Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Elk Hunting Big Seven for Elk

Anyone hunting elk with a magnum 7mm this year, or have we become a bunch of ladies' and kids' cartridge shooters?

The trend toward shorter, lighter, smaller, at longer range for huge animals has me wondering if the ghost of WDM Bell is haunting this site.

Sure.....why not

7mm whatever mag is pure elk magic I've been told

Team that up with some Hornady Superhero and the show never ends

Be carryin my mashburn this year.

Finally a real man amoung metro's!

I've takin my 25-06 before but the mashburn needs baptized on my cow tag at fort peck. I'll be taking my 338-06 to the Crazies later into the season.

Been using the STW W/ 160 gr Hornady btsp @ 3200 MV. But I Loaded up some 160 AB to try this year.

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Thought a 7 Mag was a ladies & kids cartridge.......

Funny, That's what a lot of people I know call it.
7MM Rem Mag "the ladies magnum"

That must be the rest of the story.

Giddyup!

Always thought the magic 7 was a city boy rifle

Haven't used my 7mm RM on elk since 2005 or before. Got tired of the bullets bouncing off...

Either that or I've been too busy trying other toys. This year it will be the Ruger American .30-06 Dad gave me before he died.

Take your pick.

(Hint: For the 20+ years the 7mm RM was my only bolt-action big game rifle I never realized I needed anything else. "Wanted" was an entirely different story as I a curious SOB.)

Funny....I've mostly seen the 30/06 in the hands of country boys who couldn't shoot.

Seven? Millimeters? Pshaw. I'm using a .50 caliber rifle.

You have been with the wrong country boys. I used a 7 mag for a few years and then found out the .06 will do everything the 7 mag would with less powder and less recoil

The 7 Mag is surrounded by a mystique perpetrated and propagated largely by those with little actual experience, who seem driven to pass along their ignorance to younger generations who revel in a cartridge that will do magical things without having to actually practice shooting.

Don't know why that is�The 7 mag is an excellent cartridge, but its users rely on the mystique, rather than the reality.I have yet to see anyone competently shoot a 7 Remington Mag. Skip up to the .300 Mags and I know a bunch of guys with a bunch of experience that handle them very well indeed.

A cartridge anomaly, as it were�.

+1

'splain, please?

I thought the 7mm mag was a ladies' and kids' cartridge. Pretty good for coyotes and the like.

Tom

Yep, and it works damn good on deer, yotes and smaller critters. I'll be using my 338 win again this year..

Lots of wowen and kids will get along great and kill this year with a 260, 308, 7/08 and gasp 243.

I'll be along on a few of these hunts. It's great hunting with people that don't try to over complicate things with things they think they know.

7mm magnums are fine elk rounds. In fact they're just as good as the .270 or .30-06.

7-08...anyone?

I like mine, but haven't tried it on elk yet. I know many that do. In reality it's not much different than my wussy 270win.

Killin schit ain't tough. Finding them is

I'll be carrying my 30-06 for elk this year. Same as deer and elk pretty much every year. 180 Partitions and H4350 loaded to about 2800 fps.

It's not that I think the 30-06 is better than every other cartridge, it's just that if you have a 30-06 you don't need other cartridges.

Words of wisdom...

For sure.

I've got four 7s, the hardest part after finding game is choosing which to bring.

Ingwe special (7x57)


Lever awesomness (284)


The classic


What the classic should have been, the Mashburn.

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Funny,
I've seen more guys with 7mags that couldn't adjust for trajectories or handle heavier recoil and were trying to compensate with the 7mag.......

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The current conventional wisdom is that you can only kill elk with a 243 or smaller or a 338 WM or larger. Nothing in between will work. You have to either pip squeak them to death or blow the hell out of them.

That said, I've killed a truckload with either a 270 or a 300 WSM, about 50/50. I honestly think every one I've shot with the 300 could have been taken as well with the 270. The 7mm fits in between those 2 so it should be at least marginally useful.

Really..... A cartridge in use for fifty years and you've NEVER met anyone who uses it and can shoot straight? Is this satire?

Nope.Not satire. Didn't say they weren't out there, just that Ive never seen one...

No, kids' and women's cartridges have case heads .378"-.473".

I'm not sure I grasp your logic here. What I am after in this thread is not only what potential posters think they know, but what they have used and will use for elk, and why, with a preference of opinions and experiences involving fast 7's for said elk.

Obviously, this is a tender subject. Sorry if I offended anybody with my goading. Sheesh.

Uh-oh�everything Ive got is a .378 or .473...

I used to have bigger stuff, but no longer hunt the big stuff the bigger headstamps are made for...

