Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Canada Your Longest Standing Free Hand Shot on Big Game?

Some of us have been in hunting situations where a rest of any kind was not available and a "Free Handed" shot was your only option.

What was your longest "Freehand Shot" on Big Game, with what caliber and how did it turn out for you?

Cheers ~

180 yards on a mule deer facing me straight on. Used a 30-30 and he never took a step.

That's good shooting jmp300wsm! Open sights?

Just so I understand the question, do you mean standing/offhand or using you own body as the support as in kneeling and sitting? Can throw in prone too.

Hi Just a Hunter, I hope you had a fun Christmas.

I was talking about your longest standing "Freehand/Offhand" shot and the weapon, caliber, scope and and outcome? Although it's always fun to hear of other types of hunting situations with difficult shots that you had to take.

My personal longest freehand shot was 525 yards on a big bull moose, I was using my BSA P1917 .30-06 Winchester SuperX in 180 gr. with a Bausch & Lomb Elite 4200 2.5-10x40 mm scope.

Happy New Year with lots of great outdoor adventures ~

Many years ago while hunting with my father he made the longest free hand shot I have ever seen A moose was crossing a seismograftic trail. It was a darn long ways away but it was the only shot we were going to get. 375 H&H bullet hit its neck and dropped right there. Biggest body moose I have ever seen. Rack was only 57 inch but it was really deformed. We killed a 72 inch bull the next year and that rack was 10-15% lighter. I do not know how long the shot was but after gutting the moose I went back to get the spent brass and it was 415 long strides.

My longest shots on big game from the offhand position were all probably under 250 and most of them under 150.

I did shoot a LOT of jack rabbits and rock-chucks at 300 and farther when I was younger, but I missed a lot too and because of that I knew I was not good enough to be sure of a clean kill on big game for shots "way out there" if I could not get to a sitting or prone position. Jack rabbits were my "gauge" as to haw good I was at any given period of my life. I'd go to a sitting or sometimes kneeling position on big game if the shot was over about 150. Resting over my pack was even better. So I can't remember ever even trying to make a kill past 250 from offhand, and I have been killing deer since 1963 Elk since 1967.

When it came to rabbits, ground squirrels and rock-chucks I'd shoot at any of them at any range, and did as well as I possible could from offhand just because of the challenge but I didn't really care if I missed.

Doing a LOT of shooting from offhand also helps you in the better supported positions and I am a believer in firing about 80% of your practice rounds off hand. Then think deeply about every miss.

It's not the hits that teach you to improve, but the misses.

Hi FNWhelen

That is a hellava shot, you must have been proud of the old man!

We were blessed to have beautiful fathers that took us out hunting and fishing and to take their time to teach us about the finer things in life that makes our lives great and to teach us how to feed our families with delicious wild game.

God bless them one and all!



Yep, we sure did hone our skills on them small critters hey szihn?

Personally, I honed my rifle shooting skills with a pellet rifle shooting hundreds of black birds, sure was great practice!

Congratulations on such a long hunting career!

KillerBee;
Good afternoon to you my friend, I hope you're not getting more snow like we happen to be and if you are that you don't need to go anywhere, which I actually do....

Regardless sir, to your question, I don't believe on big game I've shot at anything much beyond about 80yards give or take free hand.

Strangely enough, both the cases that come to mind for me were whitetail bucks which I ended up shooting in the neck because that's what I could see and they both died in their tracks.

The first one was in '92 with an '06 - likely a 180gr Hornady but might have been a 165gr Hornady too. I spooked it in the old growth, called it to a stop and saw a brow tine so thought it was a spike.



The second one was 20 years later and less than a kilometer from the first one. The racks have the same palmation and extra sticker points, which I find interesting. This one was a .308 Norma with a 168gr TSX.



Other than them, I've shot a fair few deer and a bull moose at about that distance more or less. There was a coyote one time that my hunting partner figures was close to 200yds I hit with a .30-30 with a receiver sight, but that was more bad luck for the coyote than luck on my part honestly.

All the best to you all this New Year.

Dwayne

Cool topic. Longest (that I remember) was a running coyote at 300 + - a few. Coyote & dogs headed for big country (no roads no trails) about 4:30 getting dark. Said I'd be home to go to company Christmas dinner with wife. Rifle, 17 wee wee (17 on the 30 m1 case) yes I know it was stupid!!! All told, unluckiest coyote ever, but we caught the dogs & I made it to the party. Happy wife happy life. Yes I'd try it again, it's a frikken coyote, ever come onto a deer that's not dead with its guts & azz hole ate out, hardest deer I ever had to finish. GWP. 🐾👣🐾👣🇨🇦

Hello there Dwayne, I trust you had an exceptional Christmas with your beautiful family.

