Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters Too obsessed with accuracy??

264,
I was thinking of that exact editorial when I read this thread.
I try to remember what Dave(and others) have said about practical accuracy when my groups off of the bench don't look quite as good as I would like.

Remember in math when you were taught about multiplying negative numbers and getting a positive number. The corollary to that here is that a very poor shot coupled with a very innaccurate rifle can be positively deadly...

Gdv

You only need what you need. But target sizes vary, angles change, brush gets in the way, distances vary, in the end you many only be able to thread the needle through a tiny hole in the brush. I know I wobble so accuracy is a plus. I won't wear the barrel out though getting it. But I may continue to tweak as I practice, after all it won't hurt anything if I'm gonna shoot anyway.

The last thing I want is an inaccurate rifle, a 300 yard shot, and a 2nd rate bullet and nothing to rest on... BUT if I have an accurate rifle, something on the lines of 2 inches or so at 300, and I add in my wobble that will effectively double that or worse depending, I'll be looking at a 6-8 inch group in reality, fudge in some error for windage estimations, take the worst group and the widest shot of that worst group added into the shot breaking on the outgoing wobble instead of coming in, well you'll be at 12 inches pretty quick, which starts to make things interesting.

Couple all that with a good bullet, and its pretty much a given for a 300 yard shot in 12 inch vitals but with no extra room for other error....

Being better prepared allows options at times that others might now have.

Recent experience..... questionable scope or accuracy of a larger rifle, first shot came at appx 280 yards, with the issues of the scope and rifle not being a good combo and shooting large groups and seemingly not wanting to stay windage centered... I opted to pass. With a proven rifle and a prone rest that passed shot could have been easily a head shot. Later on same rifle easily passed muster at 100ish yards, though the hit was somewhat off to one side that I did not expect from the offhand shot process... IE called it good but a hair high, ended up 6 inches left of that.... IF it was a rifle issue, that 6 inches of error could have been 18 at 300. Liveable up close, not so much at longer distances.

That being said I rarely get shots past 150 yards. But with the proper rig a 300 yard shot from a rest seems like the worlds easiest chip shot.... only from lots of shooting and accurate rifles....

Of course its an individual choice. And one can get a bullet into an animals vitals somewhere generally easily with almost any 30-30 and iron sights out to 200 yards with enough killing energy, but that doesn't sell guns or keep life very interesting.

Jeff

John

That 20 shot group reminds me of my 6.5X55, no matter what bullet or what powder charge it still puts em in there very close. Just a very accurate rifle, it copper fouls quickly, but seems to shoot better with the fouling. I have gotten into the habit of just cleaning powder fouling after a shoot and waiting for the accuracy to degrade, then i clean out the copper, seems to works well and a lot less of a hassle.....

Yes.......we do obsess with accuracy. If my rifles can do an inch
@ 100 yds....I am fine with it.

I agree! Wyoming looks about the same as far as antelope goes. Accuracy rules.

Over the course of a year, I get to do a whole lot more shooting than hunting. Strongly suspect that most of us are in the same boat...

When I hunt, at least some of the success is judged by what I bring home (if anything!) and likewise when I'm just out shooting... Do I end the day with a good group? A high score? Accuracy, my accuracy, is about all I've got to hang my hat on when I'm just shooting.

Sure would like to do more hunting, and would quite willingly trade away some of those days at the rifle range for days in the hills after game.

Also... "Remember I said "normal" ranges. Most deer are shot under 75 yrds and very few over 200." Wow... I've shot a few deer under 75 yards, with my muzzle loader, but around here a 200 - 400 yard shot is considered normal. Hence the emphasis on accuracy I suppose. Still, concur that most stock rifles, scopes and most decent ammo will provide the accuracy necessary to cleanly take game at reasonable ranges. Most of the hunting I've done was with a factory rifle, maybe with an adjusted trigger, and my own handloads. MOA groups have been good enough for me, for a general purpose game rifle. After that, in the field, it seems to be largely the skill, or lack of skill, of the shooter that determines if the hit is made...

Yeah, I like accuracy, but no, I'm not going to try to whittle away like crazy to shave another quarter inch off the groups my standard hunting rifles will produce. I will always continue trying to improve how well I can shoot them from various standing, sitting, kneeling and prone positions.

Regards, Guy

Play around with the ruler a bit and you've got 20 one-shot groups. Measure each one of them from where you were intending to put it.

- TJM

It's not an obsession with accuracy...it's an obsession with distance. Many hunters are starting to take game at much greater ranges than needed. I'm sure some of you saw the video of the antelope "hunter" who set up a shot at 1,015 yards on a pronghorn. This was an intentional situation set up to show off his shooting ability. To call such a situation "hunting" is an insult. Hunting is pursuing, stalking, etc. This is not hunting, it is "shooting". Certainly, "shooting" is not a bad thing, but these bozos are going to get us more bad press as animals are needlessly injured, and as non-hunters berate these guys for hunting solely to satisfy their egos, which is what they are doing.