HuntnShoot: My Remington 700 Classic in 7mm Remington Magnum with 160 grain Nosler Partitions sure works well on Bull Elk for me!
Yeah, I could buy a larger caliber but have no need or desire to do so.
Long live the 7mm Remington Magnum!
Hold into the wind
VarmintGuy

We all know you're a sniper anyway, Ingwe. You get a rush out of nutsackin' a good bull with a Red Ryder, and then walking up and cutting his throat while he thrashes around. I wish you'd elaborate more on your technique...

Yep, the .378 and .473 are also good elk rounds, especially when Ackley Improved.

Duuuude, the .473 rules. You must be an aficionado? Or maybe just one of the cognoscenti?

Another description for this thread could have been:

I know a magnum 7 works good for gut-shooting deer at middle to long range, but how does it do for elk? Only posters with experience, please.

LOL!

Sometime in the late 60's me and a buddy use to go up to WY to hunt deer and pronghorn, around Laramie peak, NE of Wheatland or Chugwater. We would drive up from Albuquerque meet his father and uncles up there who were all from Wisconsin and used the old pump action Remingtons in.06.
I was doing a lot of rifle competition back then, but was in no way a world class marksman.

I was out one evening trying to get one of the uncles his pronghorn and he was worried that his rifle was not accurate enough for long distances( 200 yards to him).So I loaned him my Model 70 7 mag to use and told him it was dead on at 200 yards.

We made a sneak on a nice goat and the guy laid down prone. I told him to hold dead center on the chest, but he blew one over it's back. The goat trotted away another 50 yards or so and stopped. Ditto on the shot. He handed me the rifle and asked me to shoot the pronghorn which at this time was about 300 yards and about to crest a small rise. Running, but not flat out.

I swung on the animal and let a shot go. The pronghorn disappeared over the rise.

This was the last day of the season and in the evening. The guy was dejected that he was going to eat tag soup and said "well you gave it a good try, but missed". I told him, no I didn't miss ,lets go look.

We walked up the hill and over it and sure enough there was a dead buck laying there,shot perfectly thru the chest. I had an unfilled tag,but really wasn't interested in filling it, so I let him tag it and figured my tag was punched

It was one of those shots that you might make one in a thousand. Just crap house luck.

The guy was estatic and said he just had to buy one of those long distance 7 mags. I don't know if he ever did as he never came back, but he sure bragged on my shooting and the rifle that night. I was too embarrassed to tell him I could not make that shot again if I tried a thousand times.

The 7RM has always been a lucky round for me. It seem the more I practice with it the luckier I get. But as others have suggested it is no better than several other capable rounds. But at the same time, if there is a better combo than a 160gr. Nosler Partition or a Nosler Accubond out of a 7RM at 3000fps or so for mule deer and elk it would be news to me.

Same here.
I have 3 7mags.
I'll be using one of them this year.

My "kid" uses nothing but a 7mag.
He'll be 47 next month and has killed a lot of animals.
He started with it when he was 14 and never saw a reason to change.
A few years ago I had his original rifle redone and upgraded because it was about worn out.

Tracts, sounds like both you and your kid are fortunate people. You've got a smart kid and he's got a loving, generous dad.

Cool story.

I pack a small 7.
Short and fat.
It seems to work.
(That's what she said)



Why did I buy an stw again?

Alcohol was probably involved .

That and a virgin Ti stock must have been it.



Who can turn down a virgin?
GFY.

7mm mag, .300 mag and 30-06 are the most common calibers where I hunt. Sure you occasionally see other calibers, but if you look at a guys rifle it will more likely than not be one of those calibers.

KC

I'll probably be carrying my 7mm-300weatherby some this season.

That is funny ill be carrying one or the other 7mm RM or 300 Wby. I like the Barnes150 TTSX in 7 for elk. Th reason 7 mag shooters may not adjust well is inside 325 you don't ever need to think - just shoot. I tell new hunters to go get a 30-06 but it is tough to beat that 7 for making things simple. Ive been fairly lucky with mine it tends to cause lots of work cutting and packing when it goes off.

I picked up the 300 Wby as a cheap back-up rifle but it shoots really well out to way past elk range. And it took a cow at 300 and bull at 337 in the first week it got into the field.

It was my wife's favorite!!.

LOL.

My 270 with enough H4831 to push a 140 AB at 2800+
or the old 700 30-06 with 4350 pushing a 165 at 2800 kill every bit as well as a 7mm mag in my experience.

I see no need most days to carry anything else, though if I feel the need for more, I have 300mags and a 338. Just really never feel the need...