What's it going to be like when your daughters bring their boyfriends home and they confess that your daughters can outshoot them and the gals are putting game on the table? Sure hope them boys can at least do the dishes lol.

That is is a humdinger of a buck in the old truck and a beautiful picture of that second one. When I see pictures like that I always wish I had taken more pictures. Sure are nice to look at as we get older, to relive the great experiences God has blessed us with afield.

Neck shots are the best for two reasons, first they drop dead in their tracks as FNWhelen pointed out in his post and secondly there is no meat loss. I know that we are both meat hunters and that is very important to us both.

The picture below is of the moose I killed at 525 yards, one of the few times I took a picture after the hunt. The other is of my BSA P17, which is my favorite hunting rifle of all time.

I wish you and your clan an awesome New Year and look forward to reading your posts and sharing stories in 2023.

All the best from your internet friend from Alberta.

Darren

KillerBee;
Good evening and thanks for the reply.

We had a good Christmas thanks, though for sure a bit of a quieter one than we'd planned since our son in law's family was hoping to come over for Christmas dinner but got sick so that as they say - ended that.

Our eldest has been married to a fine young fellow for 6 years now and no he doesn't hunt but does shoot once in awhile and is also a wonderful cook. His rabbit stew is out of this world.

Our youngest made it back to her home safely on the coast today, so that's both a relief and a bit sad too for me since it'll be months before we see her again.

Finally thanks for another look at that fine stock work on the BSA. I am mostly Teutonic so that's likely at least partially to blame for me liking the Germanic cheek piece and pistol grip lines.

Happy New Year to you all.

Dwayne

Hi FNWhelen

That is a hellava shot, you must have been proud of the old man!

We were blessed to have beautiful fathers that took us out hunting and fishing and to take their time to teach us about the finer things in life that makes our lives great and to teach us how to feed our families with delicious wild game.

God bless them one and all!


Dad said he was shooting for the shoulder area but there was some wind and probably a little wobble to push the bullet off course a little. I was 40 years old before I saw him miss an animal. I got lucky and nailed the deer he missed. After the deer hit the ground I told him I had been waiting 40 years for today. Looking back I am sure it was the proudest moment of my life.

That is an incredible shot on a running coyote GWPGUY, great shooting!

425 measured yards on a spike fork moose.

35 Whelen, 250gn Barnes FXB, 6X Leupold.

Aim point was level with its back, bullet dropped 24", first shot holed the heart , still standing, second shot nipped the inside of the fore leg, moose was dead on feet and then tipped over.

I can normally use my walking staff, or find sonething to rest the rifle on. My longest offhand shot however was 150 paces on a mule deer with a .58 Hakwen rifle .
Cat

My son and I were out in central Nevada, retracing a very remote portion of the Pony Express route, hadn't seen another rig in two or three days, stopped on a two track, got out a beer and cheese and crackers, 20x spotter, Springfield trapdoor, on the hood. There was a chalk or caliche boulder way, way in hell off, before the days of affordable range finders, and we started whanging away at it...with no success. Son says, damn, look, a rig coming. The cowboy stopped and we did all the polite stuff, cracked him a beer. He was just mesmerized by the old trapdoor, asked all about it..so we insisted he take a shot or three. What are you guys shootin' at? Yonder white boulder. Jesus fellas that thing is farther than heaven. But he's game, takes a bead (I got the Buffington set on 700 or so), boom, he lays the rifle on the hood..., little puff of white drifting off, then we hear a 'thwock'. Son and I look at each other in astonishment...cowboy starts laughing, from the look on your faces, I take it there wasn't much chance of hitting that? We explained we were using the hood as a rest...and he donged it offhand. Anyway, after he left we paced it down and up and wandering through the sage clumps and we guessed it at 750 yards. You could say it was luck...but you could also say he hit what he was aiming at.

Two hundred yards, running whitetail, 7 mag, dead.

Hi hanco, I shot a nice whitetail on the full run @ 200 yards as well once, gotta admit I was pretty proud of the shot, just like you were :o)

Happy New Year!

125 yards at a walking whitetail buck. I was turned around and standing on my climbing treestand in the last five minutes of the last day of the season.

75 yards offhand and a little winded after chasing a 6X6 bull up the mountain. He turned to face me and I hit him head on with a 30/06. He ran about 35 yards.

Ok thanks. My farthest that I can remember was ~ 100 on running whitetail doe. Hit while she was in the air and folded her like a duck using my Winchester M94 .356. I have had other as far but that was my best.

Thanks for asking about Christmas. We didn't get to go to the in-laws since the roads were closed. That could be good or bad. Stayed home warm and cozy. I hope your holidays were good too.