What's the proper range at which to take an antelope, deer, elk, etc?

I plead "GUILTY as charged" I even own a range finder capable of working on game to 500 yds.



Normal range for taking game is terrain dependent. Unless a man is going to don a gillie suit and spend 14 hours crawling through ankle tall cheat grass on his belly, we have a lot of hunting areas where you will not approach your deer or elk closer than 400 yds.

So my carry rifle is equipped with a bipod and I anticipate that I will be shooting prone from the top of a ridge into the center of a valley or draw.

I really do not see that shooting deer, elk, or antelope under these conditions is any different from shooting varmints. How big is the heart on a deer or antelope? About the same size as a prairie dog? How big is the heart on an elk? About the same size as a rock chuck?

These photos are of deer my dad killed over forty years ago. I have shared them here before. And I use them to illustrate the terrain features which are common. Dad killed these animals from over four hundred yards with his new at the time Rem 760 and 3-9x40 Scopecheif. Dad never handloaded, and he never heard about tuning a rifle. He always brought meat home, but he did it through sheer firepower. He might well have used a full clip or two to take each of these animal shown. It was not pretty, but it kept the freezer full.






I like to do things a bit different. I like to try a bunch of bullets, and a bunch of powders. I will tune the trigger and bed the action. I am looking for that .5 inch accuracy at 100 yds. I will go prone on the bipod so that I know darn well and good that my first bullet will impact in that four inch circle over the deer's heart.....all the way to 400 yds.

Shooting soda cans full of water from the same positions in the same terrain at the same distance makes great practice and is a great confidence builder.



Having never hunted under conditions of heavy cover, I might ask: "How could it be considered ethical to shoot offhand at such a regal animal as a deer or elk?"



A resounding and absolute yes. In a word....CONFIDENCE.

In my experience the man who works with his loads and tunes his rifle so that he knows exactly where it shoots is a lot more likely to be the man who can call his shots.........whether they be at the target bench or in the field hunting game. And in my experience, the man who can call his shots is also the man who had his cross hairs on the target when he pulled the trigger.

Except with a very small minority, it is not about extending the range. It is about being prepared to take the shot at the range required to fill your tag.

Here are a couple more pics to demonstrate typical hunting terrain in this part of Idaho.



The rocks on the left side of the photo are at 700 yds from our shooting position.



It would be quite typical to find mulies or elk anywhere in this valley grazing on the dried grasses or browsing upon the sage. There is simply no cover available to the hunter except the terrain features. Often we have the choice of taking the shot at 400 yds or better as we peek over the ridge......or just forget about it and go home with an empty tag.

This day we were just killing rocks. The deer remained unmolested as they grazed upon the tender new grass.






This is another subject altogether. And as a matter of fact, I have worn out a barrel on a rifle doing load development without ever killing a single head of game with it.

The rifle is a very nice Win 70 classic blued with an aftermarket laminate stock in 264 mag.

Allen, I do not know what you do for recreation, nor do I particularly care. But I experiment with load development and my rifles. I play with the bedding and mess with the trigger and see if I can make them shoot a bit better. I might shoot a box of Speer 165 bt's and then a box of Sierra spbt's and then a box of 165 ballistic tips through the old 06 just to see which one groups the tightest. then I might start all over again with about six different powders.

It is recreation. And that is why I have a bench rest fifteen yards from my front door.... so that I can play with the rifles.

Call me a "kook" if you want, but shooting is what I do for fun. Hunting is the job I do to help justify the shooting and put a little extra meat in the freezer.

On the offhand point I consider it ethical because I have practiced it and can consistently place my shots into a group well under half of what is required to effecively take deer. Remember I said at 100yrds, i would not take a deer at say 200+ off hand but would and have many times using a tree limb, shooting sticks, etc... Not that I don't think that I could place the shots I just want to be 100%.

I don't think your a "KOOK" at all. I would probably fall in the same boat. I have a bench set-up that I shoot out of the back of my attached garage. I shoot alot 4X a week or so and develop loads just like everyone. I like accuracy also so please don't think that I am saying everyone is stupid for wanting their guns to shoot well. I am was more making a statement/question about a trend that seems to be taking over.

The variable can be controlled by getting closer.

I'll bet there are bow and muzzle loading hunters who shoot game at 20 to 100 yards on that same terrain every year.

If you want to start a pissing match, engage the anti-hunters. Don't needlessly divide the ranks amongst hunters by trying to tell them what is proper or improper from your perspective and opinion. Yes we all have opinions, but we don't have to try to force them on others who chose to hunt at longer ranges, and do so legally by the way. You're too full of yourself. People shooting at close ranges can wound just as many animals as those that shoot at long ranges if they don't prepare properly and pick their shots. Long range hunters spend a lot of time preparing and becoming proficient at what they do. And yes, I'm one of them.

