Black Iron’s Glory

Chapter 374 Hunting a Bison

I'm not really good at working in the office, or I'm more comfortable on the battlefield, and I don't have to deal with all those chicken and garlic chores all day long... so Claude is rushing around on a vast prairie at the moment. The sky and clouds are faint, and the glimpse of the Alberto prairie gives Claude a pleasant, pleasant feeling.

A handful of light smoke rolled in from afar, with McJackie up his palm at the front and most of the horses behind him starting to slow down. That was one of the scout cavalry squads sent by the Thunder Division, and it was supposed to be something that came back to report.

Indeed, the four men who flew in strangled the reins not far away, saddled down, and rode in front of Mike. McJackie interrogated him and walked to Claude with the bearded soldier.

“Reporting General, Sergeant Linkmat of the Thunder 131st Regiment Reconnaissance Battalion, returns at the command of Lieutenant Colonel Berklin. We have discovered the route of the buffalo migration and are currently reconnaissance near the herd, with no trace of the enemy.” Soldiers salute Claude and report loudly.

Nearly a million bison migrate, but the Alberto grasslands are even more vast. Although the direction in which bison migrate each year remains unchanged, from the northern plateau to the southern plain, this does not mean that bison migrate year after year. Often, in order to chase beautiful aquatic plants, bison herds often change routes and deviate from previous years' migratory paths. So in order to find the enemies who are ready to hunt the buffalo, you have to find the buffalo herd in the Albato grasslands first.

People who have never seen a buffalo migrate can never imagine how huge a herd of nearly a million buffaloes can be, like an infinite shadow covering the entire meadow. Looking far away, it's a cloud that can't see the edge of the grassland moving, and where they pass, the lush green disappears, leaving only a piece of wolfsbane soil...

“General, we can't come any closer.” Guided Sergeant Linkmat said he was from overseas territories and was chosen from overseas field regiments to join the Thunder Division and had several years of experience hunting bison.

“Around 500 meters from the buffalo herd is a safe distance, and within 500 meters is the hunting range for predators hunting buffalo, which can easily be attacked if they enter. And a hundred meters away from the buffalo herd is a buffalo alert area, which can trigger a buffalo alert. If a buffalo thinks you're their enemy, they'll come after you in groups until they get you out of the way they think you're safe. General, our war horses cannot withstand the impact of a buffalo. Sometimes a short sprint, a buffalo runs faster than a horse...” explains Sergeant Linkmatt.

This should be true, Claude has seen several famous carnivorous beasts on the continent of Nubicia. Among them are clusters of longtooth lions, nubician scorpion tail brown lions with agile and single-handed fights, speckled leopards, brutal redhead wolves and brunette prairie wolves. Almost all of the carnivorous beasts documented in the animal atlas of the continent of Nubicia appear around migrating buffaloes, looking for the time to prepare to capture their prey from the buffalo herd, but more often fighting over a hunted buffalo corpse, screaming constantly...

“Sergeant Linkmat, can you tell us how you used to hunt buffaloes?” Claude asked curiously.

“Absolutely, General.” Sergeant Linkmat was flattered to point at the distant buffalo herd, “he said," hunting the buffalo, we can't stay ahead of them. Because almost all the buffaloes in the forefront are the strongest and most aggressive, and they are the pioneers of our forces with the task of opening the way. Any enemy that stands in their way can easily cause a buffalo to go wild, and no matter how powerful the enemy is, they will only rush past and crush all enemies that stand in their way.

Likewise, hunting a buffalo on the front side of a buffalo is not a good option, and hunting a buffalo tends to trigger a wild pursuit of the buffalo, which is simply immortal. I once heard the old buffalo hunter say that there was a group of noblemen who came to visit the continent of Nubicia, and after hearing about the buffalo migrations, they were ready to get together. They dodged straight ahead and started hunting those buffaloes on the side of the herd.

The first hunting of dozens of bison went well, but forgot that they were too close to the herd, and the herd that came after them had put them in the inner circle. At the same time, they attracted the attention of the buffaloes and started chasing them. As a result, they were trapped in tens of thousands of buffaloes, and when their rides could no longer run, this group of aristocrats and their entourage of more than thirty horses were all trampled by the buffaloes into rotten mud...

