Originally Posted by Mule Deer
Got curious about this question after the thread first disappeared for a while.

So looked through the big game hunting notes I've been keeping since 1966, after taking my first deer. The arbitrary cut-off was a maximum of 50 yards, and here are the results from all the deer since then:

Cartridge/ range(s)/ bullet weight(s)
.30-30/ 40 feet and 12 feet/ 150 and 170
.243 Win./ 50, 50, 20, 35 yards/ 100-105
.257 Roberts/ 50 yards/ 100
.25-06/ 50 yards/120
.270 Win./10, 50, 50, 50, 40, 40, 50 130, 150 yards/130 and 150
7x57/30, 42 yards/140, 156
.30-06/20, 50, 50 yards/165, 200
.300 H&H/35 yards/180
.35 Remington/50 yards/200

The closest range, the 12 feet with a .30-30, was accomplished with an old outside-hammer drilling made by Sauer and imported by the original Charles Daly firm, which had both open sights and a flip-up tang aperture sight. But the 10-yard shot with the .270 Winchester was accomplished with a 4x scope.


I wish I kept records like that. Do you keep a daily journal? Do you keep a journal of your hunts? I kept one for one season when I quail hunted. I can read it now, takes me back to that day. I see the locations we hunted, the dogs we had then, wish I had kept one for every year I hunted. My wife has kept a daily journal like her grandmother. She can tell you the day and time most everything that’s happened in her life. It’s in Italian, so I can’t read it.