7mm Rem Mag is a great elk caliber. Use a quality bullet, I've had great success with Nosler 160g Partitions for over 30 years in mine. I've put a lot of elk in the dirt with that caliber at distances out to and just past 400 yds. Use it with confidence and don't pay any attention to all of these retarded azz clowns comments who don't know WTF they are talking about anyway.

Foxx...

What he said! I have never lost an elk that I knew was hit. A 160 Partition at 3000+ fps is serious medicine. My go-to load is Re 25 under the partition for 3006 fps from my Remington 700. Another good load is 75 grains of Re33 under that bullet. It produces 3124fps in my rifle. Reloder 33 with a 175 produces 3024 fps in my rifle and shoots half inch groups, also.

7mm AnyMag

The end all cure all

My primary is a 300 Win Mag, my backup is a 7mm STW. I have killed elk with both. But more with the 300, I have had it longer and it is more accurate than the STW.

I have 4 7mm's , a Remington magnum, an STW, a 7x61 S&H, and a 7-08. I take them out fairly regularly, but have only killed elk with the Sharps & Hart. The others are newer to me and so far have only been to the range, but looking forward to getting them into the field.

I'm taking my 7MM Rem Mag n my elk hunt.

When the 7MM Rem Mag was designed, it was the definitive elk rifle. Since then elk must have begun juicing because now a hunter needs a 30-378 Wby to kill one. Elk must be smuggling steroids from Mexico.

Hell, ask me & I'd say that the .280 Rem is probably the best rifle for all North American big game. If Remington were to put a belt on it & call it a magnum, it'd be a bigger seller. It's all about the belt and magnum attached to it. Otherwise, it's hardly suited for vermin.

Reading this thread is entertaining.

Start a 165 or 180 from a 30/06;use it for elk,and you are a sensible guy and a solid citizen who thinks straight and has all your shidt together.....likely you are a Consrvative, don't beat your wife and kids and are emotionally stable.The fellas who use a standard case of 308 dimensions necked to various smaller sizes occupy higher moral ground and look down their noses at anyone burning more powder...

You are such a wizard in the field that you can calculate drop and wind drift like Einstein,remain cool in the face of impending doom,and never, ever make mistakes in the field.A paragon of the rifle and hunting prowess.

Burn a lot more powder,make a 30 caliber bullet go really fast,get kicked more, in a heavier rifle,and you are a wise and astute rifleman whose manhood is secure because you can manage long strings of the drubbing and are an Iron Man who can lug 9-10 pounds of rifle up the mountain....makes sense to me! I did it plenty!

But, reduce bullet weight a few grains, add 6-10 grains of capacity over a 30/06 case,add a belt,and start slightly lighter and sleeker bullets at higher velocity for flatter trajectory and improved wind drift...all in a lighter rifle of more tolerable recoil,and suddenly you are:

-Compensating for a lack of intellectual acumen.

-Can't judge distance much beyond the length of their arm.

-Are incapable of dealing with more than 10-15 inches of bullet drop.

- Are a speed freak.

-Compensating for a lack of rifle related skills by buying equipment.(I suppose the same could be said for anyone who moves to a 308 or 30/06 from a 30-30 or 45-70).

- Are too weak and frail to manage more recoil or rifle weight than a gorilla on steroids.

- Are from the Dreaded City and couldn't find and kill a little old whitetail in the cornfields and little wood lots of Wild Missouri, like the Country Boys with a 30/06. (Set aside for the moment that the City Boys may have seen,passed on, and killed more bull elk in more places than the Country Boys have done in their dreams, or while flipping through the pages of Field & Stream).

- Are compensating for so many personal disorders (ranging from birth defects,lack of confidence,low testosterone, too much testosterone,insecurity,abuse as a child)that their treatment would cause a clinical psychiatrist to blink...


I sometimes wonder what Les Bowman, Warren Page, and Bob Hagel would have thought about all this.

(Especially Bowman who guided legions of elk hunters and watched the 300 Weatherby clients wound more elk than those shooting 270's,concluded the average clown could not manage 300 Weatherby recoil, so invented a cartridge called the 7mm Remington Magnum that gave more poop and shot flatter than the 270 or 30/06, recoiled less than the 300's and killed elk at long range with impunity; that his clients COULD shoot,and field tested it with his clients on everything from elk and moose to grizzly for several years before Remington brought it out. No City Boy, he, who did all this up in Cody. But he could never know as much as the Country Boys on the CF,now, could he?)

These guys were among the the earliest users of the various 7mm magnums and killed piles of elk with them.Probably a lot more than the Country Boys on 24 CF....but WTH did they know? Not much I guess compared to the wizards on here...

