Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Deer Hunting Any slug users?

Anyone use slugs to hunt with, I have a weekend hunt planned on a Corp of engineer tract that require slugs only. Taking the 300 gr ftx hornady slugs. Sited the gun in 2 inches high at 50yds, I should be good for 150-175 yd shot if needed. I’ve never killed anything with slugs so I’ll be new to this.

Being in a slug state all but 2 of my gun kills have been with either a 20 gauge or 12 gauge sabot slug. Taken a doe a piece with a muzzleloader and my 450 bushmaster. Honestly 175 yards is stretching it. They drop like rocks. I try to stay off the shoulder, never had a long or bad blood trail with a slug. Good luck!

I used to. The local military base in the 90's was shotgun only. That changed when the Army left and it became a National Guard base. But in the 90's we didn't have these fancy sabots and rifled bores were uncommon. It was Foster slugs and smoothbores. And it worked

I killed a yearling moose once at about 35 yards, running, with a 12 slug. Single bead Win 1200. Wing shooting, so to speak, but a bit higher than planned. I was rushed...

Perfectly centered the large artery just under the backbone. He ran about 100 yards and tipped over in mid-stride, all bled out. Ate the last (lost in freezer) roast 2 years later- still better than the one I'd killed that year. But he had been perfectly aged, too, due to circumstances out in the remote field.

Caught out in the field, working, the 1200 was all I had, and I bought the only two 5-packs of slugs the village store (20 miles down river) had. I used the first 5 pack to check sights/ drop. I think I still have the other 4 slug loads 40 years later....

Check the drop. Those big slow bullets drop like a rock once past 100 yards. They do work well though.

True- IIRC, from 25 to 150 yards on my check shoot- there was a couple feet... but every damned one nailed that 6" root-wad river-bank, washed out spruce tree I was shooting at.

I was confident to 150. Plus, mooses are big!

The quickest way for the average hunter to develop a flinch is to sit down at a bench with a couple boxes of 12ga Fosters and "sight in".

I was forced to use them for years. Finally got smart and went to a 20 out of a semi. Better, but still sucks. Now a days I'd rather go to the wife's family reunion than shoot phugging slugs.

If you have to use slugs and are gonna hunt that area for a while the Savage 220 in 20 gauge with a decent scope is the best thing going b

We used to have to use them in Iowa, hated them, especially from a smooth bore. Tried the 20 gauge Savage bolts with sabot slugs and they were better but still not optimal. Much better now that we can use any cartridge over .35 caliber.

Hornady SSTs with the FTX slug are good loads, IF your gun shoots them well. Using Hornady SSTs, my Savage 212 will hold a 1" group at 100 yards. Out of my Ithaca M37 with a rifled barrel, it will barely hold a 10" group at 100 yards. Ive never shot any other brand of slug that had such a wide range of accuracy from different guns. If you think you are going to get 100 yard shots, I would HIGHLY recommend you shoot that gun at 100 yards and see what you get, and not just rely on being 2" high at 50 yards.

Yeah, no kidding. I think that my slugs drop at least a foot from 100 to 150. I've been using Breneke Magnum Crush 12ga 1 1/2 oz. 1500fps.

With a slug gun, a rifled barrel is a necessity. Scope, red dot or irons depending on your eyes. Irons should be good rifle type irons, not beads. I wouldn’t shoot much past 125-150 with a scope, 75-100 with irons/red dot. Those slugs drop like a rock past 100 yds. The wind can mess with them past 75yds or so, so pay attention to that.

EVERYBODY should do that every time for everything,
but they seldom do. These days they get online
and read that they need to sight in so-and-so right
there at 25 yards, and that'll be perfect for so-and-so
at 300 yards, never having fired past 100 to see
what's what

One of the best lines I've heard

I've shot a couple of whitetail does with the Federal 328 grain lead sabot slugs and the old Winchester BRI sabot slugs.

They all have a pretty arching trajectory, so with a 2" high zero at 100 yards, you probably want to check the POI at 50 yards in case you get a closer shot. The Federals are soft lead, so I'd aim for the lungs. The BRIs were a lot harder, so they might have been successful at breaking bone, but would still put a big hole through the lungs.

Haven’t had to use slugs for years, for which I’m grateful. My last couple of Ithaca slug guns are in my sons’ hands now and I don’t think they really have any use for them.

The Model 37 Ithaca “Deerslayer” smooth bores with rifle sights always seemed to throw a slug pretty well, certainly adequate for most in-the-woods deer hunting. I always thought there might be something in the fundamental design of that model that lends itself toward shooting slugs relatively accurately. Even the ones with modified and full choke “bird” barrels seemed to shoot slugs better than most smooth bore shotgun designs.