Not big game, but woodchucks.

200+/- yards, offhand, 22-250 (50 grain Sierra Blitzkings), Rem 700 Varmint synthetic with 8x Lyman All.America PermaCenter with 1 moa dot. Have done it dozens of times (100-200 yards). OSOK.

Woodchuck hunting in central NY, you are in rolling hill country. It was common to walk up a hill, and see a woodchuck on the next hill as your eyes get to the crest of the hill you are climbing. You take a few steps further up hill to get a line-of-sight on the woodchuck on offhand position-so you minimize your exposure to the chuck.

My hunting buddy and I started doing this for the challenge. We COULD crawl up to the top of the hill, and take the shot from prone (off Harris bipods), but a 100-200 yard shot with an accurate 22-250 is a "gimme" (too easy). Our new adopted rule was: "200 yards or closer were offhand shots", when we carried 22-250 rifles (his was a 22-250 AI with 7" twist Kreiger, shooting 77 grainers). I began using my 222 Rem, and he used a 218 Bee Kimber 84 more as there were more 200 yard shots than 400 yarders.

I used to shoot smallbore varsity rifle and air rifle in college. I used to be pretty good in offhand, so I looked forward to those woodchuck shots.

Good practice.

250ish. Buck moving along pretty good. Not running.
First shot hit.
Not well.
Took a couple shots at his neck to get a finisher in.

This one brought back some good memories for me.
We we're at our Hunt Camp in PA years ago and I was hunting with a local Buddy for White Tails on a good size piece of Woods down the road that I never hunted before and as we we're coming out of the woods the Snow picked up almost blizzard like conditions, and Pete and I must have pushed a Buck out of the woods we we're in as we looked across the field some ways off and a nice Buck was moving across the field and away from US. Pete leveled his scoped 30-06 Rifle and missed and I shot with my opened sight .375 Win. Marlin Rifle,(200 gr. ammo), aiming high to allow for Bullet drop and it Turned the Deer and he Dropped. I told Pete to flank the Deer wide to the Left as I Ran up to see along with Pete moving quickly to my Left and the Buck was crawling as I spined him and a finishing shot ended it. We paced 350 yards back to where we shot and just couldn't believe how fast it happened and unfolded. Heck I'd rather be Lucky than Good. That Buck hangs in my office and it brings back good memories.

HS 58

Good morning HunterShooter, great story, awesome shot with open sights!

Do you have a picture of that buck to share?

Happy New Year Sir!

I have no clue what my longest offhand shot would be.
It would probably be 150- 200 yards.
I always carried a backpack, and would use it routinely, a dry snag, a Boulder etc to shoot from.
At one time , I was quite confident with my positional shooting , on paper. This roughly translated in hitting a pie plate @ 100 yards 8 out of 10 and would score a minimum of 80/ 100.
Field conditions are not nearly as ideal, and a stuffed backpack was a far better choice for me.
Happy New Year, folks

The longest shot I ever made on big game was off-hand. The target was a mule deer buck, the rifle a 35 Whelen, loaded with 250 Hornady's. I should not have taken the shot but I did. The buck was facing me, head up, and the shot broke when the crosshairs were about 6inches below the tip of the antlers. The bullet struck low, just inside the ribcage, and centered. The deer laid down but jumped up as I approached. The second shot, from 25 yards, was better placed and finished him. This was about 35 years ago and I was embarrassed about taking the shot. It was too far, and it would not have hurt me any to let that buck go. Nonetheless, it ended OK.
I have made some decent offhand shots on coyotes but have also logged some spectacular misses. One good hit was on a coyote running straight away, at about 200 yd. I was carrying my 308 Norma and scored a perfect bullseye. When I say perfect, there was no entrance wound. The 200 grain Sierra exited just under the chin and that was the only hole in the hide. Another coyote was taken at about the same distance but was running straight across. The shot took him right behind the angle of his jaw. It would have been better if that had been the only shot I took. The next coyote popped up at about 40 yards. I shot behind him, then in front, then finally hit on the third shot.
I have shot quite a bit of competition, of various sorts. In doing so, it is the misses I have made which have made me much more reluctant to try long or difficult shots on game. GD

This is going to sound a little crazy but 35 yards with my bow. In 1989 I did shoot a running buck with my Remington 760 at 150 yards but I was kneeling so that don't count. I was a bow hunter before I took up rifle hunting, I hunt with my rifle the same as in do with my bow. I find a good spot and just sit and wait, usually in a beach lawn chair or a foam pad with my gun on shooting sticks.

