Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters 300WSM

That sounds like a good thing.

Yeah, he liked hunting more than hunting liked him. He never really developed a knack for it. Oddly enough he would pull off a great shot every once in a while.

Amen..............

I see tourist hunters in town here most evenings buying ammo for the next day's hunt all the time. I think I have used 10 shells in the last five years to harvest enough antelope to keep us fed..........

We stopped in a gunshop in meeker Colorado last yr and he had some real odd ball ammo on the shelf. Most of it was just one box. I suspect yrs past guys probably stopped looking for ammo.

Nothing is guanteed to be found. Remember a couple of years ago during the panic buying of the ammo scare, common calibers were all sold out, even at Midway USA.

Like has been said before better to take your ammo in separated bags, even if a store has your caliber, they may not have the brand or bullet weight and style your sighted in for.

308,30/06,270,7 Rem Mag,300 Win Mag. in North America.

Can we all have an Amen.... At least to your last sentence anyway. Sounds like it's a good thing he gave it up.

That's a good point. I remember around here, all that was left on the shelves of 3 different gunshops were 280 Remington. Everything else was gone. I almost thought about buying a 280 at the time...

I think the answer to be "no"; and, I think the list fulfilling your requirement includes only 7 or 8 calibers/cartridges: 223, 243, 308, 270 30-06, 7 mm, 300 wm and maybe 30/30. I would put the 300 WSM in the second tier of availability of on-the-shelf ammo. That is, it's more available than most.

Thank God for small miracles

Sako 85 Finnlite 300 WSM weighs 7.2 scoped.

I believe the Winchester EW is also lighter at about a 1/4 pound lighter..

That's exactly why I bought my 280.

My goofy nephew came up to me at first light, 3 miles away and 1000 feet above the truck to tell me he forgot to bring his 06 shells. I told him to go over a ridge and see if he could borrow some rounds from one of our group he came back 1/2 hour later with his Barney Fife 3 bullets.

That probably doesn't happen with a 300 WSM but I'd rather have that than an 06 on an elk hunt.

He doesn't hunt anymore either - seems like a trend.

. I remember seeing some damn nice classic 280 fwt's at the time too. I wish I would have bought one. Now my LGS has a damn nice older Remington BDL mountain rifle for sale. $800.00 with an older leupold 3-9x40. Awfully tempting...

You can get it all over Alaska on the road system. I think that you are safe.

I think the 300 wsm is generally available, nowhere to the extent of 06, 270, 243, 300 wm and others but I see it in a lot of places. The variety isn't great but seriously if I'm hunting a long way from home and need ammo $60/box isn't going to stop me.

I too load my own and always take way more ammo than I need but if availability was a concern I would take a 30/06 anywhere in the world.

Your guns and ammo are the first things you put in the truck. Double checking is the last thing you do before you drive off. I have forgotten my bullets before. I have walked a mile up the hill to the stand and remember bullets in camp. Bullets first!!!

I don't know about the WSM but can relate a tale about the 340 B and 2 boxes of carefully crafted hand loads with 210-gr TSXs--I left them at home. I had no ammo with the exception of three rounds that were in a leather cartridge carrier.

Not until I got to camp in northern CO did I discover it. The nearest "big" town was 45 min away, it was nighttime and I had serious concerns as to finding any as the only sporting goods store I noticed on the way in was a "Bobs".

They had [/i] one [i] box of 340s with 210-gr NP which I bought but knew would fly differently than mine but hoped I could get by with the three. I killed a killed a bull across a small canyon at about 475 yds with a single shot.

I even make lists but did some content and bag switching at the last minute and that's how it happened; stuff does happen--to me at least. I usually leave stuff at the hunt site rather than at home though .

I tend to take a very long-term view. Long term, I can't see the .300 WSM and the .300 WM both surviving. They are too similar. Like everything else in business, there will be consolidation. One of the other will cease having rifles chambered for it and ammo will become scarcer, eventually becoming a hand loading only proposition.

My bet would be on the WM winning. Both have advantages (velocity vs. short action) but I think the WSM won't overcome the big head start of the WM.

The .300 H&H and .300 Wby will survive as cult cartridges with a small group of loonies.

As for the other .300 magnums recently introduced, fuggedaboudit.