English, French, Circassian, and Turkish walnut are all examples of this thin-shelled wood, which is chosen for its strength, stability, and beauty.

Wood stocks come in all flavors, but the finest of them are made from Juglans regia, a species of walnut generally classified by its country of origin. Sure, I own plenty of synthetic-stocked rifles, but that doesn’t make my guns that wear walnut obsolete.

Wood-stocked rifles are beautiful in ways that no plastic-stocked hunting rig will ever be and can be just as functional. Maybe, but many of those hunters could make a tricky 300-yard shot in the wind using a four-power scope without consulting a ballistic app. That type of thinking assumes that the hunters of the past weren’t well-equipped because they didn’t have the technology we have today. It is easy to presume that wood-stocked rifles are something from another age, when bullets bounced off elk and variable scopes didn’t sit atop every hunting rifle. You see, I had stocked the rifle myself from a semi-inletted blank of walnut, shaping it for countless hours until it fit me better than any suit I own. No, it was something far more practical and important to me. It wasn’t the most cutting-edge rifle on the market. As I looked down at the rifle in my hands, I couldn’t help but think that it was one worthy of this moment. We found him 75 yards ahead he’d died in wait for us, watching his back trail from behind a thick clump of Savé Valley brush. I cycled the bolt in recoil, but a second shot wasn’t in the cards. I followed the front leg a third of the way up the body and put a 300-grain TSX through the old dagga boy’s heart. I didn’t want to shoot through brush, but here I was and that was that. 375 came up smoothly, and my eye found the scope without conscious thought.

I was 35 yards from one of the deadliest game animals on the planet and the species that had drawn me to hunting in the first place. After years of dreaming the dreams, saving the money, and practicing on the range, the moment of truth had arrived. Some black hair here, a hoof there, the glossy boss of horn reflecting the afternoon sun. I couldn’t see a whole buffalo, but rather pieces of buffalo. Finally, we were among them, hulking black shapes in the thick brush. I stepped to the side and snuck a peek ahead, and he’d caught me. I’d grown tired of staring at the PH’s back in our single-file line. Mudzingwa, the old tracker, shot me a death look.

Trail carbine vs brush gun