Generally speaking, it is a better hunting ground on the side of the buffalo herd, but it is necessary to pioneer the carnivorous beasts from the area so that they understand that this is a human hunting area so that the buffalo hunters have time to clean up their hunting. Buffaloes that just landed on the rear side of the buffalo are mostly elderly and infirm, and they are the hunting targets of those predators. For buffalo hunters, the buffalo hunted on the rear periphery of the buffalo herd is not of great value, the quality of the cowhide is poor, the taste of the beef is not good, and is generally used to make beef jerky sales.

At the same time, when hunting in the rear of the side, pay attention to the covert attacks of carnivorous beasts. Team buffalo hunters often fail to sustain their hunting areas, are raided by the beasts and, without vigilance, can cause harm to people. So basically, in the evening, the buffalo hunters abandon their daytime hunting areas and retreat with their hunting to a camp a mile away in case the beasts attack them at night. Wait till the next day to take the next hunting area from the carnivorous beast with a large crowd of people.

If you can organize a hunting team of over a hundred people, the best hunting buffalo grounds are at the tail of the migratory buffalo herd. Many of the buffaloes there are old and weak who can't keep up with the herd, but there are also a number of young and strong buffaloes who have just begun to live alone as adults. This is the best prey for a buffalo hunter.

The advantage of hunting a buffalo from the tail of a herd is that you don't have to worry about a bunch of buffalo repellents, but you also have to be aware that half a dozen buffaloes suddenly attack the team. Birds as big as this tend to be aggressive, they don't care how many people you have, hunters or beasts, and if you annoy them, they won't stop chasing them until they die.

And the most vigilant way to hunt a buffalo at the tail of a buffalo is with a wolf herd. Both redhead and grassland wolves are the most annoying enemies of buffalo hunters. There are enough of these wolves, and there's a lot of revenge. Every time a buffalo migrates, these wolves combine from a small group into a large group, tailing behind the buffalo, hunting the old and weak buffaloes for food, on the one hand, and capturing other predators on the other. Even the fiercest scorpion lions can only give up food to leave if they encounter the wolves.

Once there were buffalo hunters battling the crowd, killing dozens of redhead wolves who followed them behind the buffalo herd to fight for their capture. As a result, at night, their camp was surrounded by thousands of wolves. Then the Wolf Wars lasted three days and three nights, and the buffalo hunters were killed and wounded before many people guarded the camp and killed hundreds of redhead wolves. Finally, the bison herd left, the redhead wolves withdrew, and they had to go back to the house to get some rest, so to speak, it was a loss to get home.

Now the team of experienced buffalo hunters will hunt the buffalo behind the buffalo herd, leaving the dead old and weak buffalo to the wolves to take the bodies of the green buffaloes themselves, so that the wolves do not invade each other and the boundaries are clear. Our previous experience is basically that three hunters must leave at least one, otherwise, one time they will take it all away, the next time there will be hunted buffaloes, the wolves will rush up to fight for the body... "

A circle of people surrounded Sergeant Rinkmart and listened to him tell the story of the buffalo hunt. "What do you think is the most important thing about hunting a buffalo, Sergeant Rinkmart? ”

Sergeant Linkmat thought about it and responded: "The most important thing is a well-defended camp with adequate support staff. Because hunting a buffalo is what we buffalo hunters should do, but once we get good prey, we need support personnel to transport the buffalo bodies to the camp for immediate disposal, peeling, leaching, smoking and drying the beef, and initial treatment of horns and cowhides to prevent spoilage, all of which are urgently needed for the benefit of our hunting buffalo...

In addition, because of the large number of wild carnivores, which pose a great threat to us bison hunters at night, it is important to have a camp with good defense that allows us to rest safely for one night and regain energy. Organize a buffalo hunting team, with only one third of the buffalo hunters, and the rest are logistics support staff. We are all looking for a suitable place to build a camp a kilometre from the buffalo, and basically all the materials we build are being transported from the rear and trenches are being dug to keep us safe. ”

Big Gemmy suddenly asks, "Are those abandoned, semi-collapsed camp sites that we saw when we first came here the ones you built before? ”

Sergeant Linkmat nodded: "Yes, the first one was built 10 years ago, but now the route of the buffalo migration is also increasingly oriented to the east, and these built barracks are largely abandoned every other year or two. After all, being too far away from the buffalo herd to transport the capture is not only safe, but also stiffens the corpse and affects the quality of the skin..."

Claude took a look at the sky and ordered a local camp, while telling Sergeant Linkmat to take some men hunting a couple of buffaloes and add some fresh meat to dinner to see if his old buffalo hunter charm was still there...

