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I just returned from a successful cow elk hunt with Boulder Creek Outfitters in Idaho. The day my partner and I arrived we were paired with another man from Idaho. This fellow had apparently hunted elk quite a bit in the northern part of the state and he sounded quite experienced. He said he had previously killed several 5x5's.

Our first actual hunting day found us in a truck with quite a long, early drive to our hunting ground so we visited to pass the time. Our guide asked us at what distance we were comfortable shooting. My buddy and I asserted that we were comfortable shooting at around 300 yards but preferabably a shorter range. The other man from Idaho said he was after a nice bull and was comfortable shooting at 500-600 yards as he had this Leupold scope which he could twist the elevation dials and adjust his impact point for various ranges. His new Browning rifle could put 3 shots into a six inch circle at 500 yards. As he said, his "rifle is accurate out to 500 yards. I've practiced at 500 yards and I can make the shot. My range finder also adjusts for horizontal elevation distance to the target and my scope dials are matched to my particular bullet and load."

Well, you guessed it. That morning he had an opportunity at a nice 6x6 bull at something approaching 525 yards across a canyon. It was raining slightly, some blustery wind, and he was prone using his bi-pod attached to his rifle laid over his back-pack. The elk were moving slowly across the hill side slightly below his horizontal elevation. He fired three shots and missed all three. His first two shots were called "high" by one of the guides.

He couldn't figure it out. He admitted he wasn't steady using his bi-pod over his pack, necessary due to the tall grass. It was raining denying a clear visual on the elk. It was windy. He wasn't sure he was ranging the correct animal due to the rain, and extreme distance. He had made the necessary scope adjustments. Thre may have been other possible reasons for the miss too but I have forgotten them.

There you have it. The trials and tribulations of shooting at game at long ranges in real life situations.

500/600 is not that far.

It was most likely the Indian, not the arrow.

Well, yeah. But he was bragging about his rifle putting three shots into six inches at 500, which even under ideal conditions isn't that great. Add some wind....

Not steady.
Raining.
No clear visual.
Not sure if correct range.
Blustery wind.

Shoots anyway.

Misses 3 times.

Nuff said.........

Yes, heaven forbid we should infer that shooting elk at long range is anything other than good, common practice. GD

plus the elk were moving, i wouldn't shoot at a moving target that far.

I think we're all saying that, given the conditions and skills of the shooter.

This is what happens when the casual range work morf's into real life situations and the conditions are never the same. I'm sure the guy could do what he said.....at the range and under ideal conditions.

Those "short range" 500 yard situations are suddenly not so "short". The technology lies to you,the wind throws you off in calculations,shooting conditions not ideal. Doesn't take much to throw you off at that distance when a bullet is plummeting 25-35 inches and the wind is blowing.

Why I don't listen when I hear that 500 yards is "short range"..I've BTDT several times on elk and I promise there was not much about it that I found easy. I even walked away from some shots.

If the guide had asked me I'd have responded..."Let's get as close as we can and I'll let you know then..."

Plus the ground is rarely as level and your platform is rarely as stable as it is at the range.

John, very true. At the moment of taking such a shot there are probably innumerable factors ready to derail it. But speaking of wind, a cross-canyon experience I had made me very careful in considering them from then on--the 15-20 mph winds were in opposite directions on a canyon only five hundred yards wide.

smokepole is it ever flat level across those canyons?

When is 500 yards NOT 500 yards?

Riddle....

I don't know, but it seems like most of the time when I'm up on a vantage point where I can see a good ways for a LR shot (in the mountains at least) the ground is falling away in front of me. It's never as easy as at the range, and you never have as much time to get situated "just right."

Did he practice in the same conditions as when he made the shot? There's your answer.





P

I'm at the age where there are some things I'm sure of but they are relatively few. I would never tell a guide or outfitter or hunting companion, "I'm good to six hundred".

To paraphrase a famous saying," it's better to remain quiet and be wondered about than to make decalarations you later fail at".

I hadn't realized there was a question...

But I'll put my oar in the water, as we all seem to be rowing in circles anyway. I don't have a problem with hunters shooting game at 500 yards, any more than I have a problem with folks doing so at 150 yards. I've seen plenty of folks who have no business doing either, and others who are dead nuts on at the same ranges. As you say, it comes down to how well you've trained.

I recall a hunting trip a few years back when I missed 4 animals out of 5 I shot at in the first 2 days of the hunt. This was with a very familiar and very accurate rifle and scope I had killed many heads of game with over about 8 years, btw. I was so confident in that rifle and it's pet load that any big game I'd selected inside of 400 yards always went down. I was puzzled by these misses, but as I didn't have an easy way to check the rifle out in the field, I switched to my backup rifle. I filled my remaining tags with no more misses.

When I went home, I found one of the scope ring screws was stripped, and 2 or 3 of the others were slightly loose. The rifle would barely hold minute-of-barn door at 100 yards. But I hadn't known this before the hunt because I only put 2-3 rounds down range at 100 yards to "check zero" before my hunt. If I'd followed my usual habit, and put 15-20 rounds on paper out to 400 yards prior to traveling to WY I'd have known about this problem before it became a problem. BTW, this pre-hunt Ritual has more to do with checking 'the nut behind the trigger' than any part of the rifle, IMHO; but as this case proved, rifles and scope mounts can and do get gremlins without warning, so it'/ smart to assume Murphy has been at work in your gunsafe every new hunting season.

In tactical circles, we often cite the mantra, "Train the way you expect to fight, for you will surely fight the way you have trained," and "If it ain't rainin', it ain't trainin'!" Same things apply to hunting. You have to train with your rifle from hunting positions, in hunting conditions, if you expect to succeed when you draw down at that trophy animal, whether it be at 150 yards or 1050 yards.

