Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Rifles What would be your perfect pronghorn rifle?

If starting from scratch and putting one together today, I would do the following:

Action: Tikka T3

Stock: Mcmillan Sako Hunter pattern.

Barrel length/chamber/contour: 24" 6.5x284 mag sporter contour.

Scope: While I really like Nightforce optics, and a 2.5-10x42 would be great, honestly my experience with fixed 10X MIL/MIL SWFA scopes have shown that they are outstanding, repeatable scopes, so more likely than not, I would stick a fixed 10X SWFA on the rifle and call it good.


Bullet: 123-142 Berger/Scenar. I would favor a higher BC, but ultimately the rifle will decide what it shoots best.


That answers the question of "what to build" for a pronghorn-specific rifle.



" What to grab" would likely be my Tikka T3 in 6mm Remington (Lilja), that shoots 85 grain HPBT gamekings at 3430 fps.

or T3 in .308 with 155 Scenars, or Sako TRG with 155 Scenars, or...

Haven't hunted them yet, but hope to, as they seem like a good choice for an old guy's first (and maybe only) trip out West. If I go, I'll take a Barrett Fieldcraft 6mm Creedmoor with long, pointy bullets of some sort, with a reliable scope (yet to be determined). Good thing about the Barrett is that even with heavy glass on top, it should weigh well short of 7 lbs. The same rifle in .243 would also be fine, but 6CM is what they had, and anyway I like the case a bit better.

A classy second choice would be one of the Browning Low Wall .243s, but you'd have to go with a stubbier bullet, maybe a 80gr TTSX, or 95gr BT. Very nice rifles, if you can find one.

6.5 SAUM, 130 VLD



6.5 SAUM, 136 Scenar L

Nice looking Model 70

Go - before it's too late. You'll want to do so more than once. Wyoming and/or Montana. Makes for a great family trip - ask my daughters, sons-in-law, nephews and my hunting buddy and his family.

I've used a .243 Win/95g SST, .257 Roberts/100g TTSX and 110g AB, 6.5-06AI/130g Scirocco II, .280 Rem/140g AB, 7mm RM/140g North Fork and 160g Grand Slam, .30-06 and 168g TTSX, .375 Win/220g Hornady FP just to list the ones that come to top of mind. The 257 has been used by my daughters, nephews, myself and others more than any other rifle.

Right now my perfect pronghorn rifleis a SS winchester classic 257 Weatherby, with a 27 inch Benchmark fluted barrel without freebore, a Bell & Carlson stock with an aluminum bedding block, and a 4-12X 40 leupold VX2 scope with CDS. Im shooting a 100 grain TTSX on top of IMR 7828 SSC at 3500 FPS. It shoots 1/2 MOA or less. Out to 500 yards on a speed goat I think it would be really TUFF to beat.

Just finishing it up, well it’s my do it all rifle. Worked great last fall on my pronghorn

Tikka T3x stainless
270 Win
McMillan Sako Hunter stock edge fill
Sako optilok ring mounts
Tikka Performance bottom metal, magazine and bolt release
Lumley Arms tactical titanium bolt handle with carbon fibre round knob
Leupold FX-3 6x42
Hornady Precision Hunter 145 gr ELD-X

Planning to get it cerakoted graphite black.

George Gardner with a dandy from a few years back. 6.5 SAUM.

I wouldn't bother making it overly light. Probably 8 to 9 all up. I shot all 3 of mine with a vanguard in 257 roy I'd go 708 or 7wsm mainly cause I never played with us before but goats can't read headstamps.

I understand the plight of a guide. Don’t you think 400+ rounds is optimistic?

I few years ago I decided I want one rifle and load that would do it all here in sask. I mean antelope to moose with deer and elk in between. I wanted flat shooting and hard hitting. I ended up with a t3 7mm rem mag. My load is 140gr etips at 3200 fps. I get excellent accuracy. This load worked fine on a moose last fall. That's the only thing I've shot with it so far. Of course I still mess with other rifles and loads but I think if I get drawn for speedgoats this one will get the nod. I have a Nikon monarch3 scope on it with the anal bead reticle and I've verified it out to 600 which is farther than I would take a shot at while hunting.

No such thing as "perfect" for me. Lots of good choices, though.

Daughter #1 with another doe, using her .308 Win and 130g TTSX, same load she uses for elk. Her previous antelope were taken with m,y .257 Roberts/110g AccuBond and her .308.


Daughter #3 with her first, using my .257 Roberts and 110g AccuBond.


Son-in-Law #2 with his first, using a .30-06 and (I think) a 168g TTSX.


Daughter #1 helping me with one of mine, taken with a .243 and 95g SST. I've had success with my .,243 Win, .257 Roberts, 6.5-06AI, .280 Rem, 7mm RM, .30-06, and .375 Win.

Roll the dice! pick the top 6 mentioned here minus the 6 and 6.5CM. Then go get you a 6 or 6.5CM and be done with it.

I don't think that's an overly high bar, and it would do more to set the table for success than almost anything else.

But I could be wrong since it is rare.

400+ rounds of precision rimfire practice (or 223) would be great too and shouldn't be "optimistic" at all yet that almost never happens either.

The fundamentals need to be practiced ad nauseum in any sport.

I took my first few with a 308 - no problems.
I took several more with a 30-06 - including the only "antelope wreck" I've ever been involved in. When it was over, the antelope had been hit 5 times - all broadside in the chest.
4 from my '06 and 1 from a brother's 243. How he ran, I will never know, as he had almost NO ribcage left!
You never know, while hunting.
The last ~ 20 years, a Savage 99, 243 lives in my truck whenever I'm on the ranch during big game seasons - and I've loaned it to a few of the hunters, for various reasons.

I have an older Remington 700bdl in 270, when I say older, I mean like ~ 1995. The thing shoots lights out and it’s the only gun I ever used for antelope (3). My dad used a Howa 243 which he loved.

I moved north and my dad got serious about antelope hunting, he has a few weatherby mkvs in 240wby and a few 257wby rifles. Those are all he uses now. One of his 240s has a McMillan stock and a zeiss conquest scope, fluted barrel, that’s his go-to with his backup being another mkv 240 with a non fluted barrel and some sort of synthetic stock..

I've killed 'em with .30-06, .35 Rem Contender, 7mm STW and 6.5 SAUM. None came back to life.
Having said that, I just put together a .257 Wby that shoots 100 gr E tips over 3600 fps. Either that or my 6.5 SAUM with 130 gr JLKs will get the nod for my next pronghorn hunt with my XP 100 7mm-08 as backup.

out my safe it would have to be the 270.
if I HAD to buy a new rifle just for that. 7-08 or 6.5 CD sounds like a perfect match.

6mm Remington for me.

Got all but one of mine with 257 Roberts. Other with a 30/06 model 70 carbine. I got all of them with a
load of IMR 4350 43.5gr with 115gr Nosler Partitions. Still use the 115gr Partitions but moved on
to different powders like Norma MRP, RL23, RL26, RL22, RL17. May go on pronghorn hunt this
year with brother-in-law. With these new powder I get about 3100fps. IMR4350 gave 2925 in my
rifle. It seems to have a pretty fast barrel. 257 Roberts does a great job with just about any load.
second choice in bullets is 110gr Accubonds. I need to try 100gr Barnes TTSX.