When I was stationed in VA I hunted a lot of shotgun only places. Slugs will knock the hell out of a deer but as others have already pointed out they are not long range. Where I hunted with them 75 yards was as far as I could expect to shoot and at that range a slug is deadly

Used to be all we could use in Ohio was Foster slugs. People killed tons of deer with them. Me and my pals (pards 😂) included. Then they allowed certain handgun calibers (.357, 41, 44, .45 Colt). Next they allowed rifles barrels and sabot slugs. This was really a step up. I started with a cantilever barrel for my old Mossberg 500. Lightfield slugs shot great, but Federal Premium Barnes Expanders shot even better. I bought an H&R trophy slugster single shot and put a Simmons 4x shotgun scope on it and used it until Ohio started allowing straight walled cartridge rifles. Now it’s 350 Legend out to 200 yards. Take your rifled shotgun with the XTP slugs and go slay some deer. You won’t be disappointed out to 150 yards.

Ron

when i was 12yo, smoothbore with a bead, i had a 20ga Savage pump gun and Remington slugs (i think Brenneke). i could hit a coffee can lid at 75 yards. i didn't shoot a deer either. next year it was borrowed Winchester m94 in 32 Special.

i always wondered what the 20ga does to deer?

For the same reasons I have been shooting more than a few slugs. Sighted in a smoothbore using Winchester 1oz rifled slugs and a 50 yards they shot pretty tight but at 75 yards 5-6 inches was the norm. Put together two rifled barrel 12 gauge slug guns and both shoot plenty fine out to 125 yards using either the Monoflex all copper or the SST loads from Hornady. They do not hit to the same point of aim sadly.I like to hunt so I use them but I also use my much nicer to shoot muzzleloaders more. Use the shotguns when rain or hunting from boats.

I've used slugs off and on for about the last 20 years. With a socped rfled barrel Mossberg 835 and Lightfield slugs took a number of deer.All under 75 yards. It shot 3 or 4 inch groups at 100, and big patterns at 200. My current slug gun is a Verona double with Hastings rifled barrels and a reflex sight. It's regulated at 50 yards and shoots both barrels side by side with 1 1/2 groups there. At a hundred still easy 5 inches both barrels with WW Copper Impact. I've currently no access to a longer range. I've fired and hunted several other slug guns, smooth and rifled that did not perform that well. I have a friend with a Savage 220. It groups around 3 inches at a hundred with Hornadys. Again no access to a 200 yard range. I have a Savage 24 20 that will do 4 inches with WW fosters at 50. Have/had a number of drillings and BBF's that would do the same with Brennekes.
It took 14 different loads to find the current load for the double. It took 7 or 8 for the Mossberg. Dumb luck on the 3rd load on the 24. Brennekes and Remington fosters were the only choice for the German guns. Slug guns that I've shot at 200 years dropped a lot and made groups way more than double the 100 yard groups.

My experience is that (1)different ammo shoots much differently in each gun. For example the Hornady load that shoots so well in the 220, groups over 6 inches at 25 yards in my double gun and the load that does well in mine can barely keep on a paper plate in his 220;(2) groups at 50 and 100 yards are not indicative of longer ranges;(3) every slug gun is an individual(4) i never shoot at game at a distance I haven't checked out on paper, no matter what it says on the box or what someone says on TV or the internet.
Good Luck
Bfly

About 50 yrs ago I had a JC Higgins 20 gauge bolt gun , modified choke
With Remington rifled slugs I could hit quart oil cans around eighty yds pretty consistently
That was shooting off handed , so don’t really know his it grouped , but was plenty accurate for me in those days
Now have a 220 savage , shiieet ! No looking back with accutips
Often clover leafs at 100 yds on a bench
Kills em dead too
Kenneth

Can’t swear to its authenticity, but a while back I read a story that stated that an Ithaca employee hunted where only slugs were legal and had enough pull to have a special model created for that. The barrels are slightly undersized to give a better fit, and straight cylinder-bored. The rest as they say, is history.

My fondness for them comes from my late uncle, who loved deer hunting, although he was not a gun guy at all. He bought a 20” 12ga back in the 60s and had a K4 with a dot mounted in a Weaver Pivot mount. Those mounts seem pretty rinkydink these days, but that thing held zero for decades, and he swung that scope over and used the irons more than once. His son likes to say that the K4 has a lot of DNA on it because so many people got “scoped” by that wicked little cannon. It shot like a rifle with ordinary Remington Fosters. Paper-hulled Brennekes however, just fell out the bottom.

