Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Why a 45-70?

A 45-70 is a very capable long range hunting cartridge if it is loaded with the proper bullet and the rifle is set up properly AND YOU KNOW HOW TO USE IT.

I have taken a number of animals in Africa with a 45 caliber Sharps, and only two of them have been at less than 200 yards. I shoot 480 to 520 grain bullets and drive them at 1200 to 1350 fps. I have never recovered one of these from any animal I have shot, always getting complete pass throughs.

Since it has been brought up, I will state that I have taken kudu at 302 yards, Black wildebeast at 225 yards, Blue wildebeast at 312 yards, impala at 229 yards, gemsbok at 200 yards, and springbok at 325 and 526 yards. All distances were measured with a Leica CRF 1200 laser rangefinder, and all of the shots are on DVD except the 526 yard springbok. All were first shot hits. However, I do have the two African PHs talking about the 526 yard shot on DVD. Only the two wildebeast required more than one shot.

It is something other people can do, if they want to. I shoot OPEN BARREL SIGHTS WITH A COPPER BLADE FRONT. The sights are a ladder sight that is standard equipment on a Sharps, and I have correlated the staff and marked it in 100 yard increments against the laser rangefinder. If you know the distance and have the sight set correctly--and break a good shot, you will hit with a killing shot. It is that simple. I have in fact had several people come to my range here at the house, and I have shown them how to do it.

I also have a Marlin 1895 Cowboy in 45-70. I have replaced the standard barrel sight with a ladder sight off of '73 Winchester, and correlated this sight with the rangefinder as well. I load the Lyman 457121 bullet at 480 grains and have nine shots at my disposal. I shoot steel animal silhouettes at my range at varying distances from 100 to 500 yards, and I can tell you that an elk at 300 is a dead nuts gimmie with either the Sharps or the Cowboy Marlin with ladder sights. 400 yards is not hard to do. LADDER BARREL SIGHTS as fitted to early Winchesters and Marlins greatly extend the range at which these rifles are capable.

Any of these loads will shoot through TWO INCHES of sun dried oak planking at 800 yards and and you are limited in what you can shoot ONLY BY THE QUALITY OF THE SIGHT PICTURE YOU CAN GENERATE.

Anyone who thinks that a 45-70 is strictly a short range proposition needs to go to a BPCR Silhouette match some time. When you see some guy run 10 pigs at 300 meters, and 7 or 8 turkeys at 424 yards or 8 or 10 rams at 547 yards with a 45-70, it becomes apparent real quick that if you are within a quarter of a mile of some guy with a 45-70 and he wants you, you are in serious trouble. I realize that these guys are using target sights. I have them on a couple of my rifles.

But you need to realize that I know several guys that can hit a gallon milk jug at a quarter of a mile with the barrel sights on their 45-70. I can do it, they can do it, and you can too, if you know how. If you can hit a gallon milk jug, you can hit a deer or elk in the hear/lung area.

IT IS THE SIGHTS that keep today's 45-70s from being long range capable, NOT THE CALIBER. That, and the 400 grain and lighter bullets.