Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Alaska Caliber / gun recommendations

It's better to "give" (small person), than to receive (big person's mass absorbing the recoil).

Why shooting from the bench can be tough.

Standing bench is the way to go with big boomers.

Ole Elmer was big on those.

DF

Avoiding big boomers is better. 😉

A good pad helps tremendously, and would be nicer than “someone’s” steel-buttplate 416 Taylor.

Not mentioning any names. He knows who he is!

I've always lusted for my very own .375 H&H - I carried one on USFS trail crew. Explodes middle of the night cabin chewing porcupines right nice...

My wallet has always over-ruled my alleged mind, however.

Carry the .308
6.5 for backup

Education on the .458 Win Mag is incomplete if someone thinks it has to hurt! But of the two owned, I'd suggest the .308 Win.

Bob
www.bigbores.ca

I kind of fell in love with the .375H&H too. It's borderline pleasant in the Winchester 70 Safari, and the 70 Alaskan is pretty manageable too. Just a big push mostly. Seems like you get way more than it costs. The ammunition is substantially cheaper than .458 WM or Lott last I checked as well.



I had a Ruger RSM in .458 Lott. Shot four rounds and the stock split at the tang, so that was it and I sold it on at a loss of a few hundred dollars. Not sure if the .458 is for me, as that Ruger definitely walloped me to the point where I was thinking it's a bridge too far. Even with a PAST shoulder pad that I haven't worn for anything else.

Maybe a Winchester 70 Safari fits better and would punch me less, give my above experience with the .375. I'd like to play around with hand loads for the .458 WM in lieu of a Marlin Guide Gun. I bet it would be lots of fun with Trail Boss powder, and that 325 or 400 grain bullets would lower the brutality a bit from full house 500 grain DGX cartridges.

All of the above are from standing position. Probably wouldn't do either prone, though the Safari in .375H&H would probably be fine.

Shooting the 458WM with 410 loads (factory or 458 brass with card wads) makes a dandy "birds for camp" option.

That guy again? Sheesh, why in the world you still hanging with that rascal? Thought you had better sense then that...

I got big plans for him.

I think you’re well covered with 6.5 and 308.
If I really wanted to buy a new rifle. 7-08 if you re load. 270 win if you don’t.

I did that too, out of Sitka. We were given as much ammo as we wanted to "practice". One field season all I did was follow around a F&W guy as gun bearer as he documented eagle nests around Sitkoh Bay. I also remember when they got some defective M 70s, and the maintenance guy used a cutting torch on them to cut them up and he dumped them in Sitka Sound. Your tax dollars at work.

Back in the 70's I made up my mind that I was going to hunt every animal in North America with one rifle.....had Dave Gentry build me on a pre-64 Winchester in 338 WM action was electro-nickel plated pencil thin stainless barrel Mag-na-Ported 24" barrel and a custom carbon fiber stock topped with a 1 1/2-4 Leupold and a extra 3-9 Leupold weighed just over 7 pounds....I shot every animal in North America several times over except a Polar Bear.....

If I were to do it again a 338 WM would be my rifle.....

You shot every animal several times over? Hmmm..., I'd have expected at least SOME one shot kills :-) Sounds like a great rifle, though.

Sounds mighty expensive.

Either the 308 or 6.5 will he fine, if your thinking lightweight than a 243 would be hard to beat for recoil, not first choice for moose, but had a friend that hunted moose with a 243, he never went hungry... he dead now, wonder what happened to that gun.. ?

It is. My wife took her caribou last fall with "Stub" - a 17 inch barreled RU Tanger in 30-06, using Hornady's 150 gr. reduced recoil ammo that I sighted the gun in with for the hunt. I didn't tell her, so neither she nor the 'bou (bull-200 yards) noticed the difference. bang-flop. But she handles recoil well, expecting it, as others have mentioned - I just wanted to try the RR ammo, mostly.

I will say, tho, I didn't notice much difference - at least with Stub. Some, but I would not call it a significant reduction in recoil, FYI, if you haven't tried it.

Stub, however, is no longer with us..... went gay with a 22" . 270 take-off over the winter. Because I could. Her stock got shortened another inch (bulky clothes caused some problems with acquisition) and re-finished, and I fitted, bedded, refinished a standard length take-off stock for me - I picked the worst of several I had laying around. I didn't even take off the original Ruger pad - tho hers' wears a Decelerator.

I can swap stocks with no change in poi- tho that has nothing to do with the OP.

Make sure the gun she hunts with is sighted in. Then let her shoot the schitt outta a .223 all year. Game day she will hammer it.

What ever cartridge I choose to hunt with has to have enough of the "right stuff". Meaning sufficient power to deliver a good tough bullet of high weight retaining deep penetrating at the needed impact velocity.

Both the 6.5 Creed and .308 Win. will do that. So for your wife I would use the Creed and buy some factory Barnes 127 grain LRX bullets. I put a SWFA 3-9x42 on my Tikka Superlight Creed. Plenty of power for a hunting scope. A guy on You Tube runs my set up out to a 1,000 yards!