food and accommodations, and, most importantly, the areas we hunted. I even managed to shoot a mountain nyala on each trip. My perception was also that the government was slowly putting more and better controls in place to facilitate and encourage hunting, and I had no more trouble with permits, licenses, or corruption. Although no bribes were paid (Nassos defines bribes as paying someone to do something he should not do), I suspect the outfitter paid the occasional "encouragement" (Nassos's term for paying someone to do something he should do anyway).

Before my first trip, I read everything I could lay my hands on regarding Ethiopia-Bahru Zewde's History of Ethiopia; Maydon's Simen-Its Heights and Abysses; Powell-- Cotton's A Sporting Trip through Abyssinia; Rey's The Real Abyssinia; Sanchez-Arino's Hunting in Ethiopia; Thesiger's Danakil Desert and A Life of My Own; Lesley Brown's book of research into mountain nyala, Ethiopian Episode; as well as reports filed with The Hunting Report, travel guides, coffee table books, and various magazine articles. However, not even the book on mountain nyala had a picture of a live, adult, nyala bull. In fact, the only such pictures I eventually found came from the Bale National Park.

Hunting High and Low

Mountain nyala, once called mountain bushbuck, actually appear to be closely related to the greater kudu, and are one of the very top trophies in Africa, ranking with the bongo, giant eland, and sitatunga. There are two basic types of mountain nyala hunting-the high-mountain heather hunts, where we reached over 15,000 feet on one memorable trip, and the forest hunts. Not only is the type of hunting different due to the separate kinds of terrain and habitat, but the animals themselves look and behave differently. Forest nyala are a dark gray rather than a minky brown, are bigger in body, eat differently (forest nyala are browsers, whereas their upcountry cousins mainly graze), and their horns are shaped and constructed differently. Most members of the forest variety have a very prominent ridge detailing the spiral (and curve sharply in and sharply out to create an acute-angled lyre shape). The high-mountain nyala lack the prominent ridge and have thinner, more gently curving horns.

Hunting methods also differ quite markedly. In the high-mountain heather, the nyala are more exposed to view, and, in a way, the hunting is simpler, if not exactly easier. Teams are dispatched to high points, and, with binoculars and spotting scopes, they scan a large area quickly. Even when the nyala bed down, typically between 10 A.M. and 3 P.M., they still stand out amid the heather. In the forest, the reverse applies. Shots are seldom more than 250 yards. Cover is abundant-spotting the animal is the problem.

In the high mountains, the hard part is stalking closely enough, quickly enough. In the thin air, where a 500-yard climb can leave even the fittest hunter gasping like a goldfish in an empty bowl, this is much easier said than done. As such, physical fitness and acclimatization are priorities. On my first trip I went from Johannesburg (where I live) at 5,500 feet, to Addis Ababa at 9,000 feet, to our fly, or spike, camp at 13,400 feet-all in five days. It was too quick for me, and I suffered from terrible headaches, nausea, and vomiting for three days.

On the whole, however, having experienced both kinds of hunting, forest hunting is probably the more challenging. For instance, where in the whole morass of grass, moss, vines, creepers, shrubs, and trees should you start looking? The terrain on the lower mountain slopes where the forests are found normally consists of a series of steep, narrow, serrated, steak-knifelike ridges, separated by deep-river-- bottomed ravines. This makes it difficult to glass much more than two square kilometers at a time, and, therefore, a detailed knowledge of nyala movement and habits is essential.

For example, the drier it is, the higher the nyala move on the mountain. They prefer to spend the night high on the mountain, preferably in an open area, and then descend and browse to the lower rivers before bedding down and reversing the process in the afternoon. They have a limited sense of territoriality but, when in a given area, tend to use the same routes to and from their resting and browsing areas. Then again, although nyala are born all year-round, the peak birthing period is October and November. January and February are the months when the bulls are most likely to lose their inhibitions, inasmuch as this ever happens to these cautious beasts.

