Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Elk Hunting 7MM-08 for my first elk hunt?

So your prejudice is for large cartridges. I wonder if you set aside that prejudice and used a 7x57 or 7-08 to kill a few elk that perhaps you might change your opinion... just a thought.

Take your 7mm-08 with your 140 AB loads. A couple of years ago, my grandson killed his first cow elk (over 400 lbs live weight) with his mother's 7mm-08 and a 120-grain Ballistic Tip. It was a one-shot kill. Range was 309 yards and the bullet went through both lungs and exited. Elk are not bullet proof. The important thing is to be able to put your bullet where it needs to go, and the heart/lung cavity on an elk is a big target.

The 7-08 and Ballistic Tips even works on 8.5 year old bulls:

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So your prejudice is for large cartridges. I wonder if you set aside that prejudice and used a 7x57 or 7-08 to kill a few elk that perhaps you might change your opinion... just a thought.

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Well, I have a M70 Featherweight 7x57 that I’m working up loads for accuracy that have escaped me so far. The .300 Wby is the best shooting rifle I have at the moment with the 7mm Wby close behind. When I shoot the 7x57 with great confidence, I’ll likely switch to it.

Saw that SPS had a sale this weekend, so that sucked me in. Found their 7mm08 140 grain ETip loaded ammo on sale for $24.95, plus 10% off Ammo this weekend. Reckon that would be a good elk round. We shall see how it shoots...

How in the world did you get that bull to jump in the back of your truck before he was shot?

7mm08 should work damn well, if you use a good premium bullet. Good luck to the OP. I'll even pack my 7mm08 for a day or 2 during my hunt...

He was sleeping in the truck when my nephew shot him. The bed is comfy.




P

I've used 150 grain partitions on elk and 120 grain B-tips are tough to beat for antelope in the 7-08. I had to finish a big desert bull one year that had been shot several times with a 338 WM, for that i had a 7x57 on hand with 175 grain SP. IMHO you can't go wrong with the medium volume 7's for elk or any ungulate for that matter.

Regardless of the cal you use on elk the toughest bullet you can use is important. Having been hunting big game for over 60 years I've seen elk taken with just about every cal & bullet type . If you get a clean rib cage shot just about any bullet of sufficient weight will work. In my opinion if that bullet does not completely penetrate out the opposite side of the rib cage it is not a bullet I would consider for elk. I have observed elk shot from just about every angle. Your bullet must be able to penetrate deeply from any angle. You may have a very acute angle from the front or back. You may have an elk facing straight away from you or a shoulder exposed between trees. What type of bullet would you want in a case like these. Don't expect a rib cage shot every time. Emotion should not influence what bullet you use, nor should the cheapest box of ammo you can buy from Walmart. I have found the most dependable deep penetrating bullet to be the homogeneous copper style as produced by Barnes, TTSX, TSX, or Hornady GMX. There are some other brands I have not use but from what I have read about them they produce the same results. I have seen the shoulder of an elk stop C&C style bullets & fail to penetrate beyond & require quick follow up shots or an animal could be lost.. When it comes to cal's from 6.5 to 338 the toughest bullet available should be used. When you consider that a solid gives the deepest penetration the homogeneous copper bullet is a solid with an expanding nose. If you come from out of state & spend thousands of dollars for an elk hunt don'e skimp on the bullet. I am a 6.5 shooter & me & mine have had complete success on elk over the years with the Barnes TSX... I have a father/son friend who shoot the 270. The use the Basnes 130gr TSX with complete penetration. Another friend who uses his late fathers 7-08 & the Barnes 140gr also gets complete penetration.These copper bullets give you bone crushing penetration time after time.

Or you could just use a Partition. I hear they work pretty well.




P

They work well . I have used many in past years but the all copper bullets like the Barnes will far out penetrate the Partition. That's why I switched.
Here is an example. These two bullets were fired from the same Savage 260 Rem . The bullet on the left is a 6.5 Nosler Partition that started out at 125grs. It was recovered from the off side of a buck I took in 2016. The range was about 80yds.No bone was struck. This bullet now weights 87grs.
The bullet on the right is a Barnes 120gr TSX recovered from the dirt behind my 100yd target. It still weights 120grs. I have taken numerous elk with this Barnes bullet & complete pass thru.every time. Never recovered one even thru bone..Retained weight means retained momentum & therefore greater penetration.

It's not always about penetration...

On an elk it's always about penetration..

Nah...

I'd take a partition over any Barnes all day long, even with a crappy BC...

I'm not getting in a pissing match regarding copper solids vs bonded lead core bullets or partitions, but you're comparing apples to oranges. Your Barnes was shot into a dirt embankment! That would make it expand much greater than a game animal in most cases. No doubt a Barnes will out penetrate lead core bullets most of the time, but it doesn't always expand to a perfect mushroom like the photo and that doesn't suit some people. To each his own. I'm a big fan of Barnes bullets, especially in small calibers, but I have recovered several that were barely expanded past the tip and the width measured no more than 10-20% greater than bullet diameter. They still killed the deer, but they don't always expand as shown in your photo. That being said, I still think Barnes is an excellent choice for smaller rifles and bigger game. If I was forced to shoot an elk sized animal with my daughter's .243, there is no doubt in this world, I would take the 80 gr ttsx she currently shoots.

Just reading that makes my back and legs hurt, must have been one hell of an extraction. I don't really worry much about rifle caliber anymore, but I spend a lot of time worring about how I'm going to get what I shoot off the mountain, or worse, up out of the valley.

I've never shot an elk with a 7mm-08, but can verify that 140gr ABs out of 6.5 Creeds and .270s will poke holes through both sides of a cow and leave a trail of havock in between. Along the same lines as the OP, I'm considering using 127gr LRX in the 6.5 this year just to try them. The LRX shoot great and have a good reputation, but Accubonds just kill so well... Hard to mess with a known preformer.

This...

The partition, or the Barnes?

140 TTSX broke both shoulder blades and exited on this bull at about 60 yards from a 17” barreled 7/08. Impact velocity was about 2600 FPS. Found one petal of the bullet in the off side shoulder meat.

Bull went 20-30 yards, blowing chunks of lung out his nose.

I was pretty impressed with the performance.



Front shoulders.... entrance side on the right, exit on the left....