b-rice

I heard of people hunting them with a bow witch is cool but what do you do after you harvest it. I mean i have never heard of elephant steak of elephant jerky.

Fieldmouse

I still have a pair of Elephant skin boots from when you could buy them.

The Mouse

Elephant Recipe
Ingredients:

1 elephant
7 bushel carrots, chopped
7 bushel potatoes, chopped
7 bushel onions, chopped
Salt and pepper (to taste)
Brown gravy
2 rabbits (optional)
Dice elephant into small pieces. This should take about 2 months. Add enough brown gravy to cover. Season to taste. Cook over fire for 4 weeks. This will serve 3,800 people. If more are expected, add 2 rabbits, but only if necessary. Most people do not like to find a hare in their stew.

Sorry guys. I couldn't resist this old joke.

Antler Eater

I'm told that the villagers in the area gladly take care of every scrap of meat that an elephant has.

I was intrigued with Chuck Adams viewpoint on hunting elephants with bows. His recommendation to the Zimbabwe government was that it shouldn't be allowed after his bad experience. He was using a 100 pound (draw weight) bow with a 830 grain arrow.

The Mouse

Is there an article or book that I could read about his experience?

c j

Life at Full Draw, by Gregg Gutschow. link I'm about 3/4 of the way through it. Chuck doesn't feel elephant should be taken by bow because it's essentially a crapshoot. There's no real way to tell where the ribs are, so it's all up to chance whether you can shoot between them. Most likely you'll hit one, and his 100lb bow with 800+ grain arrow couldn't penetrate an elephant's ribs. Chuck did a number of tests on the one they downed.

kelincp

Its kinda of ironic that The Mouse is giving a elephant recipe.
I've always heard that the big eared ones were scared to death of Mice.
Great recipe tho, I will se about running it as as a feature tomorrow at the shop. I'm just not sure what to charge?

Straightarrow

I have no personal experience in this, but I've heard from other "experts", that an 800 grain arrow is way too light to be going after elephants. I believe recommended draw weight is also higher. Like most things, there's a right way and a wrong way. No need to ban those who are capable of doing it the right way.

Antler Eater

C J is correct.

According to what is printed, Adams feels that at best a person would only be successful on getting by the flat two inch thick ribs one out of every three times. Plus the vitals on African game are farther forward making the target harder to get to. The shot apparently was under twenty yards. He hit right where he was aiming and still hit to far back. He says shooting an elephant with a bow is a "stunt" and shouldn't be allowed.

Here is a quote from his book 'Life At Fulldraw' page 144, "....a strong two-thirds of the chest cavity is covered by ribs so thick, you couldn't shoot any arrow through those ribs...."

"...I can tell you that no matter what you read or what you hear, most of the elephants supposedly taken with a bow are not taken cleanly... Most them are finished off with a rifle."

Sidebar

Other than the two bladed Zwicky broadhead, the bow and the gear he was shooting has been mentioned above. To show you how technology has advanced, with that hundred pound setup, although close, he didn't get 90 ft. lbs of kinetic energy. Today we are pushing that number with a much lighter drawing bow. I am also surprised at how light his arrow was.

BOWFANATIC

100lb bow and 800gn arrow not enough? C'mon

I dont care if you have a 200lb bow and a 1000gn arrow , if you hit an elephant in the rib you just pi$$ed him off!
I've read stories about the same problems faced by rifle hunters who had to put numerous shots in the kill zone due to an elephants humongous bone structure.