It is difficult to get any of the four outfitters in Ethiopia (there are a grand total of 15 active professional hunters in the whole country) to commit to the best time of year to hunt mountain nyala. This is because the weather is notoriously variable from year to year, and rain, mist, fog, and sleet can almost never be discounted, particularly in the high mountains. Based on my own experiences, I would choose the end of January or beginning of February. Hunting in midwinter allows you to check out the other major areas of Ethiopia (such as the extremely hot Danakil and the Omo Valley) if you want to combine your mountain nyala hunt for other animals indigenous to Ethiopia. These animals include northern gerenuk, northern Grant gazelle, beisa oryx, bang, Neumann hartebeest, Gunther dik-dik, and Soemmerring gazelle.

Staying Focused

There is something very special about hunting one animal and one animal only. It's a bit like putting all your money on zero at roulette: no distractions, one focus, winner takes all. On the other hand, as day after day clicks by with not a bull in sight, there is no light relief to help keep up your spirits. As with all the top trophy animals of Africa, you hunt nyala with your head, and it is so important to stay positive and not let your morale, and that of your team, droop. I often take small gifts for the hunting team-T-shirts, woolly hats, and pocketknives. It's amazing how the appreciation you show for their efforts, coupled, sometimes, with an afternoon off, can help lift the whole team-and you as well.

My third mountain nyala hunt developed a steady rhythm-up at 5:15 A.M., out of camp, on foot, in the dark, by 6 A.M. Then two to four hours per day on horseback to reach and return from the ravine where we had chosen to set up our spotting team. Then one or two hours per day climbing and clambering into and out of the extremely steep lower reaches, which the horses could not traverse safely. And hours and hours of looking-and I mean really looking, not just scanning. Good quality 10X40s are the best binoculars for the job, and it is important to minutely quarter every aspect of the sight picture before moving on. And once you have carefully examined an area, looked through every shrub and bush, checked and rechecked every shadow, nook, and cranny, you need to do it again and again. You never know when a nyala is going to rise up like a phoenix from the ash-- gray shadows, as the sun moves and exposes his cool nook to its hot, penetrating rays. You also need to concentrate. Once you let your mind wander, you may think you are still looking, but you aren't really doing so.

On day six of this hunt, we decide to establish a fly camp at the southeastern end of the concession, a three-hour ride by horseback to the chosen area. We leave in the dark as usual. As dawn lightens the track, I mount my mule, Mbeki. It is a difficult ride for me, since it's been only three months since I fractured two vertebrae in my back. Although I have mended well, it will still be some months before my recovery is complete-I really do not want to fall off. Somehow I stay on, however inelegantly, and, as we climb out of a deep valley past stands of tall, green bamboo, I recover my equilibrium and thoroughly enjoy the eight Menelik bushbuck rams and twelve females we see en route.

Parting company with the camp staff, who go on to erect our fly camp, we continue following the fresh track of a big bull we found earlier. We reach a far valley with an open, grassy glade, surrounded on all sides by forest. Arriving at just after 3 P.M., we sit among long, thick, pale-green grasses and dark-green shrubs at the foot of a huge koso tree. The tree's red fruit is used to make a medicine for people suffering from tapeworms. (The thought makes me cringe inwardly.) We are on the uphill side of an elongated clearing, surrounded by tall trees and thick, lush grass, shrubs, ferns, and creepers-green on green on green. It is shaped like a rugby ball, about 80 yards at its widest, stretching away for a distance of some 265 yards. We are a little exposed, and, quickly and quietly, we cut two leafy branches and plant them in front of us to act as camouflage. I immediately take readings of the distances to a series of reference points, near and far, in and around the clearing, with my Leica Geovid 7X42 binocular. (On either type of mountain nyala hunt, a rangefinder of some kind is essential.)

I pull out the legs of the bipod attached to the front sling swivel of my rifle and practice aiming at my various reference points. Owing to the steep slope of the hill, the only way I can get comfortable is to rest the feet of the bipod on the tops of my waterproof hiking boots, which were originally maroon in color but have, thankfully, faded to a dull, reddish brown.

There is not much to do now but wait. Given the small size of the area exposed to view, there is not even the necessity of glassing to wile away the time. Cicadas buzz and burr, and the dark olive green of my shirt absorbs the warm winter sun. It feels good. My muscles relax. I tilt the butt of my rifle until it rests on the ground. My arms drop, my head droops, and drowsiness creeps over me.

