Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters 25-06 loads

115 Bergers have worked very well for deer, pronghorn, hogs and coyote at extended ranges. Retumbo is my go to powder for a 25-06. With this combo, I get 3150 fps with a 25" barrel.

IMR 4350 and 110 Accubonds and 100 NBT's is what my sister's loves. When it's clean, at least...

Great little round.

How many grains???

The 100 NBT is a LOT tougher bullet than most hunters realize. For that matter, so is the 115 BT.

Tell ya John & Tanner - I've become quite impressed with Nosler Ballistic Tips in recent years. They've always been accurate - but doggone - these things penetrate amazingly well anymore. That's a crazy thick, strong base on them now.

On a hunt this fall I used the 115 Ballistic Tip on a pronghorn and a mule deer. Both resulted in instant death and the bullets exited.

My two hunting buddies used the little 120 gr, 7mm Ballistic Tip, and had the same results.

Last year I put a .30 cal/165 gr Ballistic Tip right through a small whitetail buck, and it opened up a very large exit wound on the way out.

My son has been drilling mulies with the little 95 grain Ballistic Tip from his 6mm - and each bullet exits.

Yeah - I'm impressed with the way the B-Tips perform. No doubt about it.

Regards, Guy

My Sako 75 likes Nosler 115gr. BT best......and the 115gr. Silvertip even better. Great deer bullet in my opinion.

Here is a 3 shot group @ 100 metres.

Nice shooting Konnari!

NBTs impress the heck out of me, as well. I watched my Dad whistle 2 through a thick bodied mulie this year at 380 yards, both probably would've killed another deer behind the buck. The exits weren't messy, but the deer was just wrecked inside. Pretty darn good performance... (this was the .308 180 NBT launched at 3090fps via 7828ssc)

I may have to let the sis shoot her bag of game next year with the 100 NBT. They absolutely bughole out of her rifle.

I've owned a 25-06 since '78 and while there were several different bullets loaded, from 87grs to 117grs, I settled on a 100gr Nosler Btip when that dandy critter hit the market years ago.

Does everything I've ever asked it to do since, seated over 54grs of IMR 4831. Whitetails and woodchucks, out to 500 yards.

Somethin' ain't broke, I seldom attempt to fix it?

Konnari, that's some mighty good shootin' there!

How's winter treating you?

60 grains.

For my 25-06 I usually use IMR 4831 with 100 grain and Re 22 with 115 NBTBT..Killed lots of game with both..Re 22 shoots a bit slower than 4831 with 100 grain, and IMR 4350 25fps slower yet at 3350, but boy is it accurate..

I've used a wide variety in the 25/06, but like many of the posters here I've settled on the NBT and primarily use the 115 grain version. I use RL 25 with a 24 inch barrel and get 3200 fps or thereabouts. Suffice it to say that its a very effective load. I wouldn't mind some higher B.C. bullets for the 25/06 but for ranges out to 400-450 yards it is a very good killing combination. Very little recoil, flat trajectory, lots of smackum, tough to not like it..........

Yup!

Thanks......and winter so far has been very mild so no complains

I have two rifles in this great little caliber. The 'old' one was a custom stocked 700ADL w/ Timney trigger that I worked the loads up and then gave it to my Dad. That little rifle liked the Speer 100 gr w/ IMR4831 pushing it. Managed a 5-shot group at 100 yards of .447.
The second rifle is another semi-custom based on a 700 as well as the Timney trigger. That rifle hates the 100 gr bullets but loves a 120. I'm still working on the last re-loads I did for this one, about another 150 rounds before I'll have to start over again. Still used the same powder, IMR4831 and either a Speer 120 BTSP or the NP. With this rifle and the Nosler's I've taken two bull elk with three shots.

All of my 25-06s have been easy keepers and liked everything from 100-120 grains with almost any powder I tried. IMR 4350 and 4831 were my first powders and worked quite well. I moved on to Re 17 and it works exceptionally well with the 100 grain BT and TSX/TTSX. Think I'll give H4350 a whirl next.

I use 100 grain bullets exclusively now in this caliber as they give great performance on coyotes and antelope, which to me is what this round seems perfect for. Low recoil, less muzzle blast than bigger bores, and fine accuracy. What's not to like when you're mainly shooting from the ground and don't need to be engulfed by a dust storm when trying to watch the reaction of the game.

The 100 grain BTs also provide a relatively inexpensive plinker for whacking my steel swingers that I bought from Jake. That is a hoot and great practice for hunting season. I think I'll ask Mike Venturino about the steel targets he discussed in one his recent articles in Rifle. Those sound good for areas with lower stands of grass.

TenFo will be working UP this on the weekend thanks so much Bo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Very new to the 25-06 here and got some guidance from a few here. Dober pointed me toward IMR7828 and this seems to be a good powder to work with. I'm really liking the results with a 115 Berger so far. Not to the redline yet but it seems the more I push closer to it, the better it shoots. This should keep me entertained for a while.

Sweet, you found out what everybody else does when they try 7828. It friggin' rocks.