Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Elk Hunting Are premium bullets needed for elk?

This........

And allows the opportunity for more difficult angles. Only occasionally have I had elk stand broadside and pose for me.

That is the problem. A lot of people will not pass on those "difficult" shots and end up wounding elk whether using a premium or C&C bullet.The difference between a wounding and a killing shot of a raking angle is a few inches and a wounding shot is just that,no matter what bullet is being used. Funny, I killed elk every year for 30+ years, sometimes two, except 2020 when my knees and health gave out. I can't remember ever taking one of those "difficult" shots. At most, maybe I clipped shoulder when I should have shot maybe 2" further back.There is is no sin to putting the safety back on if a suitable shot does not present itself. A person is not going to starve and more than likely if he or she is good hunter, the elk will turn to offer a better shot if the hunter has patience, or another elk will come along.I get tired of hearing hunters say,"by God I spent a few thousand dollars on his hunt and I am going to take any shot to put an elk down " or " I shoot this super duper magnum with these super penetrating bullets and I can put an elk down if I shoot it in the butt and the bullet will come out it's mouth" or. " I'm not passing on a 350+ bull no matter how it is standing.I don't care about the meat anyways".

Agree completely.

failed bullets? a picture of a failed bullet [ on the right] the rest are premium bullets that were recovered because the angle was severe and the bullet stayed in the elk or moose. the bullet on the right was against the skin of a bull and was healed, no idea how long the bull had carried it before i killed him, but it had to be over a year. it is a 30 cal

Couldn't disagree more SS.

I killed my first elk in 1971. I killed my last two elk a a couple months ago. Both were "difficult" shots that I would never take with a conventional jacketed bullet. My freezer is full of elk meat.

"Nuff said........

For many years hunting forums are full of posts by (no-doubt experienced) hunters, who claim that anyone who uses an above-averaged performance cartridge or anything but the cheapest bullets are just complete dipchits who are looking to shoot an elk in the rectum or something equally stupid.

I bought a truck that is more capable off-road than some cheaper models, and I didn't put the cheapest tires on it. Doesn't mean I'm going to stupidly roll it, rather than use it wisely to be able to go more places.

I don't buy the cheapest tires, and I don't necessarily use the cheapest bullets. It doesn't make my rifle magic, but it also doesn't make me reckless when shooting it.

Thing is, you just don't have enough experience to be nearly the loudest voice in the room... have you even killed an elk? Any elk?

Everyone is entitled to an opinion - but not all opinions are equal.

If "elk" is the only valid measure of effectiveness and with a grand total of ONE elk (180gr TTSX 300 Weatherby@ 330 yards one shot) then my opinion is well below the standard. But if similarly sized and configured animals can be substituted, I've taken about half a dozen of those so I'll offer this: I shot an impala with a 180gr Hornady Interlock quartering towards me at about 80 yards on the point of the shoulder. DRT and recovered the bullet in the offside ham, weighing right at 79gr or so. What if that exact same shot been taken with an elk (sized) animal with the same parameters? Suffice it to say, on my next trip I switched to Partitions that penetrated almost the same, except this time it was a kudu and a wildebeest. I eventually switched to TTSXs with even better performance. I think I'd opt for premiums.

Now for a counterpoint, my uncle too two rifles on his three Safaris back in the late sixties early 70s, a 458 Model 70 and a 270 of the same make using old fashioned Winchester Silvertips. Except for the elephant and buffalo, he took everything else including lion with the 270.

On that point are any of us really wrong Brad. We all have different experiences while hunting and killing elk. I’m all for fellas using what they feel comfortable and efficient with in the field.

No doubt some may not have the vast amount of elk kills to absolutely make concrete assumptions. The one fella uses the same combo for 30+ years to knock down elk and his experience is narrow and the other uses a different rifle for 39 elk and his experience is limited since he only used each rifle/cartridge and bullet once

Nope. Just been on two brief elk hunts, due to work, and am making it my priority going forward.

My voice wasn't loud. I was just pointing out how some, but not all, successful hunters derogate people who use certain components, and claim that people who use them are retards. I've never criticized someone else's choice of bullet to make me seem important, which is some of what's going on.

You ever killed anything this big?:

God damn that’s a big moose. 👍

It's actually an elk with weird antlers.

All I heard when I drew my oryx tag was how tough they were. So I used the ultra premium bonded monolithic tipped blah blah bla Hornady interlock. 😂😂😂

Nice Judman. What rifle/round/bullet did you do that with, and at what range? Just curious about the backstory .

Hornady does work.

Nice SLM. Is that Oryx dead, or is he just sleepy? More details?

Awesome Oryx fellas! Those are too darned cool!

Accubonds do too.

I train them to pose.

/06, 180 Hornady on the first, 165 Accubond on the second. Shot placement was almost identical, but the second one needed another shot in the neck. ( that’s all that was visible)

Drew the tag first year I applied, stallion range on the wsmr. Hunter in the flats for about a hour, dummies flying around shootin like madmen. Pard and I drove up the a mountain range and setup the glass. Pard spotted him couple miles away, made a hunt on him. We popped out at 475-480 yards, bugger already had us pegged. I set up on my sticks as he was goin 1/4’d away. I raked him, just in front of the onside ham, bullet angled up to opposite front shoulder. He didn’t react much but we heard the shwack. He ran a little ways, stopped, stepped up on this rock pinicle like a ibex, all his feet on a rock the size of a 55 gallon drum lid, started swaying and did a nose dive off the rock and fuucking cartwheeled 100 yards or better!! I bout puked, figgered his horns were broke to shiit. Made our way over to him, horns were fine other thansome scuffs. During the tumble one of his horns poked through a hide quarter, pretty gnarly. Super fun hunt, best wild meat I’ve had. Taped out at 36”, heavy bases, old stud bull. Rifle was a browning abolt 338 wm, 3-9 ziess, no turrets, just familiarity with the rifle. Hornady 225”s. Couple months before killed a stud double shovel mtn caribou in bc at 20-25 yards, same rifle/load.

Nice bulls brother. I’d love to do it again