The Bull

The hoarse, low whisper of our tracker, Sayfou, breaks into my daydreams. As I jerk my baseball-capped head off my knees, my heart lurches. There, at my 160-meter mark, a massive mountain nyala bull stands broadside, energetically horning the mud beneath his forefeet. A young male and a beautiful, dove-gray, mature female stand like statues, staring at the impressive performance of the bull.

Where have they come from? How did they get here so suddenly? Slowly and carefully mounting my .375, I turn my head toward the PH, Nassos. "Wait," he whispers urgently. "Wait, I want to check his horns. Be calm, he will pick his head up again. He must."

To fix the cross hairs of the scope on the bull's left shoulder means I have to tilt my feet-on which the bipod rests-upward, as far as they will go. I am excited, but not so much that it affects my aim. I am confident. At this distance, with such a large target, nothing can go wrong.

Still the bull keeps up his Oscar-winning performance. My calf muscles eventually start trembling ever so slightly. I can feel the tension building in me. I am ready. I want to shoot now!

I drop my feet to the ground while still holding the rifle firmly with both hands, the butt tucked into the nook of my shoulder. Oops! The right-hand leg of the bipod slips off my boot. At that precise moment the nyala looks up. He is majestic, muscular, proud. He looks directly to the front, ostentatiously ignoring his audience. "OK, he's a good one," whispers Nassos, awed as I am by the huge, thick, lyre-shaped horns sprouting from the noble, Roman-nosed head of the bull. The horns are covered with mounds of moist, black turf As the sight settles on his shoulder, I immediately squeeze the trigger. In my eagerness, I squeeze not as gently as I should have. However, my last recollection of the picture in my sights is all dark gray shoulder and ribs before the recoil rips the bipod off my boots again.

I am in time to see the nyala turn unhurriedly and regally to his right, and, in two huge bounds with the powerful muscles of his haunches bunched like a bodybuilder's, he disappears up the steep bank and into the long grass and shrouding shrubs.

Nassos turns to me and raises his hands, fingers extended, palms open and facing the sides of his head. "You missed him! Oh my God, you missed him!" he says, a look of horror, pain, and disbelief written over his tense face. Clutching his head in his hands he exclaims, "Oh no, oh no, not with such a bull. Please, not with such a bull!"

I look back at Sayfou, who looks down at his feet and will not meet my gaze. I am in shock. Seeking an excuse for the inexplicable miss, I mutter, "I think the bipod must have slipped off my boots as I fired."

In a state of helpless bewilderment, aghast at what I have done, I stumble down the hill ofter Nassos, toward where the bull had stood, ignoring the dumbstruck cow and young bull as if they are a bad smell emanating from under the table at a posh dinner party. Only when we reach the spot do the two mountain nyala reluctantly move toward the tree line.

There is no blood. Nassos urges Sayfou to pick up the tracks and follow them. There is urgency to everything he says and does. His eyes burn holes in my head when he looks at me.

As we follow the tracks in the hope that the bull is not spooked too badly and will seek to rejoin his companions, any hope that I have hit the bull fades. Thirty, forty, fifty, sixty meters wind slowly past as we head up the bank. There is no blood, just big, deep tracks scuffing globs of still-damp black turf from the ground as the bull cantered effortlessly up the steep slope.

Suddenly Nassos points to down at the tracks. "Blood! You hit him!" I bend over to examine the tiny splotch of bright red blood gleaming against the emerald green of a fallen leaf over which it is splattered. Hope surges through my chest. I have barely digested the information when Sayfou runs toward me, arms outstretched, shouting, "Shoot! Shoot!" I stare wildly around me. Shoot where? Where is the bull? I can't see it! My head swivels frantically like the turret of a demented tank. The tracker grabs me by the shoulders and a torrent of Amharic flows over me. He turns me to my left and points, shaking me in the strange passion that grips him.

"There he is," shouts Nassos. "What a monster!"

Eventually I follow Nassos's gnarled, nicotine-- stained forefinger as he points to the ground four meters away. There, under my nose, on the ground, in amongst the tall, green grass, stretched out on his right side, as if fast asleep, lies the most magnificent mountain nyala I have ever seen, a bright buttonhole of blood precisely marking the position of his heart on his left shoulder.

We go crazy. We hug, shout, shake hands, run in circles-even dance a little. For a few moments we are drunk, delirious, in a world of our own. It has been the longest 70-yard walk of my life, but now the celebration can begin.