Mogwadiri Safaris, Namibia

May 19, 2020 Hunting,SCA Articles

The game is plentiful around Amolinda, but Hartmann’s mountain zebras are the main attraction.

The countryside of Namibia leaves a lasting impression. It’s a place where the sunrises are rivaled only by the sunsets. Then there are the grasslands and the abundant game. Its ineffable beauty quickly gets into your soul.

I experienced Namibia for the first time with my dear friend Ruth Cusack. She and I traveled there to hunt gemsbok and Hartmann’s mountain zebra with Mogwadiri Safaris, which is a sponsor for the Prois Awards hosted by Prois Hunting & Field Apparel for Women.

Each year Prois honors one woman who not only is dedicated to hunting, but also exhibits a passion for conservation and community education. Ruth was the 2012 Prois Award recipient, and in addition to the safari, the prize package included an incredible bounty of gear from the sponsors.

After our long flight to Windhoek, the capital of Namibia, and five hours on the road, we arrived at Amolinda, another camp associated with Mogwadiri and where Nicola Van Zyl, the owner and PH, greeted us warmly. After a brief tour of the German-style lodge we caught a much-needed night of sleep and were ready to hit the countryside in the morning.

Amolinda provides a very unique African hunting experience as it is a remote area that boasts an array of habitats, from valleys to mountains to rocky outcrops to open plains. This diversity supports a wide variety of free-ranging game over its 28,000 acres.

While the Amolinda hunting grounds support gemsbok, red hartebeest, kudu, giraffe, baboons, dik-dik, duiker, klipspringer, steenbok, caracal, and leopards, it’s true legacy lies in the rugged pursuit of Hartmann’s mountain zebra, which, as the name says, tends to reside in the mountains and rocky outcroppings near the camp.

Hartmann’s mountain zebras are classified as a Specially Protected Game in Namibia as they are endemic to the country. There is currently a secure and stable population of 24,000 animals in Namibia, and in those areas where herds compete with cattle, the zebras are considered a nuisance.

According to Van Zyl, “We do not have a quota on the Hartmann’s mountain zebra; therefore, we get permits issued on a regular basis by the Ministry of Environment and Tourism. Professional hunters in Namibia do need to adhere to the Namibian quality-control system, which requires that we can target only animals that comply with a minimum standard and that all harvested zebras must be reported to the Ministry of Environment and Tourism at the end of each hunting season.”

The trophy fees paid by hunters as well as the permit and registration fees paid by the PHs funnel back to the Namibian government to continue managing wild animals and their habitats.

“The revenues generated by trophy hunting has given our game animals a higher value, therefore wildlife numbers have increased dramatically,” reports Van Zyl.

Reaching the zebras is no easy task. The outcroppings are treacherous, and the mountains provide them with all sorts of rugged cover. The saving grace for hunters is that the animals range from the mountainsides down to the open plains to graze in the morning and evenings.

The mornings began cool and comfortable, but the temperatures climbed to above 100 degrees in the afternoons.

We’d start out each day walking the valley bottoms looking for sign. If the herds had returned to the mountains, we’d hike after them. Strewn with loose rock, the mountainsides provided mostly difficult footing, and it seemed every grass, shrub, and tree in the hills came equipped with razor-sharp thorns. Everyone experienced mild hemorrhaging by the end of each day. Still, Nicola, his tracker, and skinner wound us tirelessly through the hills. I enjoyed the difficulty of it all, and the onerous nature of the hunt resonated with Ruth as well.

Early in the hunt Ruth shot a beautiful gemsbok – a kill that allowed us to focus solely on zebra. We bumped gemsbok around every bush but found no zebra that first morning. We returned to the lodge for a quick lunch, then hit the mountainsides in an effort to locate the animals in their rocky refuges.

That afternoon we hunted an area aptly named Eensaamheid, which means “loneliness” in Afrikaans. This particular region is an expansive grassland nestled between rocky mountains. In the heat of the day we saw few animals on the move.

Late in the afternoon, however, we made one last steep climb and spotted eight zebras. The shooting light, however, was at a minimum, so we called it a day. Fortunately, the scorching temperatures from the afternoon had been overtaken by an early-evening chill. We pushed back to the lodge.

We left camp the second morning to scour the valley bottoms before heading up the mountains. We’d not gone far when the tracker picked up a trail that proved pretty much invisible to us. He moved methodically and we followed closely.

Soon, we spotted a small herd in the valley. Nicola quickly got Ruth into position on the shooting sticks, and with one shot, she killed a beautiful mare from 200 yards with her .300 Weatherby. Once the animal was down, the trackers and skinners quickly set to work.

“One of the things that impressed me most was the trackers and how they were able to pick up sign in the grass and rocks and then follow them to the animals,” Ruth said.

We spent another day hunting, looking for my chance to shoot a zebra, but to no avail. We spotted several small herds but stalking them is quite difficult in the mountainous terrain. It can be noted that I will be back to Mogwadiri again to pursue this incredible animal.

Mogwadiri Safaris runs a professional, family-run operation that promotes hunting out of two camps: the main lodge at Magdalena and remote reaches of the unique Amolinda camp. We saw every type of animal native to the Namibian plains and mountains, and all can be hunted with Mogwadiri Safaris. PH Nicola Van Zyl established Mogwadiri in 2011 after guiding for many safari outfits since 2006. Mogwadiri is family friendly and female friendly. Additionally, they have been the banner sponsors of the Prois Award for three years.