Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Deer Hunting Comfortable Kill range for Deer with a .243s

Snidley I have shot a few deer with my 243s . My longest shot was about 200 yds with a ruger 77 RSI. It dropped the deer like somebody pulled the rug out from under it. I later found the load was really quite mild and the 100 gr core lokt was loafing along at about 2550 fps. Since you generally limit yourself to 300 yds you should have no problem especially if you use full power loads and stay away from the explosive varmint bullets.

+1 Great post.

I prefer to keep them at 300 and under....but then, I prefer that all my deer rifles shoot well at 300 and under. I have been using the .270 for over 40 years...and I KNOW it will do better...but too long distance to me is possibly inviting a disaster, and I would rather not go chasing thru the boonies looking for a lousy hit bleeder. 2 cents.

I have killed several deer with a couple different 243. None have been over 200yrds, But I like to hunt. 95gr ballistic tips work very well, but so do 100gr Remington corelocs

If you're comfortable to 300 with the 30/06 you will be ok with the 243 too.

I prefer to keep most of my deer shots under 400 yards with the 6 mm's . I don't want to lose a animal due to poor bullet placement . What a rifle and bullet combination is capable of under ideal field conditions and what most people are capable of under most field conditions are two different ballgames completely. Most hunters aren't as good shooters in the field as they think they are . Wind is your biggest enemy in the field and unlike paper targets , Big Game Animals don't usually give you a second chance if you screw up the first shot.

What you wrote holds true for any cartridge.

you are right, i usually keep all my shots on deer under 400 yards regardless of the round i'm using

I like your 300 yd. comfort zone. That 's mine too with the .243 and most other calibers I shoot and even then it has to be in decent weather from a solid rest at a stationary animal. The .243 can certainly deliver a killing shot well beyond that, but unless you regularly practice shooting at those longer distances under hunting conditions, not from a bench, there are too many variables other than the cartridge itself that can make a longer shot go bad...wind, limbs or other obstructions that can't be seen, animal movement, adrenaline rush, quality of optics, etc. It's not worth the risk of a poor hit for me, personally, although no doubt others may be 100% successful beyond 300 yds.

With all due respect sir, I'm calling BS on this one. Everybody knows nothing less that a 50 BMG will suffice for a backup to a .243. Should the concrete bench not be available, a 37 mm. anti-tank weapon would be the bare minimum for a backup.

It's plain to see you aren't a stunt shooter.

This should be copied and automatically posted every time a novice on here starts asking about taking long-range pokes at big game. It can be done, but not one hunter in a thousand has the skill and experience to pull it off regularly. Nobody should try it unless they're willing to hike over and check for signs of a hit after their "miss". If you're one of those that can do it, good for you.

Hunting shouldn't be a long distance contest

Too many people THINK they are good shots at long range

With the 243's I've shot, probably not too much past 400yds would be the max I would feel comfortable with. They were very accurate guns, but with milder ammo. I know that there are a great number of guys with more specialized guns, but the few I've shot were plain off the shelf Rugers or Savages. If I could load a higher-BC bullet to a good velocity and shoot MOA from field positions, then I can see 600yds for deer with a 243. With 95gr Partitions, at 3000fps, shooting MOA, 400yds.

If I expected farther shots, I'd bring more gun, such as an '06 with 168 or 180 BT. Those are 600 yd combos. The great thing about 243s is that they are easy to shoot, and speed does kill. You don't need big or stout bullets to kill big deer when you can heart-shoot them.

Snidely,
If you keep moving your paper targets out progressively shooting 5 shot patterns at each distance, when you reach the distance where the 5 shot pattern has become about the size of a grapefruit, then you have found your maximum distance.

I wouldn't want to shoot at a deer in the field with a basketball size vital area with a rifle/load/scope combination that I couldn't hit a grapefruit with from a sand bag rest on a shooting bench.

From what I've seen, most people who can shoot 1" groups at 100 yards using a hunting reticle in a scope topping out around 9x, their group will get too big somewhere in between 300 and 400 yards. But just average hunters who use the same box of ammo for a decade will most likely not be able to do this well.

Your 95 grain partition ought to be able to penetrate well enough to kill with a hit at these ranges and beyond.

Under really good conditions I might go to 300 yards. But, I am certainly capable of missing a deer much closer.

Lord, you've described me to a "t", or at least a powder burn...

The "Complacent" shots are the ones I will miss...every time.

I am comfortable at 1/4 mile right now. Put 10 deer out there, and 10 deer will fall in their tracks.
I have shot one at 600yds, and it fell dead. I have shot them in the neck at 525yds. I only shoot a .243 with 80-87gr bullets. 26" heavy barrel. Topped with good glass.
I head shoot them at 200yds no problem. I may be a woman, but that .243 has killed a lot of whitetail deer. In the last 3 years over 150 deer have crumbled to the gun. We shoot all year long out of crop fields for depredation. I try all bullets to see what one works best for quick clean kills.
A .243 win is plenty gun for a deer, range depends on how far you are comfortable shooting.

Can't argue with experience! We westerners don't get that kind of deer-shooting experience in a lifetime.

I'll shoot a pig or coyote as far as I can see them, which is 500 yards on my place, but won't shoot at a deer at that range. I keep the deer shots mostly inside 300 to 350, and the actual average for the last 5 years or so is inside 150. Longest on coyote was 400 and on pig was 487, per the rangefinder. I'm using a 260 and 100 gr Ballistic Tips.

When around folks that talk about shooting deer at really long ranges, I tend to not believe them and I hope they are just BSing. I think that it's wrong to do that unless they are top notch shots, and people that shoot that good are rare.