Home Forums Hunting & Shooting General Big Game Another year with "more" gun then I needed? .what are you using?

Klikitarik,

Great photo with the boys & the bear.

I've used 30-06's and 25-06's for whitetails but have fell in love with my 280 rem lately. If I ever get to go west I will use the 280 rem

Now yer talkin !!


I have a 308 and a 300 Wsm. I like short action cartridges a lot. My poor 280 feels abandoned. I can't help but latch onto the Short Mag when I go hunting. I love the gun. And, next year I'll have the same gun, Sako 85 Finnlight in 308 Win. to compliment its brother.

The last two years I've killed a deer with my 338 Ultramag. It does the job and it is one of the most accurate rifles I own.

when it doesn't matter, I tend to go light unless I"m playing with rounds or testing bullets....

When it matters, IE I'm trophy hunting or on a long trip and may get only one chance I pack something that can reach out and touch and stem to stern my target. Most call that overgunned, while I call it prepared....

I've shot a handful of 100-150 pound deer with my 7x300 wtby and it hasn't mattered to the deer or me.
OTOH after a doe we used my 32-20 in a brush hide and a 25 yard shot.....

Bob,

I was actually surprised when I began looking at the pics in the camera to see a serious shot among the many that reflect the more usual shenanigans those two are known for.

All: thanks for the comments re: pic.

I'd love to have been behind one of those two to watch them drop the hammer. However, they're not there yet. I'm trying not to live out any sort of vicarious pleasure through them, so no rush. They did make the 3/4 mile struggle over hill and dale, tundra and willow to get close enough. I figured I probably better give them a 150 yard buffer just in case though so they could only hear and imagine what was happening on the other side of the last willow line - and it was just across the willow line. Lots more fun to be had with youngsters in tow, even if more work...yet.

Bob,

I was actually surprised when I began looking at the pics in the camera to see a serious shot among the many that reflect the more usual shenanigans those two are known for.

All: thanks for the comments re: pic.

I'd love to have been behind one of those two to w

MINE TOO! JUST GET A .260!

Damn them Rugers, anyway!

You will be packing for those two yet. Trust me.... Love the head gear...

I wish I could remember the who, what, and where details.. In one of the early sponsored explorations of the Montana country, a scientific group took along something like a 4 inch cannon.

There were no military issues to address, but the cannon "proved to be a gruesome and yet entertaining means of dispatching buffalo."

Too much gun????

Ray, it could be the trend you see towards smaller calibers is due to better bullets and (mostly) lighter game. For instance I see no point in hunting deer any longer with a 8 or 9 pound 30-06 rifle, of course this revelation took 30 something years to dawn on me. God willing when my last kid gets through college in 2 years I will be able to travel more to hunt. To go out west I have a 300 WSM that when maxed out is shooting 180 grain bullets very neatly.

I have to disagree with your comments regards its the macho thing to do regards smaller calibers, its not so much macho as it is "easy" to do now with the bullets that we are shooting these days. You yourself have mentioned killing elk I believe using a low powered 25 caliber lever gun if I am not mistaken? A lot of folks have taken to shooting smaller caliber lighter rifles with less kick using better bullets I think and have found the results comparable to what they achieved with bigger guns.

Most of my bud's still hunt WT deer with a 30-06, 270win, 7MMRM etc. I and another fellow I know are the odd man out in the group me experimenting with smaller rounds and Joe shooting them with a 220 swift and now a 6mm BR. He and I don't agree either as he likes highly frangible bullets while I like penetrators. He says if it blows up in the chest they die faster, I say he eats more lead than me so he is now dumber than me, its a fun argument we have often.

I would not advocate one way or another unless someone asked me a direct question. If a man wants to hunt deer, elk, pig, porcupines, armadillos�, coyotes, and fiddler crabs with a 10 pound 375 H&H, then have at it! Me I think a 30-06 is a powerful cartridge and so is a .270 win but with bad bullets combined with poor shooting you can make them into bad performers on game. I saw another so called "light magnum" that did not make its way thru the chest cavity of a WT deer just this year. Sure the rifle killed the deer, so the bullet did not fail, its just food for thought. You have to admit that a fellow with a .243 win shooting 100 grain partitions that is not afraid of his gun most likely will be better off than a fellow with a 300WM that cannot tolerate the kick. So the "there is no such thing as too much gun" is BS. If you hunt in an area where you expect something might eat you, then carry a bigger gun, on the other hand if the gun is not too much for the recommender, it may be too much for the man you are recommending it too. The machismo thing is more often a part of the "no such thing as too much gun" argument and more often a part of why we have so many folks toting 300WM and shooting their game squarely in the Arse. I would bet that 75% of the folks that carry "magnums" would be better served with a .243, .260, 7x57, 7-08 etc. On the other hand if you want to take your 10 pound elephant gun shooting $20.00 cartridges then by all means have at it!

PS: Now we can just need someone to bring up that since they started using their 7mmRM it kills them Dead Right There we can complete our usual argument!

jimmy/ray: Both good posts.......it seems that elk have always been the "line in the sand" where the differences in opinion start flying between big guns and little guns....over the years that I've been reading opinions on elk rifles(and elk hunting myself),I notice a geographice "trend"This is not a HARD AN FAST RULE....

But early on,and continuing right through today,I notice that big rifles for elk(say heavily loaded 30's,338's and mediums up to 375,seem to predominate in Idaho,parts of Montana(likely the heavily forested NW portion)and continues up through BC,Alaska, etc.

OTOH, elk hunters of parts of Wyoming,Arizona,New Mexico,Utah, etc seem pretty content with the 30,7mm, and under "flat shooters".....

Guys like Elmer Keith,and Will Haffler,Bill Steigers,Bob Hagel,prefered 338's and up;I know Steigers prefered the 375AI for much of his hunting and also used the 35 Whelen,etc.Haffler also liked stuff like the 458 American,a 458 caliber on a shortened case for raking bulls stem to stern. Idaho also seems to have been the home of a lot of big bore gun writers who liked big stuff,wrote it up...

Again, there are exceptions to this(many),but it seems Idaho and Montana boys had to do a lot of elk hunting in the kind of country that Ray describes...heavily forested,steep as a chalet roof,tangled brush,and huge yawning canyons requiring ridiculous distances...it was dump your elk on this side of the canyon at spitting distance,or reach hundreds of yards across a yawning canyon where you dumped the elk where he stood, or you stood a good chance of losing it....raking shots up close were also all you got.....

As a rule, the boys further south in Colorado, New Mwxico, the alpine country of Wyoming,got chances in somewhat more open country,high alpine basins ,etc, where chnaces to plant a shot were a bit more common.

Also, in the Northwest,you had grizz and moose mixed in.....

So the guys up northe gravitated toward heavy calibers,bigger bores,high velocity cartridge with bullets that could rake stem to stern,and yet reach way out as well.....nothing really does this stuff better than a high velocity medium,although a heavily loaded 7mm or 30 with really stout bullets might be an acceptable minimum.

Even JB used a 30/06 with 200 Partitions in NW Montana for his elk hunting.

So,when I see a Montana or BC elk hunter argue for a 340 Weatherby,or a 375AI for his elk hunting,while his New Mex or Wyoming counterpart is slapping through the ribs with a 25/06 or something similar.....I can understand the discussion a bit.....the rifles are being suited to the terrain and conditions rather than the animal itself

AGAIN,obviously many exceptions to this.....but I understand where the bigger gun guys are coming from.... The debate will go on forever......has been for decades now......

What is this "more gun than needed". Can you kill it too dead?

Nope!