Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters What Does It Take - to Hunt Medium/Large Game at 600 Yards?

Last Lemon,

Just about every bullet from nearly every cartridge will NOT put a buffalo DRT when shot through both shoulders just about every time.

LOL Move the goal post much? Where did you or anyone previously mentioned Buff (or any bullet) and a 6.5mm for buffalo or dangerous game Vs. a 338 Win mag?

This thread is supposedly about a 270 being the end all be all hands down best caliber out to 600 yards for deer and possibly elk.

What’s next pachyderm hunting to further muddy the waters with a 6.5mm Vs 577 Nitro Express?

A 270 Win is no better than any number of camberings out to 600 yards given bullet selection. What does that have to do with dangerous game? If anything your 338 Win Mag proves the point. That a relatively small for caliber for the game being hunted (compared to a 375 H&H or 458 Lott) works just fine.

LL, Buffalo appears earlier in the thread...but not by that name (hint - Jogowini dialect).

Thank you for the outstanding post. I wanted to add one more factor - luck. Every animal is different and reacts differently to being shot.

Last year, I got invited to a game management harvest at a West Texas ranch. Basically, the rancher wanted to reduce the number of does on the property and we got some meat out of the deal. The second day, I got set up in a blind 87 yards from where we put out some feed.

Shortly, after sunup, a nice sized doe came out of the thicket and I placed a 143g ELD-X from my 6.5CM right behind the shoulder. She dropped DRT. Since I didn't have to track her, I decided to stay in the blind while my friend continued his hunt in a different blind about 1/2 mile away.

About 45 minutes later, I was shocked to see another doe wander out and start eating the corn near where the first doe was laying down. I ended up taking the exact same shot with the same equipment. She ran about 30 yards before she passed. When we gutted them out, I swear the entry and exit wounds were within a 1/2 in of each other and no "big" bones were broken.

Why did one doe drop DRT and the other run off bleeding? Luck. On that first shot, the hydrostatic shot from the bullet must have impacted the central nervous system whereas it didn't on the second.

BradFord,

Yep, you never know!

A decade ago, on one of the many pig culls I've been part of in Texas, several of us were hunting the King Ranch. It had been a very wet year, and natural feed was not only abundant, but the grass grew so high it was tough finding pigs unless they were right on the ranch roads.

On the last evening it was my turn to shoot, and I'd brought two rifles, an open-sighted .45-70 lever-action and a scoped bolt-action .257 Roberts. Just at sunset a fairly sizeable boar--somewhat larger than I generally pick for eating--was moseying along the edge of the road around 250 yards away, feeding with his snout just about touching the tall grass along the edge.

Soon he disappeared around a bend, giving me a chance to stalk closer. I would have preferred to use the .45-70, because it would leave a bigger blood trail if the pig got into the grass, but the light was not only growing dim but the boar was pretty much in line with the sunset, so I grabbed the .257 and made the sneak. As I came around the bend in the road, the pig was about 150 yards away, broadside, and instead of getting fancy I aimed at the rear edge of the shoulder, knowing any wobble would still hit something vital.

At the shot he dropped right there, and I thought the 115-grain Partition might have broken the shoulders--but nope, it had only gone through ribs and lungs! It was another one of those lucky instances: Have seen a bunch of other pigs hit in the same place, most with cartridges larger than the .257, and they'd run off 50 yards or more before expiring. One was a 60-pounder that went 60-65 yards after a 250-grain monolithic from a 9.3x62 made a big hole in both lungs!

My old friend Ron Spomer's wife Betsy had basically the same thing happen with the first Cape buffalo she ever shot. The placement was basically the same, just behind the shoulders through the lungs--and the bull dropped right there and never moved! The rifle was a .375 H&H....

Actually, this thread is RE: building a 600 yd capable hunting rifle around a 5R/1:8 twist long throated 24" Bbl. and .270 Win./150-165 gr high BC bullets at ~ 3000-2900 fps at the muzzle respectively.

That's it.


This place is a kindergarten.




GR

"This place is a kindergarten."

That explains why you stick around?

Bradford;
Top of the morning to you sir, I hope the day is behaving in your part of the planet and you're well.

Thanks for sharing the hunt story with us, I appreciate you taking the time to add the wound details.

As John said, "you never know"...

If I can tell this tale yet again, with apologies to all who've read it here previously and with the understanding that if I've changed any details from a past recounting of the hunt, please forgive me as I'm going off of memory and not looking at my reloading notes or hunting journal.

Way back in the day we used to have horses and hunted the mountain behind the house with them. For my usual horseback hunting rifle I used an '82 vintage Ruger No 1 in .300 Win Mag loaded with 165gr Hornady BT Spires to about 3100fps. Usually that load worked extremely well on the meat buck mulies I was hoping to bring home on the back of Carly the Appy.

On the morning in question, we - Carly the Appy and I - had been having a glorious and uneventful ride on the loop we hunted. It was a morning so relaxing that I'd just thought it would be a shame to spoil it by shooting something and having to get dirty and then take the long walk home afterward. Of course at that moment I spied a 2 point up on a ridge looking down at us trotting by. They usually didn't get too, too spooked by the horse and this was the case that day.