But Page, Hagel, and Bowman never posted anything on the CF.

Amusing.

Thanks for this great read. Straight to the point.

Mashburn all up and ready for this year, you says?

Ready: Ready!

Glad to hear, if not surprised one bit.

They killed a LOT of elk. Les Bowman wrote that during one season in the late 1950's his outfit packed 90 horse loads of elk out of the WY backcountry.

If I were to build an elk specific rifle it would most likely be a 7MM Remington or 7MM Mashburn set up for 160-175 grain bullets.

Love the belt.....funny.......does it come with a matching purse?

No mention here, but I thoroughly enjoyed John Wooters' accounts of his 7mm Remmy using 175gn bullets. (partition)

He seemed, pleased.

Bob - enjoyed your write-up but the clucking & dancing chickens here on the CF are getting to you again, you better get out and hunt - soon!

I have two elk tags this year and will be packing a 54 cal Hawkins in 3 weeks and my new (gasp!) 7mm Wby (in a 700)during rifle seaon in October.

Though I backed the 7 Wby load down a ways, that 160 partition leaving at 3100 fps is like a freakin' laser up here at 10,000'. Very impressive!

Good huntin' to you

Bob: insightful, entertaining, and even educational piece of writing. You are one of the reasons I don't write this site off.

Bring on the big 7! Size does matter. There's a short action, a std action, and a std magnum, just like condoms. Do you guys know what is written at the base of the Trojan Magnum condom?











I didn't think so.

Made in Texas, size regular?

Bob enjoyed your post about the 7.. Also the references to the older writers: Bowman, Hagel, and Page.. While the .300's are my favorite, I must agree that many using them are not capable of good accuracy with them.. I still favor mine for much of my big game hunting.. But I also have a couple 7mm mags. in the safe should I find the recoil of the big .30's more than I want to deal with at some time in the future..(Say if I live to be 90!!)

Met Hagel several times.. Never met Page or Bowman.. In my younger years I was a fan of all three at one time or another.
Still have some old articles or books buy all three..

I do remember Bowman talking of not only the 7mm mag as a good elk killer, but he also had a couple .338's they used on western game.. He mostly used the 200 grain factory.. Hagel of course was a long time .33 caliber guy from his association with Elmer..
In addition to Hagel's love of the 7mm mag. He also favored the .340 in his later years.. I believe the 210 Nosler was a favorite.. I talked with him just after he killed one of his last elk, maybe his last, he had taken it with the old Mashburn.. It was a cow for meat..

Due to his writing, I tried the 7 mags.. and later the .340.. It is great to hear from others who remember those "old timers".. Writing was a different game in those days..

I have probably killed more elk with the 7 Rem mag than any other cartridge just because I keep circling back around to it after playing around with other stuff.



Sorry it isn't a more elegant photo, but I could not get him twisted around until I got some help.

I never have killed an elk with a 30-06, but none of the ones I have shot with a 7 RM would have survived the experiment had I tried. Or a .270, for that matter.

Yes it will be. I got 3124 fps with the 160 Partition from my Remington SPS 7 mag using Reloder 33 powder. It is 75 grains, which is just under max for the 175. The 160 could even go a little higher with that powder, but I used 175 data due to the fact that Alliant had no data for the 160s and Re 33. The 175s were clocking 3025 with the 75-grain load. This was just some experimenting that I did, as my go-to load has been Re 25 at 3006 fps. All loads shot around a half inch. The 160 Partition is death on elk.

Well played, well played! A tip of my hat to you, sir.

I like the shot. It is less posed and more real. And that beauty of a lefty bolt gun is the star!

+1. I was looking for the right words and your post pretty much says what I was thinking..

I'll be carrying a Rem 700 loaded with 150 Nosler BT's. Elk and mule deer should be in trouble.

Guys: Kudos to all!

My favorite personal (present)elk rifles both look like Utah 7/08's,except the bolt handle is on the other side. I presently have two,one chambered 7 Rem Mag and the other 7mm Mashburn Super.I don't know how many more elk hunts I have left but with a tag one of these will get the call.

I try to stay objective about rifle cartridges because they are what they are and do what they do,and nothing more or less.

I am also the last person to argue that the 300 magnums and 338's are anything but fantastic elk cartridges,since I have used the various 300's on them myself,and seen the 338's used quite a bit.

I have even been in one outfitted elk camp where it was strongly recommended (but not mandated) that the hunter bring a 300 magnum minimum because ( it was said)that in their experience heavy, tough 30 caliber bullets simply break heavy bone better, penetrate, deeper, and chop bigger wound channels in big bulls than anything lighter (including the various 7mm's).Magnum velocities made long range work easier.

