What's in your bag of tricks?
My best trick is understanding what things really cost, then spending money to save money. For instance, the cheapest way to get 30-06 brass is to buy loaded ammo in bulk. I recently bought 1,000 rounds of 180-grain Winchester Power Point 30-06 for about $625, or 62.5 cents per round. Buying Winchester brass and bullets, powder, and CCI primers online would cost 91 cents per shot plus Hazmat fees. (I didn't count taxes or shipping for either, so that's a wash.) Now I get to shoot 1,000 rounds, which will take about a year, for less than the cost of components without having to take the time to load it. Once it's all gone, I'll have a boatload of good, once-fired brass for load development. And if I'm forced to go hunt something on short notice, then I can use what I have on hand.
My second-best trick is understanding that I'm trying shoot big game animals from field positions inside of about 400 yards, not win Palma matches. I pay more attention to getting quality trigger time than I do to getting match-grade accuracy. If a load shoots 1.5 MOA or a little better with a Nosler Partition or Barnes TTSX, then I'm happy. That saves a LOT of time at the loading bench that would be better used shooting offhand, over a rucksack, or sitting with a sling.
Okie John
