Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Alaska Minimum caliber for Coastal Brown Bear...

If you do your part?

Nothing to impart as my knowledge/experience doesn’t allow me to add anything of value. Just wanted to thank all the contributors for sharing knowledge on a great thread.

Knowledgeable guides aren't bashing any specific "caliber" (meaning cartridge) but the hunters who typically can't shoot a new-to-them, hard-kicking "caliber" accurately. Which is exactly what Phil was doing, and my outfitter acquaintance in the Bob Marshall.

They're also bashing the claims from many "magnum" fans that only a certain minimum, magic level of caliber/velocity/energy/bullet-weight is adequate (or sometimes "fully adequate") for certain big game animals. This is often what convinces some newbie elk or brown bear hunter who already owns and has hunted plenty with, say, a .30-06, that they MUST use a far more powerful cartridge, or the elk or bear won't die.

I know part of this due to having guided some myself here in Montana. Quite a few hunters on their first pronghorn or mule deer hunt decided they needed some sort of belted magnum, usually a 7mm or .30 caliber, to kill pronghorns and mule deer at "long range." Long range to many of my guidees was anything beyond 200-250 yards--as far as they'd shot anything back home.

So they bought a new magnum despite owning a very familiar .243 or .270 or .308 Winchester they'd already killed a pile of whitetails with. Often they wouldn't shoot the new MAGNUM enough before going on the hunt, because it kicked too much or the ammo was expensive. As a result they flinched enough to be unable to zero the rifle adequately.

This may seem impossible to many manly magnum fans, but have seen it many times, both while guiding and when hunting big game in various places around the world. One was a guy who brought a new 7mm Remington Magnum on a pronghorn hunt, leaving a .243 he'd killed plenty of whitetails with back home. Another was a European guy who'd hunted Stone sheep and caribou successfully with his 7x64 Mauser in British Columbia, killing both with one shot--but when he decided to hunt moose with the same outfitter a couple years later bought a .300 Winchester Magnum, because moose were so much bigger. He grouped three shots in about 18" at 100 yards during the pre-hunt sight-in in camp, and not only took several shots to kill a moose, but several to kill another caribou.

Why would a hunter going to SE Alaska be ok using a smaller caliber than a hunter heading to Kodiak or the peninsula?

One could easily get the impression from this thread that non-magnum cartridges are "better than" magnums because of less recoil, therefore almost anyone could shoot more accurately with them. I say "get the impression". That may not be intended, yet it's a dominant theme. That of course is true of certain shooters and/or hunters who don't shoot (for various reasons) "big guns" very often or not at all. But I hope no one goes away from here with the belief that their .308 Win is on a par with a .375 H&H under all conditions and circumstances.

I started big game (deer) hunting with a borrowed .30-30, and later with a borrowed .303 British. Sometime later I bought an Argentine military Mauser (still in the grease) in 7 x 57. It was possibly the best made and most beautiful rifle I've ever owned. But... I couldn't mount a scope due to the straight-out bolt handle, so I traded for my first .30-06, a converted M98 military Mauser. I began handloading for that rifle. Soon thereafter it was traded for a nearly new M70 in .30-06. A long story cut short: I've made handloads for most common rifles from .22 Hornet to the .458 Win Mag. And used them in hunting.

At age 86 my favorite rifle is a Ruger #1 in .458 Win Mag for which I make loads that simulate BP, or any .45-70 loads, and full house loads to Lott ballistics. And another thing: not grizzles of BB, but a "good" .458" bullet from a .45-70 or .458 Win will flatten a black bruin without a CNS hit, whereas a 9.3 x 62 will not!

I'm 86 and weigh 160 lbs.

Bob

www.bigbores.ca

Shooting is a physiological thing, meaning a good deal of it is in your mind, and the ability to negate a large amount of recoil is not all that easy.
Buck fever (jerking a rifle due to anxiousness) is a big deal to overcome as well, so the first time you hunt something you are much more prone to make a mistake.

Mistakes on dangerous game are always problematic…. So you are much better using a 30-06 with a super penetrating bullet than going with a magnum.