It is when it's windy.

Add that the "less than steady shooting position" and that's enough to explain the misses.
Everytime I get fired up about reaching out beyond 300 yds., I usually try it out under field conditions. That's means no benches rest or other really solid rest. That means with whatever wind is present unless it's odviously too much wind.

That alone usually does it for me. Especially if I'm hunting something as tough as a bull elk. E

I had a L>R wind on my side be a bottom to top wind on the opposite side of a canyon. The grass was laying flat with each gust up the side of the canyon.

When it's on the slant...

You know that.Trick question.

525 yds is too far,
for an arrow

I would wonder if that was his best 3 shot group. What would a 10 shot "group" have looked like. The real squirrel in the attic in long range shooting is doping the wind.

I don't think we were rowing in circles at all. The OP described a shooter with a new rifle who'd "practiced to 500" whatever that means, and had a self-described unsteady shooting position for a long shot in tough conditions. A lot of good points were made about the difference in practicing to 500 and making the shot in the field, and they were all as germane if not more so than an anecdote about an equipment failure causing a miss.

Classic case of an irresponsible hunter shooting beyond his means and capabilities, regardless of the distance, and not putting in the necessary practice time to make the shots he'll risk taking in the field.

What I get out of it was that the shooter didn't have the skills to set up and make the shot, or the judgement/experience to realize the same.

Since I don't belong to a range, ALL my long range shooting is done as some variation of hunting field conditions. One thing I've learned is that prone is prone and everything else is not. If he was up off the ground as it sounds like he was, then his position was nowhere near as solid as what he was likely used to.

My longest shot on game, 602 yards, I not only moved closer (to find a flat enough spot to get truly prone) and also took over 30 minutes to set up for the shot, counting the time it took to get to the better spot, sneaking through the sage and boulders. I could've taken a ~ 675 yard shot from a more awkward position, and it was a deer I wanted, but again, prone is prone and nothing else is prone.

There's plenty that can wrong with ANY hunting shot. LR just has its own particular set of considerations, and perhaps requires a bit more good judgement than some other shots. I don't like seeing these sorts of stories presented as a "see why LR hunting is bad?" Where's the corresponding tongue-clucking story about screwing up the 100 yard shot in the timber? Like THAT doesn't happen?

Jeff,

There aren't "corresponding" stories about short-range misses because they've ALWAYS been part of hunting, even before there were rifles. Why repeat millions of them, especially while clucking our tongues?

What's different about instances like the OP described, of course, is nowadays many hunters think they can BUY the ability to kill big game animals at whatever they consider "long range" after very little real practice.

You nailed that one, big time.

Good dope is priceless. CDS, no doubt.

On the money there.

I've seen some pretty unbelievable things from people. This year a guy was using his new scopeon a hard to draw hunt..sighted in, then the dope was taken right off the factory drop chart on the cartridge box..

If that weren't enough, the range he shot at the first elk at called for 38" of drop, so he promtly dials in 38MOA.

I bet he was good to 1k if you had asked him before he started shooting.

Unbelievable

I guess it's the new magnumitis, right? The notion there being that you can "buy" the ability to just shoot 'em dead....

That's been happening for decades. Before I got into modern equipment and techniques for LR shooting, I spent several years doing it the old way- kentucky windage using duplex reticles the best I could. But I took the time and spent the money to become intimately familiar with my load's trajectory before taking long shots on game. Most didn't.

Me too. I was pretty good with a duplex, 500 was getting out there but still very doable. IF you knew WTF you were doing. reoccurring theme there. Some things will never change in the practice department..ammo is expensive you know

Yeah, that's the way I did it before laser rangefinders and scopes designed for dialing. Used a Duplex reticle as both a rangefinder and longer-range aiming point. Was guiding back then, partly for antelope, and being able to put a wounded one down at what was then considered long range came in handy on occasion. Finished one buck somebody else had wounded at around 550--took two shots to get it done, but was very close on the first one, thanks to having a realistic idea of the range.

I'd be hosed in open country without my rangefinder, or as Jordan keeps pushing me to try, a (preferably for ranging) FFP scope w/appropriate reticle.

I was consistently badly misjudging distances by eyeball up on my high desert mulie hunt this fall. Badly.

If he'd put one shot in that 6 inch circle, it would have been good enough

If the circle was in the killing spot!

I've met some folks who can use a rangefinder and turrets well, but I've never met anyone who could range without a rangefinder well enough to make kill shots at long range.

I mean fast kill shots; ie, heart/lung.

You'll notice I didn't say it could not be done, but ...

That's the crux of the matter. Today's advertising makes many think all they have to do is buy turrets, a scope with some wild cross hair, a ballistic app for their phone, and a mega buck rifle and anyone can hunt long range. Seldom mentioned is the trigger time necessary to be proficient at long range especially figuring out the wind.

I agree that can happen at moderate ranges also but the mistakes are compounded by distance.

I'm pushing you to an FFP scope for other reasons, though...

With modern RF's, using a reticle to determine distance is nothing more than a seldom-used, last resort.

"... 525 yards across a canyon...some blustery wind..."

His guide should have NEVER have allowed him to shoot that far in those conditions no matter who he was. Don't forget that the wind is much faster over the canyon because there are no trees or grass to block it.

600 yards can be a relatively easy shot or an almost impossible shot. Conditions, skill set, familiarity with their shooting system, dope accuracy, etc. are often overlooked by both the beginner and "experienced" crowds. Triggers are pulled with nary a thought to hit probability. Spray and pray. Money doesn't buy experience. This appears to be just another example of that.