Home Forums Hunting & Shooting General Big Game Hardest Shot You've Ever Made?

Turkey at 64 yards with my Ruger bisley Blackhawk 45 Colt. Hit in the neck almost took the head off. He was called in by my friends 13 year old son just using his voice.

Jackrabbit offhand, around 425 yards. I'd been doing a lot of offhand practice, mostly at jacks, and I was having an especially good day, but still I was surprised at that one.

Fork horn buck, way back when they were legal, with a pack of Walker hounds less than 60 seconds behind him. Picked a hole I knew he would run through and let the Marlin .35 Rem. speak the split second he hit that hole. He never checked up, but he piled up in less than 75 yards. Shot took him low in the ribs actually under his front leg. Left a blood trail Stevie Wonder could've followed. Dogs kept right on running the doe he was running with.

700 yards offhand with an iron-sighted Winchester 1906 pump .22.

Great-grandpa said "shoot the crow". I looked around and couldn't see any dang crow. "Shoot the crow" (a bit more insistent / hurried). Well, off skylined on the horizon was a dead fir tree, and near the top was one lone dead branch, and out on the tip of the branch was a slight bulge or bump. "SHOOT THE CROW". So I lined up on that bump, add a BUNCH of elevation, and yanked the trigger. The damnedest thing happened. After a moment, that "bump" dislodged from the branch, tumbled end over end, and fell 50 feet or more apparently hitting the ground. I don't actually know if it was a crow or not, but whatever it was, I hit it. .. and then grandpa said "ya missed" in disgust as the raven that'd been 40 feet away flew off. He never did understand what I DID hit. Some days ya just can't win.

Tom

Was in Kansas shooting Prairie Dogs back in the early 90's. As we were exited the farm we had been shooting on, we saw a Jack Rabbit run across in front of the truck and disappear. My two buddies and I jumped out and I un-case and load a rifle. I start walking to where we had last seen the Jack. I was about to the spot when he bolted. I threw the rifle to my shoulder only to find the scope still on 18 power. The Jack was covering ground fast and it took a bit to get him found. At the shot, the Jack went end over end and was just over 100 yards. I couldn't pull off that shot off again in a 100 tries, but on that day I cooling went and retrieved the Jack and acted like it was no big deal.

I can’t think of any of mine but, will give you two that I have witnessed.

My dad. Off hand shot down an abandoned rail road grade on a big (170 lb) doe on a fast trot angling away. Hammered her with his 280 Rem M700 Mountain Rifle with 145 grain Speers. She took one step after the shot and nose dived. My dad is 6’4” and it was a distance of 245 of his paces. My pace count is 76 to 100 yards at 6’2”. Thinking that was a pretty good shot with some luck ......or not.

My buddy loosened an arrow at a smallish buck in an overgrown apple orchard that was running away. He managed to pick a small hole in all the branches and drilled it in the back of the head. All with an American Archery Bobcat bow, no rest,no sights and mismatched arrows. Some luck involved? Yes but,that’s what they were trying to do.

running jack rabbit at over 50 yd with a sheridan blue streak.

Mule deer buck at 110 yards at the end of day six of a seven day hunt. We were putting the stalk on a very big buck and about 1400 yards away when a nice buck jumped up at thirty yards, ran up the hill and stopped. I shot off hand and he ended up at 28.5 inches and 184.75. The other buck got shot 6 days later and went 197”. Can’t wait to get back to Nevada.

The toughest hunt physically and mentally I’ve been on. The hardest decision I’ve made while hunting.

Had a couple that led to some serious contortions back during the time when I used tree stands. Both were of similar formats.....close range, one hand hold under the opposing arm with the shot almost directly behind me. One with the left hand, the other with the right. Win 94 Trapper versus a 6 pt buck and a bobcat, both about 30 yards out. Winchester won.

Doe at about 80 yards.
Squatting, twisted around a tree, shooting uphill.
Pants down.
Trying not to step in my leavings.
Was successful with the shooting.

Not so much with the stepping.

Yeah, but after ya stepped in it you came out smellin' like a rose!

Was the shot into my 1st wife that somehow got her sister pregnant.

It was in the early 70's, I was about 11 years old. There had been a big black and white feral tomcat hanging around our barn. He was elusive and fast, would jet at the first sign of a human. Waxing feral cats was my job and that cat had already beat me several times. My Dad was home that day watching The World Series, Vida Blue was on the mound for the A's. For some reason I peeked out the window at our back yard and there was the big tom stalking a rabbit within 10 feet of our house. They were moving towards the corner of the house so I ran to the living room and grabbed my Dads Ruger single six from the coat closet while explaining myself to Dad on the run.

I exited out the front door and worked my way around to the side of the house the rabbit had been headed towards. As I neared the corner the rabbit hopped into my view. I just stood there frozen as finally the rabbit continued his advance and the tomcat hove onto view.
As soon as the cat saw me he bolted towards the barn running at a diagonal from my left to my right. I lost sight of him immediately as he had to clear two vehicles before he would be back in view. I thought he would be headed for the barn so I raised the revolver and held it pointed towards the front of my Mom's Corvair about 20 yards away. Sure enough he cleared the car at a dead run and without much thought I just reflexively put the front sight on him and let rip. To my amazement he flipped into the air and hit the ground dead. It was some moment when the rush hit me and I could hear my Dad chuckling from the window having watched it all.

My daughter shot a moose in a meadow, at the shot it dropped down in the rear a bit and I thought it was gut shot. It spun and did a quarter horse sprint towards the timber about 60 yards away and by the time I got on it and got it's rhythm and my brain together it was a bout 250 yards away. I managed to put a 250 grain Barnes X bullet from my .338 Winny right next to it's butt hole, down it went.

All things considered, it was a lucky shot. She had creased it's back with her shot. Her 30-06 bullet took the hair off of the hide in a narrow 8" strip about the size of my finger.

Ricochet?

Running deer I guess. I've shot 3 running whitetail bucks in the brush,and this muley trotting at nearly 350. Of the four of them ill give the nod to the mule deer. More thinking involved. The whitetail were more instinct than intent. Close quarters. The open sage country made it necessary to consider distance as well as the movement.

Sure, we'll go with that..

389 yard shot on a pig running wide open. Swung on him like a big Goose & rolled him like a flat tire.