Mature male baboon standing in the open, the kind of old dog-faced male hunted with Nhoro Safaris

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Baboon hunting in Africa

Papio ursinus · Gudo in Shona

Every professional hunter has a story about being outwitted by baboon. Most clients who shoot one talk about it for longer than the kudu.

Trophy to aim for

Mature males, heavy maned

A mature male has a heavy mane across the shoulders, a long dog-like muzzle and canines that would not look out of place on a leopard. Size is judged on body mass and mane rather than any measurement, and troops are led by males you will struggle to get within three hundred metres of.

Where we hunt it

  • South Africa
  • Zimbabwe

Recommended calibre

.243 to .30-06

Anything you are already carrying for plains game. Shots are usually long and often at an animal that is half hidden, so accuracy and a steady rest matter far more than calibre.

Bow hunting possible

Best months

Available throughout our season. Baboon move most in the first and last two hours of daylight, and in the dry months they are tied to whatever water is left.

Hunt length

Taken opportunistically on any safari

Physical demand

Demanding

The animal

Chacma baboon are the largest baboon in Africa and, by a distance, the most intelligent animal you will hunt here. A troop of forty has forty sets of eyes, a sentinel posted in the tallest tree, and an alarm bark that empties a valley of every living thing in it.

They are also genuinely destructive. Baboon raid crops, kill lambs and newborn calves, and take a serious toll on ground-nesting birds and small antelope. On farmland they are hunted as problem animals year round, and no landowner in Limpopo will thank you for passing one up.

Why they are worth hunting

Because they are hard. Really hard.

A baboon troop knows the difference between a vehicle driving past and a vehicle slowing down. They know what a rifle looks like. They will watch you walk into cover and simply wait, silent, until you walk out again. Clients who have hunted four continents regularly say a mature baboon male was the most difficult stalk of their safari.

They are also unprotected on most of the ground we hunt in South Africa, which means no trophy fee and no quota — you can hunt them as hard as you like for as long as you are with us.

How the hunt runs

Mostly it happens in the gaps. You are driving between areas, or walking back after a morning on kudu, and a troop crosses ahead. From there it is a sprint-and-wait game: get ahead of where they are feeding, get into cover downwind, and hope the sentinel is looking the other way.

The other method is to sit water in the dry months. Baboon drink daily and noisily, and a well-placed blind at a pan from mid-morning will eventually produce a shot.

Either way, expect to fail more often than you succeed. That is the point.

Rifle and shot placement

Your plains game rifle is correct — a .243 through to a .30-06 with any decent expanding bullet. Shots run long because the last hundred metres is usually where they spot you.

Place the shot as you would on a small antelope, on the shoulder. A wounded baboon in thick cover is a serious problem: they are strong, they have formidable canines, and they will use them. Do not follow one up without your professional hunter.

Practicalities

There is no trophy fee for baboon on our South African hunting and no limit on numbers. If you want a full-mount or a skull, say so before the shot so the skinners can treat it properly — baboon skin poorly if they are left in the sun.

Import rules for primates differ sharply by country and several ban them outright. Check your own position before you plan on taking one home. See our firearms and CITES notice.

Baboon in the field

Hunting client, professional hunter and tracker with a mature chacma baboon male taken in the Limpopo bushveld, South Africa
Hunting party with a chacma baboon male taken on the Nhoro Safaris concession in Limpopo, South Africa
Hunter and tracker with a mature chacma baboon male taken in Limpopo, South Africa

Often hunted alongside

Mature warthog boar with heavy 11-inch tusks taken in Limpopo, South Africa, with Nhoro Safaris

Warthog

9–13" upper tusks · South Africa +2
Mature bushpig boar taken over bait at night in South Africa with Nhoro Safaris

Bushpig

Mature boars, 2–3" tusks · South Africa +2
Caracal, or rooikat, standing in long golden grass, one of the small carnivores hunted with Nhoro Safaris

Small Carnivores

Coat condition over size · South Africa +1

Talk to us about your hunt

Tell us what you want to hunt and roughly when. We will come back with honest options, the countries that suit them, and what is genuinely available.

Start an enquiry

Baboon hunts run taken opportunistically on any safari.

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