After crossing the 'big lake' by dinghy, we climbed aboard the pre-positioned safari car and headed south along the floodplain margin.  The wife and I would be dropped off some five or six kilometres short of our destination to hopefully walk-up a buffalo or boar along the water's edge.  The guide and paying client were to continue by vehicle looking for a trophy buff out in the woodland until our midday rendezvous down at 'the Point'.

The breeze was quite variable at first, and several early chances at buffalo herds were blown without offering a shot.  By mid-morning however the landscape had heated up enough for the wind to settle down.  We were particularly keen to bag a fat cow for meat as we would be returning to Darwin the next day and badly needed a 'chiller-filler'.

I was carrying my 12-bore 'double slugger', a William Griffiths box-lock that had been a lovely duck-gun prior to a nasty accident while in the possession of the previous owner. The barrels were now cut down to 25-inches, ribs re-layed and regulated for solid slugs. Unfortunately our preferred Brenneke cartridges have been unavailable in Australia for many years now, and some of the intended replacements have been a dismal failure. Following bad experiences with the RC4 Palla shotgun slug I was understandably a little 'gun-shy' when a mate drew my attention to a new offering by Rio.  Closer inspection revealed their 'Bala Blindada' projectile to be a solid rifled slug with a steel penetrator doubling as a screw for attachment of the integral base-wad.  A range session proved the accuracy of this load by consistently grouping six shots within three inches at fifty yards from the open-sighted smooth-bore double.  Having already accounted for a number of Northern Territory boars, it was now time to test it on a bovine!

Late morning saw us approaching the RV point but still empty-handed.  One last opportunity was offered however, as a small buffalo herd finished watering up ahead and began meandering back through the paperbarks towards the levee.  As I stalked closer, a lone straggler became suspicious and stopped with her head behind a paperbark trunk to look and listen.  Closing to about forty yards I was able to see most of her body so the gold bead fore-sight was centred in the ghost-ring and aligned with her rib-cage.  On receiving the bullet, the stricken animal staggered through the trees for perhaps twenty yards before toppling over.  I was about to move forward when the remainder of the herd suddenly rushed back to surround the prostrate cow, and I found myself desperately pretending to be a paperbark tree for the next few minutes until they eventually moved off.  By the time I finally reached her she was stone dead.

While butchering the carcass, the path of the Rio slug was traced through the animal's chest.  After smashing a rib on entry, it had travelled perhaps 20 inches through the chest cavity to break through the rib-cage under the offside armpit where it came to a stop.  Both lungs and the back of the heart were completely penetrated.  The recovered projectile had lost the plastic base-wad but the lead slug component still showed 97% weight retention.  This was marvellous performance from a 2 3/4 inch non-magnum slug load, and pretty much the equivalent of our old favourite, the Brenneke.

Having now passed our rigorous 'field test', the Rio 'Bala Blindada' slug-load will be a regular passenger on future bush trips in the Top End.  In fact, another 'flat' of cartridges is on order as you read this!