Sergeant Rinkmart greeted a small group of soldiers who had served as buffalo hunters without hesitation and drove three carriages to the distant buffalo herd. Claude stood on a hill with Mike and others, looking at them from a single telescope, and how he went about hunting bison.

Sergeant Rinkmart began by shouting horses, waving a loud whip in the vicinity of the bison herd, scared away three spotted leopards hiding in the grass, and then parked three carriages there, where he continued to take the squad of soldiers straight to the bison herd.

Instead of rushing straight into the buffalo herd, they were led by Rinkmat, who rubbed their shoulders along the edge of the buffalo, splitting the four or five buffaloes and the buffalo herd apart, driving the buffalo outwards with horses and whips, and driving the buffalo out of the range of attention the buffalo had received.

One of the buffaloes had a fierce temper, and he ran and suddenly stopped and turned around, pointing his head down with a sharp horn at the back of the soldier who drove him off, regardless of whether three, seven or 21 ran over him. But the soldier had already been warned by Sergeant Linkmat that he was well on guard and that Lehma was heading to the left to clear the path of the buffalo, leaving the buffalo empty.

And the buffalo didn't hit the target, and it didn't stop until he realized it was close to the buffalo. It seemed boring. I shook my head to the left and right and took a few more steps toward the bison herd. Soon I stopped again and continued to eat the weeds on the ground...

And by then, Sergeant Linkmat, they had driven the four remaining buffaloes away from the buffalo about a hundred meters away, and they had changed formation, and the two of them were running with a buffalo clamped together, making it impossible for the buffalo to change direction. And Sergeant Rinkmart, sitting on the horse, has held the firearm that lit the fire rope with one hand and extended it to the back neck of the running buffalo.

“Bang” sounds, white smoke coming out.

In Claude's single-barrel telescope, you can clearly see a bloody splash on that buffalo's head. The running buffalo continued to run for a few steps, suddenly a bump, then fell and crashed forward more than a dozen steps, just one fell on the grass, the four hooves were twitching...

The remaining three bison were similarly shot, and one of them soon fell to the ground, just like the one that Sergeant Linkmat hunted. But the two remaining buffaloes were otherwise, and a buffalo jumped up hard after being shot, like crazy. The other soldier next to him, however, was quick in the eye and directly replenished another shot, knocking it to the ground.

The last buffalo was shot by the soldier on the right and then hit to the left, forcing the soldier on the left, who had not fired, to strangle the rope and deflect his horse from the bull, and then watched the buffalo break out of the siege and rush to the left. The soldiers who followed him opened fire on the buffalo, but the buffalo was clearly bleeding like no injuries. The faster he ran, the farther he ran...

Sergeant Linkmat, they had no choice but to run off with this buffalo, and they had firewire guns in their hands that had been set aside for one round, and there was no use in catching up. They could only park in place and greet the three wagons to transport the three hunted buffaloes while loading the guns and re-clamping the ropes in case the surrounding tigers looked at the carnivorous beasts.

When the carriage arrived, all but four or five soldiers sat on the horseback and alerted the surrounding area, and all the rest of them got off the horse. It took seven hands and eight feet to get the bodies of the three buffaloes onto the carriage, so that they could get back on the horse and run back behind the carriage.

Claude watched a buffalo hunt with his own eyes to see how the buffalo was hunted. Unlike what he imagined, it was almost at gunpoint against the back of a buffalo's head to kill a buffalo, not what he thought was a hundred meters away. If you look at the last buffalo, you can conclude that shooting a buffalo 100 meters away will only provoke the buffalo and attack the hunter, unless it's in the right place, which is even more dangerous...

The three buffaloes that were hunted, according to Sergeant Linkmat, were supposed to be weak, because they weighed about 1,000 kilograms, and basically all strong buffaloes weighed more than 1,500 kilograms. A few years ago, the bison store killed and wounded two or three bison hunters before hunting a bison king. The body weighed more than 2,700 kg. It was said that it stood almost two meters tall when it didn't die, and it was a very scary giant...

The hunted buffalo became an evening meal, and Claude ordered the Thunder Division not to hunt the buffalo for two days, most importantly to find the enemy's tracks first. Has the volunteer Light Rider Corps, formed by retired soldiers from the Principality of Kanas, entered the Alberto Plains under the direct authority of Bering Ghana again to hunt for migrating bison herds...