Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Ross Seyfrieds background?

Said to be a rancher, I've known him to live on a ranch in Co. in the early years of his writing, plus he did some guiding in Africa. I've read most of his work.

But before his gunwriting, does he have a formal education in a technical field? Engineering? Science perhaps. His tinkering always seemed to me to beyond tinkering & not something you'd just pick up while reloading etc.

His finances always seemed very comfortable, but thats really none of my business.

Then, you got the world champ thing. No slouch with a trigger.

His writings made me think of a rocket scientist with a pile of common sense & an uncanny way of writing to allow the common man to understand.. He never seemed to just simply report, he always dug deep & divulged the whole picture.

I assume you meant Ross?

Ross grew up on the big family cattle ranch in Colorado, and spent some time in college. Dunno if he ever got a degree.

His background? Smells like burnt gunpowder....

I think I read some one else was ahead on the shoot and ran into gun or ammo issues and Ross won that IPSIC match long ago, Bill Wilson or Mickey Fowler come to mind. Which in no way means Ross could not master a hand gun. I thought he was raised in South Africa and at some point showed up in Colorado and then moved to Oregon. I think he liked old single shot rifles and used them on elk and antelope, liked getting close to the critter.

He was very opinionated on his views of fire arms and bullets and I imagine a few other things. In one article he penned he gave an unfavorable opinion of boat tail bullets and their use in the game fields. He also believed in shooting a rifle to see how it shot, in spite of what a bore scope said. That was about the time when interest in the boat tail bullets and bore scopes was increasing and I doubt his opinions set well with manufacturers or owners of publications, since they advertised in the publications to sell products and editors and owners wanted the advertising money.

He was one of the first writers I read that was getting into hopped up .45 Colt loads in custom 5 shot single action revolvers and I think he might have put a big slug into the forehead of a Cape Buffalo at close range, had to be very exciting. He did not write fondly of old lever action repeaters, what the hell is up with that? He liked his old .416 Rigby, but after coming up dry on Alaskan Brown bears he switched to his .340 Weatherby and a .225 grain Barnes X bullet and scored.

I liked many of his articles and his insight. I do blame him for writing a glowing article on Barnes X bullets in the late 80's and because of that article I eventually left the wonderful proven Nosler Partition and became a Barnes X bullet fan for my Alaskan hunting/shooting needs. But, I could easily go back to the Partition, it never failed me.

I heard he still does some writing, but I have not read any thing new by him in years and wish I could read some more of his stuff.

1ak,

I got to know Ross fairly well just before and after he went to work for Wolfe Publishing, which if I recall correctly was around 2000, give or take a year or so. From our conversations I understood he grew up in Colorado on the family ranch already mentioned, but eventually spent considerable time in South Africa when competing.

Like all shooters/hunters we agreed on some things, not so much on others. One of the things we did agree on is that a bore-scope will NOT tell you is how well a barrel will shoot--though it's definitely useful for other purposes.

We also had a disagreement about boattail bullets--specifically the heavy-jacketed Nosler Ballistic Tips with far more weight in the jacket than the small front-end core. As far as I know he never tested them on big game, being so convinced they would "fail" somehow, because the little core sometimes separated from the jacket when he shot them in various kinds of media. I tested them thoroughly in media, starting with the first heavy-jacket model, the 200-grain .338, which appeared in 1992, which penetrated about 90% as deeply as the 210 Partition. So I did try them on big game, starting with deer, and found they worked very well. But Ross never would trust them--or any other heavy-jacket Ballistic Tip--enough to hunt with them. But on most subjects we had a lot of common ground, and traded info back and forth.

After leaving the more mainstream gun-writing market he'd written a lot for DOUBLE GUN JOURNAL, which soon turned into DOUBLE GUN & SINGLE-SHOT JOURNAL, as I understand due to Ross's influence concerning classic single-shot rifles.

He wrote two of my favorite outdoor tales.. One was about his beloved dog, I believe his name was Rigby and the other was about his quest for the brown bear.. Both AWESOME!!!

I remember both of those! Great stories.

Got hooked on a story he wrote about Federal Brass and the 45 Long Colt. A few more like it along with the writing of John B led to a subscription to HandLoader being taken up. Rifle followed and with a stack of Double Gun Journals a whole lot of trouble started...... The door to the safe locker started bulging.
Am still grateful for a write up he did on the TC Hawken Flint Lock. My dad had one that came to me. Still like smoking out the range house with a few shots using FF Black out of that ball thrower after the article helped get it on the paper.

Thanks for the info Mule Deer, I was hoping I wasn't putting out to much incorrect info.

He took some engineering courses in college, not sure what his major was. He definitely has a very technical mind. What might surprise you the most about him is how talented he is as a gunmaker.

At first I found Ross's writing style a bit too flowery, but either I got used to it, or he toned it down. He's definitely a "doer" (apart form testing BTs, I guess), and knows where it's at with regard to BP cartridge loading for the British guns and shotguns, and has done articles for the Hodgdon manual on both. Seems he hunts a good bit with the BP shotshells. A couple of his older pieces were a tremendous help to me with my struggles with a .54 Mortimer flintlock and my early efforts with the .22 Hornet. Even when the subjects he writes on aren't directly applicable to my stuff, they' re always interesting, and well written. One thing he was into pretty early was long bullets and fast twists in large-capacity .22 CFs for long range. He was a regular contributer to the sadly, now-defunct online Classic Arms Journal (hope I got that name right).

Always happy to find something written by Ross. Anyone know of any books by him?

http://www.scoutrifle.org/index.php?topic=5120.0. This hopefuy will give plenty of fodder for your consumption.

Was impressed with his article and pictures concerning the result of firing a 7mm RM in a .270 Weatherby chambered rifle; Model 70 IIRC. Was in either Rifle or Handloader. I remember his comment on the huge difference a mere 0.007 difference in bullet diameter could make.

Is he still actively writing? Or involved in shooting?

He writes consistently for the Double Gun Journal.

Ross has a sincere respect for the game. I have always appreciated that.

Thanks to all.

As noted, I've read most of his articles, occasionally searching his name in hope of finding more. I do not know of any new writing from him in the last few years. I suppose he has the right to retire just like anyone else. According to some info, Elk Song, his ranch & elk hunting operation in Oregon has been sold.

Still no book from him that I'm aware of. His comments on the matter are that he feels he is not worthy of a book about him or his exploits.

Elk Song sold several years ago. Ross then bought a country place in Kentucky. He was writing for one Internet company, but apparently that didn't last long. As Woodhits noted (as I did in an earlier post on this thread) he writes regularly for Double Gun and Single-Shot Journal.

In his teens, he spent some time with Elmer Keith and reloaded some of his keith .44 magnum loads. He was a bit surprised when Keith told him he didn't use magnum primers. One of his pet projects (Linbaugh, I think) was a .476 revolver built on a ruger SBH. It had a color case frame and a lined barrel- the outside was an octagonal billet of "damasus" steel that he had bench welded by a metal worker who said that he never would have taken on the job he he had know how hard it would be. Killed a lion with that though his guide followed his shot unnecessarily with a 7mm Mauser.