Confidence in a familiar rifle will do you far more favours than buying a shiny new .300 Mag because you think your old .257 Bob is too small.
Jordan;
I trust that this finds you and yours doing well on this wet and cool fall morning sir.
As usual Jordan, you've made a lot of sense and conveyed your thoughts in an efficient manner - well done.
In my initial response here I noted something along the same lines as what I've quoted above, that is to use something you are familiar with - that always, always, ALWAYS works in all weather conditions and that you shoot well under pressure with.
While I've never guided, I know a bunch of locals who do and overwhelmingly the most consistent complaint about visiting hunters is that they take too long to shoot from field positions.
This situation can't help but be exacerbated by bringing a "new to the hunter" rifle that has more recoil than they are used to.
While I've admittedly not hunted prairie whitetails for decades now, so they may have slowed down some since then, out here I tell new hunters that a "typical whitetail encounter" will last until they can count to five.
Our eldest and I skipped out on church yesterday morning and ran across not one but two first rack whitetails and neither one stayed around for more time than it took me to count the fingers on one hand - which as it turned out was a smart move on their part as a determined young lady was doing her level best to insert a 130gr TSX from her 6.5 Swede at the same time.
Anyway Jordan as usual I appreciated what you had to add to the discussion and even more so how you did it.
All the best to you and yours this fall and good luck on your hunts too.
Dwayne