IIRC Phil said he recommends 06 for bear…. And I understand why.

CZ550,

I don't recall anyone saying that smaller cartridges are "better than" bigger cartridges.

Phil Shoemaker did note that smaller cartridges have indeed worked better, on average, for brown bears than larger cartridges. But he did NOT say that "almost anyone could shoot more accurately with them."

Dunno how many brown bear hunters Phil's outfitting company has guided, but over several decades it's been quite a few--and his clients regularly take very big bears.

Might also note that Phil has used a wide variety of cartridges to back up brown bear hunters, from the .30-06 to the .505 Gibbs. He still prefers his .458 Winchester, but that's for stopping charging, wounded bears, something very different than hunting unwounded bears.

Its sure a shame that you have been having to be so clear on posts lately.

I think the stupidity of the world gets worse every day.

I'll take a 308 guy over a mag guy any day. Assuming the 308 can shoot and the mag guy might not.

30-06 seems like a perfectly fine gun with the right bullet for a big bear. Its not that big a deal really. Whats big is picking the right bullet. And putting the first one where it needs to go. And if need be getting more in them which is never a bad thing.

I'll say it. All day. Every day. If you can't shoot, you can't shoot. Its that simple.

Ah. Another one of those my gun is big enough to floor an animal with a rib cage lung shot breaking no bones just because my round is big.

Flooring animal. DRT or whatever you want to call it is ONLY reliable 100% of the time if you hit CNS. Period.

If the '06 was good enough for a nazi high on meth pills wielding an mp40 and who really wanted to kill you, it'll do fine for a groggy brownie 200yds away that just woke up from hibernation. Use enough bullet and put it where it counts; they can't live without lungs.

I have never Killed a bear. I have spent some time with a knowledgeable guy fishing in SE in the ABC Islands. He was a retired LEO that had had to hunt down problem bears some that had eaten people. He carried a 458 Win Mag to do it. He kept it leaned up against the corner next to his recliner in his living room. I saw 27 Brown bears on my 2 trips up there. We got pretty close to some. They are impressive muscular strong looking animals. I wouldn't try to hunt them with the minimum that would get by. I would take my outfitters advice and hunt with something that would stop them.

My observation about hunters and shooting in general is either a person can shoot, or they can't. I've hunted in a lot of places with a lot of different folks for a wide variety of game and some just can't get it done when it counts. Buck fever, adrenaline rush or whatever, their shooting has not been stellar. Size of the hole in the barrel doesn't make much difference.
I've shot in competition for many years and seen it there since the beginning, guys do ok in practice but when it counts they start missing. Pressure can do nasty things to one's nerves and consequently to how well they shoot.

I've never hunted the big bears either....But I do know that if I won the lottery I wouldn't be running out to buy a new super big magnum. I have 30.06, 338.06 and 7 mag. I don't like recoil any bigger than those and would have a hard time practicing with a 340 wby etc. I've killed plenty of game with my rifles and feel very comfortable with them. I'd take one of those after having had a conversation about it with the outfitter.

Still waiting to hear from my brother whether he bought the .300 WinMag that his buddy the sporting goods store owner suggested to solve his problem of not being able to hit fur with a .30-06.

My suggestion was too complicated; buy 10 boxes of ammo, get the hell away from the bench, and do some regular, focused practice.

Nope. Got no time for that....

I visited with several guides about 3 years ago.. One mentioned the .300's with heavy Nosler Partitions .. The others were suggesting a .375 and of course they expected you to be able to shoot.

Phil talked to a group of students for me and said he was fine with clients starting at the 270/708 level as long as they were using a good bullet and were a competent shooter. Obviously he's backing up clients with the 06 or the 458, so the big difference seems to be that the solo hunter has to be the primary shooter and the backup with one gun. Solution: make that first shot a good one 😇😀

Which is exactly why many "white hunters," in the early days of East African safaris, told their clients who shot poorly the problem was "the different light in Africa"....

That is a really good question. Having hunted all those places i can't fathom why. Just because the bears are typically a little bigger in Kodiak?

Because on the peninsula and kodiak a really big bear is much bigger than a really big bear in SE.