+1..............

That is a bet you would lose. I do know a few guys that still hunt with their 30-30 on this terrain, and they still often find they are shooting 300 yds plus. I much prefer a 270/30-06/7mm mag class weapon.

I know and have hunted with a bunch of archery hunters. And a few even use a ML for the Dec elk hunt. They move a few miles further up the road into the timber and set up their tree stands over a water hole during elk rut just like archery hunters everywhere. But they do not hunt the open grass lands which I showed with that equipment.

Idaho allows us the option of hunting several seasons with different equipment. If a hunter does not fill his tag during archery season, he can then hunt during rifle season. And he can often work in some ML seasons as well. I know a lot of hunters who hunt these open grasslands with their rifles. But they hunt elsewhere during bow season.

Perhaps you are familiar with unit 32 in Idaho, perhaps not. Remember we get an average of ten inches rainfall a year. Ninety percent of that comes between mid November and April. That amount of precipitation does not support the amount of cover that folks across most of the country are used to. Also most of these areas have been burned recently enough to kill off any substantial brush. There are isolated brush pockets left where ground water comes near the surface, which serve as cover for game. But they are impossible to approach unobserved in most cases.

Yes we have the timber and thicker brush adjacent to the cheat grass and annual blue grass covered hills. And I hunt those areas as well. Having the equipment to take game at a quarter mile does not preclude me from killing a deer at ten yards, and I have done so a few times.

Here are a couple more photos of some of my favorite hunting terrain. Deer or elk may be spotted in any of these wide open areas. One must either be prepared to take a shot out to a quarter mile or be prepared to stand with rifle in hand and watch the game disappear over a distant ridge.





There is nothing unethical about the 400 yd shot when the hunter has prepared himself and his rifle for the job. When the hunter finds the proper rest, whether it be a four foot high boulder with a backpack atop or prone with a bipod, in calm wind a humane hit is as assured as the typical woods hunter shooting offhand at fifty yards.

I have hunted in cold and wet and snow, but I can not remember ever taking a shot where I had to worry about more than about a foot of wind drift. Most of our hunts occur before our winter storms set in. And this region of Idaho does not experience much wind as a rule.

Just wondering: What makes deer and elk regal?

The primary meaning of the word is essentially "royal." I believe that a lot of human royalty has been shot over the last few centuries. If they didn't get shot, they got guillotined, hung or exiled--all in the name of liberty, deomocracy and equality.

A secondary meaning is "stately." Is it unethical to shoot offhand at stately game, but not unstately game? And if so, who should be the arbiter of stateliness? If elk are stately, then what animals are not? Coyotes? Pronghorns? Cottontails?

Over the years on this forum have read all sorts of stuff about how we should or shouldn't shoot game with this or that, or at certain ranges, or how some game "deserves better." This is good, to a certain extent, because discussing what is right and wrong is on of the attributes of being human.

But often people here are totally convinced of the rightness of their personal opinion. This is often based on their level of skill (or lack thereof) and, as in caling some game animal "regal," a view that borders on anthropomorphism. Which, of course, is what we critcize the anti-hunters for.

Sorry, but having killed a lot of animals with a wide variety of methods, from arrows to really fast bullets, from recurve bows and muzzleloaders and single-shot centerfires, and finding wild animals to all be, well, alive and very obviously able to feel pain, I find such distinctions a little strained.

And what is wrong with shooting offhand? If you practice at it, and have some discipline in the field, then offhand shooting is no more evil than any other method of killing game. Unless, of course, you consider any sort of hunting evil.

JB

Great post!

Actually, in my mind, absolutely nothing. To me they are meat, no different than shooting a beef, hog, or lamb out of the pasture. But why did I write the earlier statement?



Well John, over the computer screen you were not able to see the smile on my face as I wrote it. Not being a professional scribe I lacked the skills to properly convey my tongue in cheek meaning. It was intended as a bit of a parody of a litany which I have heard all too often.

My intent was purely to exemplify that many persons disparage another hunter's techniques, even though they have never hunted in similar conditions.



And I agree completely. As long as the hunter prepares himself and his rifle for the shot he will be presented. As long as he has proper control of his emotions so that he does not allow "buck fever" to destroy the skills he has practiced. Any hunting practice which is legal is as ethical as any other.

Heck, I would go so far as to say the antis have already managed to outlaw many very ethical manners of hunting. For example the use of baits and hounds for bear is now unlawful in Oregon due to the efforts of antihunters.

All we owe our meat whether it be beef, lamb or venison is a quick and humane death as best we can deliver it.