Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Mule Deer and others, youth rifle advice, please

I have to agree with that. I have six kids...five that shoot/hunt. I have several youth/ladies/compact model rifles around here in .243 and 7mm-08. Most of the kids have shot them all and end up gravitating to one they prefer.

Before my oldest boy went to a full size rifle, he did a lot of hunting with a Remington 700 youth in .243. Seemed to fit him well and he shot it great.




My youngest always requests the Ruger Compact in .243.



My oldest (who is now 20...yikes) will pretty much shoot whatever I put in her hands but seems to shoot youth models very well as she is fairly short and doesn't have particularly long arms.

My wife's Savage Axis youth/ladies seems to fit her very well.



My 14 YO started with the .243 but now seems really comfortable with the Frontier in 7mm-08.



When my youngest son turned 12 he received a full-size Tikka Superlite in 7-08 for his birthday. Thinking I was doing the right thing, I picked up an extra stock from the classifieds and cut it down to 12.75" or so. First trip to the range with reduced loads the scope bumped his forehead and he was hesitant to shoot it. We put the full-size stock on it and he has been shooting well ever since despite being of a size where the shortened LOP should have been about right. I did add a removable cheek riser to improved the fit.