We rode a big circle so as to hopefully come up on the buck where we'd see it first this time and that's what we did. I tied Carly to a big Ponderosa, flopped my battered Bailey on a rock and took careful aim behind the shoulder of the feeding 2 pointer who was maybe 250-300 yards away and had no idea we were there.

At the hit, the buck gave a big high kick like a bronc coming out of the chute and then began tearing at top speed down the mountain to our right. I could honestly see the blood spraying onto the Antelope Brush and sage brush a couple of times and as it went downward out of sight, I said out loud to Carly, "Well this isn't good..."

Anyways Bradford, we found the buck since as mentioned it left a blood trail that Helen Keller could have followed, but so help me it was pretty much out of fluid at the end.

As a guess, it'd made it about 300 yards and while for sure it was down a fairly steep section of the mountain, to this day I can't wrap my head around how far it went with the tissue damage it had in the lungs - but it did.

Thanks for reading my tale of "what's the farthest a well hit animal has run for you".

All the best to you this upcoming hunting season.

Dwayne

Edit - added photo because, well, who doesn't like rifle photos?

“What does it take to hunt Med/Big fame at 600 yards?”

A steady rest

Plenty of practice

No wind


If you want routinely excellent results.

Well, you know what you want, so build the rifle, shoot a deer at 600+, and post the picture.

Barrel makers and bullet companies could give you some ideas on what to specify.

Just look in the mirror to see the kindergardener

The more it is considered for game... the less attractive it is.

Be neat to have the rifle, though... just in case.




GR

But at what range an impact velocity? That seems to be part of the equation people ignore.

Garandimal,

There's sufficient information in this thread given by Harari and others to do what you want to do. Some of us disagree on certain aspects, so you work out what view is more creditable. I, for instance, believe that the ideal rifle for 600 yard shooting is different to the lightweight sporter that is great to carry and handy/compact with a lightweight relatively low magnification scope. You do not necessarily have to use such a rifle and the skills acquired to immediately (or ever) go out and shoot game at 600 yards. Those skills and the rifle can be used to just gradually extend the range at which you are competent to shoot game at consistently at this present point in time. So for example, if you struggle to consistently take game now at 300 yards, those skills you learn and the equipment might allow you to in the future consistently kill game at 300 yards.

When I'm selecting hardware for long-range hunting, I have a whole list of things that I consider:

1. I want a reliably tracking optic with high-resolution and light transmission. I want 20+ power so that I can read mirage to provide me an indication of wind speed and direction.

2. I want the rifle to be low to moderate recoil. I want to be able to spot trace and impacts. I want to be able to recover quickly in the instance that a second shot is needed.

3. I want the highest-BC bullet available with the lowest expansion velocity possible. At no point in bullet flight do I want to approach the maximum impact velocity of the bullet; this is especially true if using a cup and core bullet. I do not want to damage the integrity of the bullet.

4. I want the barrel to be adequately twisted to stabilize the bullet I choose at sea level on the coldest days I would be willing to hunt.

5. I want a trigger that is heavy enough that adrenalin won't cause unintentional discharge of the rifle, but I want the trigger to be light with a very short travel.

6. I want a chambering which I can use the best cartridge brass available; Lapua, ADG, Peterson...with a heavy preference for Lapua.

7. I want a chambering that a Hogdon Extreme series powder works in...as temperature-sensitive powder may change velocity enough that a temperature swing may change trajectory enough to change elevation impact 1/2 of the vital zone.

8. I want a chambering that will allow for flexibility of seating depths.

9. I want a stock made of material impervious to the elements.


I choose a 6.5 PRC for most of my long range hunting. In the past, I used 6.5-284. One of the requirements above I learned the hard way having shot an animal with a 140 gr. Nosler partition on a very cold day near sea level at a range of 670 yards across completely open country. I was never able to recover the animal. I tracked for hundreds of yards into the CRP where I lost the blood trail. I later realized I was below the minimum impact velocity at right at 1775 fps. Since, I have not failed to recover an animal having taken many whitetail and big game species anywhere from point blank to beyond 800 yards. While I prefer as close a shot as possible, I like success even more.

Hopefully you're filling your envelope with notes.
This is a great place to gain some knowledge if you you're willing to.

I decided to look at GA's early posts, as he's been a member since 2016--but only started posting several years later. This was his first on "Ask the Gunwriters", in response to the question "Best overall "budget" rifle?"

quote=Garandimal]
Mossberg Patriot Synthetic - Vortex Scoped Combos in .270 Win.



Hell of a Sub-MOA field rifle for ~ $400.
GR[/quote]

I have nothing against the Mossberg Patriot, in fact own a very accurate synthetic-stocked model in .308, and used a loaner walnut-stocked .270 (also very accurate) to do an article on "New Powders and Bullets for Handloading the .270 Winchester" not all that long ago. They're good rifles.

But they aren't the only candidate for "Best overall "budget" rifle," just as his dream-build of a .270 isn't the only candidate for a 600-yard medium/large big game rifle.

My major point is that since he started posting, he's mostly wanted to show off his "vast" knowledge--not actually learn anything. Which is exactly why he started this thread.....

Yup...he`s a good fisherman.

Exactly!