Man Magnum January - February 2021

IN 2021, MAGNUM will celebrate its 45th anniversary. It all started in May 1976, and if you were old enough then to spend 50c on a magazine, one of the new choices on the shop shelves was SA MAN. The blurb under the masthead read: the new magazine for men of action. It was an era when political correctness was not topping any priority lists and the cover photo depicted a female model wearing a yellow bikini and a single-action revolver in a leather holster. The centre-spread showed a lady wearing only a brown bikini, a Stetson, cowboy boots and the aforementioned single-action six-shooter. Interestingly, the ‘bikini’ or scantily clad ladies graced the covers of only the first three editions (May, June, July 1976). The August edition had a Colt…

Hunting Benefits Remote Zimbabwe Community In 2018 I successfully hunted a tuskless elephant in the Dande South concession of Zimbabwe. The safari operators who ran the hunt being participants in the Zimbabwe CAMPFIRE programme. For details of my hunt see Magnum January 2019. Today I received the good news that this conservation programme, to which my fees contributed, has resulted in two young men from the Masoka village community recently graduating as much needed medical doctors. Our hunt camp manager, camp staff and trackers, who did an excellent job, were all from this village. This certainly illustrates the benefits that sustainable safari hunting brings to local communities, not only in curtailing poaching, but in offering jobs and educational opportunities to many – as well as numerous other benefits. This and…

IT WAS A balmy May evening in the middle Drakensberg; Royce Buckle and I were enjoying a fire under the stars. Born in Tanganyika, Royce grew up on a farm before becoming a ‘white hunter’ as East African professional hunters were called back in the 1950s. Now in his eighties, Royce lives near Winterton, and in recent years we have become firm friends. We talk the same language – a language which, nowadays, fewer and fewer people can or want to talk… guns, game and hunting, mostly. “I saw a lone hartebeest walk across that hillside this morning,” I said. “A century ago, hartebeest were plentiful in the Berg. Two freak blizzards wiped most of them out.” Royce nodded, “It can get bitterly cold up here in winter. The townie…

POLYMER PISTOL WITH BENEFITS EXTRA FEATURES • Ambi manual safeties • Reversible magazine catch • Picatinny rail • Magazine loader • Cable lock • Owner’s manual THE FIRM OF Taurus Forjas of Porto Alegre, Brazil, is the largest handgun manufacturer in Latin America. As has just about every handgun maker of note – and some of no note whatsoever – Taurus now produces a line of full size, compact and subcompact polymer-frame pistols in .22 rimfire, .380, 9mm, .45 and .45 calibres that have proven popular with civilians, police and militaries around the world. Over the years Taurus has offered a line of rimfire pistols and, with constant improvements and upgrades, has resulted in what I feel is one of the neatest, most user-friendly .22 pistols on the market today – the Taurus TX22. Despite being…

THE MORNING SKY was showing the first traces of pink when we saw the herd, dark bodies in the distance, drifting across the track. We waited until they disappeared into the mopane trees, jumped off the vehicle and followed them. My watch showed five minutes past five, a good time to be in the veld and already stalking your quarry. This was the third day of the hunt with hot and humid Lowveld weather where, no matter how much water you drank, and irrespective of how much you sweated, you were always hot. And the wind. It seemed that no matter what we tried, it always swirled and carried our scent to the buffalo, we just could not get lucky. My son Matt and I have hunted together since he…

“A THING OF beauty is a joy forever: Its loveliness increases; it will never pass into nothingness.” These words by the 18th century English poet, John Keats, sprang to mind as I turned over in my hands one of the most impressive rifles I had yet seen. Made by Mus-grave, it was a classic in every sense of the word: Mauser 98 action, a heavy barrel in one of the most iconic calibres ever, with a stock that in itself was a pleasure to behold. In my mind, a thing of beauty becomes more valued if designed and created to serve a useful purpose, rather than merely to be admired. Yet it was a mystery rifle in terms of its provenance – a work of art that stirred the imagination.…