I really like the 37s, have had four, but had trouble holding onto them. My son has my first, a plain 12, and I foolishly sold a 26” 20ga DS to finance a mistake. Last year I scored a very pristine 12 with a Simmons rib, and later a 20” Super Deluxe DS with the factory Williams peep. Both are early 60s, 1963 IIRC, and in excellent shape, although I had to repair a crack in the DS. My repair seems to be holding. It like my uncles, is brutal off the bench, and now stands in the corner for house duty. I need to take it out to verify function with the ammo it’s loaded with, as the other one doesn’t extract steel-head cases reliable, a common issue apparently with the older ones. Brass heads work perfectly.

Slug guns tend to be individuals. Each seems to have a preference for a certain brand and type of slug.
My second longest deer kill was with an smooth bore Ithaca 37. 110 yards. But that gun was fitted with a peep sight and loved Federal 1 ounce Sluggers.
20 Gauge guns are still good killers and will be lighter in weight and recoil. I have a Savage 24 in 22 mag/20 gauge fitted with a peep sight, and choke tubes added. I have to change the sights for slugs but still a joy to carry in a local slug-only area.

Same here. I was stationed at Ft, Benning Ga back in the 70's. Back then it was shotgun only. I had no problem filling my tags each year there. I Used a Rem 1100 12ga with Brenneke rifled slugs. The Brenneke's were by far the most accurate slug in that gun. They were absolutely devastating. Never had to track a Deer. Most dropped where they stood. The few that didn't, stumbled and fell a few yards away.

Anybody remember the Remington BuckHammers? Man, I shot alot of deer with them big SOB's. They shot amazing in my old 11-87 with the rifled chokle tube.

Wouldn’t surprise me a bit. I think there was a lot of that “in house special treatment “ culture at Ithaca (and Remington) back in the day. I had a friend years ago whose FIL worked at Ithaca. He had a twenty gauge Model 37 that was very ordinary in every way, except for the wood. You could not take your eyes off the wood. Today, that wood would be considered exhibition grade at the very least and probably command a four-figure upgrade.

I would not assume much past your sight in without trying especially past 100 yards. Slugs are wonky and the way you sight in can have an effect. This link has a lot of hints on proper sight in with a two hand hold, not resting the forearm on a bag like a rifle.

https://www.tarhunt.com/

I've killed dozens of deer with slugs when my area was shotgun only. The area went rifle a few years ago. I always used a 1970's, 12 gauge, Mossburg 500. I put a fully rifled barrel and scope on it. I had excellent success with Remington Solid Copper sabot slugs. I too, always sighted in so it hit 2" high at 25 yards. But always shot at 50 and 100 to verify point of impact. 12 gauge slugs do wallop the shoulder at the range, but I've never felt any recoil when shooting deer 🙂. And deer don't go far after a slug through the boiler works.

Growing up hunting in Michigan and Illinois, I began with slugs early on and have tried well over a dozen platforms for 12 and 20ga set ups. After 20 years of this I can say with vengeful passion that I despise them. No other firearm has been as finicky as slugs. Just when you think you've got it consistent, one goes 6" off POA. Sometimes it has killed the scope [happened a number of times w/ sluggers] sometimes it is just a mystery. I've done all the tricks and tried all the models. Shimmed or pinned barrels/receivers on 870s or 500s, had two different TarHunt set ups. Marginal consistency with 1187s in 12 and 20ga... finally finding a decent brand of ammo. The best of the bunch have been the Savage 212 and 220s, but even then by the time you take the time to try $3/shot ammo and get things dialed... slugs for me have been a 0-75yd proposition. Even if I ring steel out to 150+ on occasion, those pumpkins [even 20ga sabots] seem so fickle in hunting situations in any wind that, despite the siren song of trying yet another promising slug set up just for drives/pushes, I am committing to saying "no!"

With the advent of straightwall cartridge legalities in both states [even with the single shot IL restriction] that's my choice every time. Or, at times I've been known to go afield with two muzzleloaders; one light to carry on the walk in/out or on a drive and the other heavy for longer pokes.

Rant over - but boy, do I wish I could get back the dollars and hours I spend chasing slug accuracy and reliability.

That said, my biggest buck was taken with a Mossberg 930 12ga slugger

Smoothbore foster slugs & iron sights work fine for hunting the thick stuff with shots under 50 yards.