I will go first: yes, I hunt with a round in the chamber.
-jeff
I won't be hunting with you Jeff.
I always hunt empty. Where I hunt the terrain is typically steep and treacherous and a round in the chamber is a bad accident waiting to happen. It only takes one fall to kill yourself with an accidental discharge.
15 years ago I was hunting Caribou near Ungava Bay and the week prior to our arrival in camp a guy was killed a few miles from camp by an accidental discharge. He was hunting with his buddy and he stumbled into a thicket of some sort and the branches in the thicket tripped the trigger and the gun went off. The guy shot himself in the upper thigh with a 7mm mag and he bled to death because he mangled his femoral artery. His buddy tried to stop the bleeding, but it was a lost cause. Let�s just say everybody in camp was a total mess when we arrived for our hunt. I will never forget the look on those people�s faces!!! After that incident and I have never carried hot since. To each their own, but unless I am possibly the prey, I never carry hot.