I didn't argue the point since I was using a 300 Weatherby with 200 gr Partitions at the time,but felt the advice was a bit over the top. But digging around a lot of bull elk carcasses pretty much confirmed what they said. I still feel in general that the various 300 magnums with good heavy bullets deserve to be lumped in with the medium bores (in the old days it was not uncommon to see the 300 Weatherby lumped in with the 375 H&H as a cartridge for heavy African plains game).

A lot of this is bullet dependent.But the 7mm magnums work good because the heavy 7mm bullets(say 150-180 gr) nudge into the weight range of medium 30 caliber bullets. Cases with more capacity than the 30/06 start them out at about the same velocity that smaller cases do with lighter bullets;and the good construction of todays bullets insures good penetration and enough integrity and weight to penetrate and break up bone along the way.

Most of this is accomplished with somewhat lighter powder charges than the 300's which, along with slightly lighter bullets, gets you kicked a bit less,which means you can build a somewhat lighter rifle.

These days I shoot a couple of 7mm mags regularly; I also get to shoot a pal's 300 Weatherby.My 7mm's are both lighter;the 300 Weatherby requires a lot more attention and a firmer grip to maintain control than either of my 7mm's.Last session with his 300 Weatherby involved about a box of ammo in an afternoon and I had about had it after that session...

Hunkering down and torching off powder charges in the mid-80's behind 200 gr bullets at 3100 fps from a blown out 300 is ok for a few shots, but I'll take a charge of 73 gr with a 175 from the Mashburn for about the same velocity...this may be age related.

None of this is "magic",nor "ego", nor expectations of miraculous effect,the presence or absence of belts(another silly notion) or (silliest of all)where you happen to have been born or live...it's pure physics at the "sending" end, and the "receiving" end,and nothing more.

Mad in Texas is great. I just wish more Texans could figure out how to use the damn things.

Bob, once again, a fine piece of writing. There is so much sense in what you say here that it really puts a stop to the haggling back and forth over what works and what doesn't. I know these endless discussions over what to use, particularly for elk, don't clarify much for the guy who is new to elk hunting and is seeking advice, but your posts do seem to provide that clarity.

It can't be just age that leads you to prefer less boom for the same effect. It may be the wisdom that comes with seeing and experiencing a wide variety of hunters and guns and animals. Anyone who'd disagree with your choice or rationale wouldn't be worth debating.

Yep. Probably the last thread we'll ever see on which cartridge is "best" for elk.

Being a .284 slut I can't resist......... I've got a 7-08, 284win, 7saum, 7rm and a 7rum. My family has proven year in and year out that elk and moose fall to the might 7. I've personally seen more mis-haps with an '06 than any of the 7s..... And the little 160gr partition works in all of them!

I'll put $20 on the other side of that prediction.

300 Savage or 30-30 for elk: anything else is overkill, used by small-genitalia compensators!?

Actually, I like Bob's traditional approach of more powder for more speed with proven controlled-expansion bullets for longer range shots that can happen often in the wide open West. I went the other way, relying on new high-BC bullets pushed hard out of a std cartridge, but I get why the traditional approach is effective and invites less clownery, as long as the hunter can effectively shoot said Magnums.

I'd put $100 on the other side. And then start the thread myself.....

No. I have it on good 'net sources that the 7MM Rem Mag, which was once the definitive elk rifle, is no longer suitable for any big game animal. It will work, marginally at that, on small jackrabbits and rats of all sizes.

BTW, the same 'net geniuses have determined that Bell did not kill upwards of a thousand elephants with a 7x57. According to the same sources, they were really African jackolopes that he killed.

There is no doubt in my mind that the 7MM Rem Mag will kill, and has killed, every single big game animal on our continent.

If I could start anew, I'd buy a .280 Rem & never look back.

Good post Bob. I also have a rifle almost like Utah's, but with the bolt on the other side. It's a great deer rifle

bsa: That thing will kill an elk, too!

I'll have to sneak up real close and shoot em point blank. It's only a 270 Bob... I'm going to start a new thread titled, "223 rem or 375H&H for elk"??????

What is a "270 Bob"--is it related to the .257 Bob?

I was responding to Bob, when I said it's a "270 Bob"...It's Bob's favorite, the 270 Winchester...

With my handloads, I'd take my 700 Classic in 300 Savage out after elk.

The 300 Savage was a pretty popular elk cartridge back before there was a 308. I bet it still kills them dead.

Methinks there have been many dead elk laying under a Savage Model 99 in 300 Savage. I might just have to do that myself one year with my Dad's 99 that he took his first elk with.