Hi Marty63, I miss bear hunting around Riding Mountain National Park in Manitoba, sure are some pretty big bears there. My longest shot with my bow was 76 yards.

The bow hunting equipment has changed dramatically since 1989, back in them days the bow hunting equipment did not hold a candle to what we are using today, that's for sure hey?

Happy New Year!

Hi KillerBee, its interesting how you miss hunting around riding mountain. I miss moose hunting between Elmworth and the B.C. border, and I also miss getting drawn for camp Wainwright deer hunt.
It looks like its getting close to happy hour around hear, time to make a drink and get ready for the Junior game.

Happy New Year.

Happy New Year K/B,
I haven't mastered the pics on this sight yet as I had trouble trying to do it a while back and just haven't made the time to try.
The Buck from the story hangs in my office like I mentioned, and I don't have hunt pics from back then as it was pre Cell phone's convenience.
Sorry.

HS 58

Happy New Year to you too HS 58

Dont we all wish we carried a small camera back in the day right? I only started taking pictures later in my hunting trips, sure is nice to look back at the ones I took, only downside is seeing myself getting older and uglier the older I get lol.

A great service I use to post pictures is www.imgur.com It's free, you simply set up an account then you can upload you photos there and after it is uploaded you can share them by copying the link from their (message boards & forms) and paste the link in your message. Simple and great service especially for free.

As an example here is a picture of my Ice Fishing Partners, fishing the other day. The one in red is hauling the beer and the gal in black is carrying my Viagra and a defibrillator lol.

Have a great 1st day of 2023!

160 yards, moose, quartering on, out in an open meadow, surrounded by jungle second growth. 35 years or more ago. Effective shot, but a mistake....

Might have only caught one lung. He died 100-150 yards away, in a circle of 10' tall over-lapping branch-to-branch spruce , obviously around the perimeter of an old squirrel midden. That in turn was surrounded by a wall of matchstick deadfall fire-killed spruce 7-10 feet tall, depending where, exactly. Around that was 8-10 foot high birch second growth covering the hillside about 10 inches apart that we had to push through. I'd walked within feet of him during the day-long search several times. Stepping thru the screen of spruce, I literally stepped on his remains at the same time I saw them.

I found him 10 days later by following my nose. That's a shot situation I won't take anymore, obviously. Now it's neck shots if I can get it within 100 yards in that kind of cover. Longer range, or more open country, I'll take the boiler room, or better yet, spine/high shoulder.

If I knew then what I know now, I would not have taken the shot, and secondly, I would have found him, simply because that was the most inaccessible part on the hillside, where all good animals go to die. Bastards! I know that now.

160 long paces or close to it. A shot I had no business taking. Whitetail doe running from my left to my right full out. Ruger Redhawk .44 magnum. Iron sights.

Missed standing quartering towards me shot on her about 30 yards away to my left. Missed running full out directly in front of me maybe 20 yards. Perfect heart shot at distance. Even though i did a lot of shooting back then, it was pure luck. Should not have taken the shot. Young and stupid.

I killed a whitetail doe with a lucky shot that I should not have taken. I was with some companions who were hunting nearby. A doe came past them and the 12 year old beginner hunter fired four or five rapid shots at the doe. I thought I heard one or two hits. She came past me, way out and running just as fast as a deer possibly can. Not sure why i thought she was wounded, but I decided to "help" anyway. I swung way in front, kept swinging and touched off my .25-06. Down she went. At just over 350 long steps. One bullet in the diaphragm, just caught the lungs. No other wound.

350 yards lead cow with 270 Win 160 grain partitions dropped her where she stood

270 hey? Have heard a lot about their lethality and light recoil but never shot one.

Good Shooting ~

KB

measured after the shot 199 yards nice 5x5 mule deer buck with my 257 Weatherby mag. Ruger #1 ,1 shot flop bang , my son-in-law passed up this mule deer buck with David and me but was pissed at himself when he held the antlers .

Nope hade a 3x9 bushnell scope on that rifle.

A friend's dad has shot a dozen or so whitetail
at that range with a scoped 30/30 ( at least 2 that
ive watched) and everybody always says that I'm
a liar. They also believe that a 30/30 runs out of
gas after 100 yards and just drops I guess.
They probably never shot or held a 30/30

Deer at 130 yards with a .32 Winchester Special 94 made in 1912. It's a carbine with the three blade express type sight. Rare shot for me until recently due to the fact that 50-75 yards is as far as you can see most places I hunted. My new property has two blinds where I can get over 100 yard shots.

So far I'd be called a liar. And stupid shot it was.

Same with irons for the most part except my irons not offhand, had witnesses.

Well actually the offhand one did too..

That doesn't excuse the stupidity of some of those shots.

400 yards on a big bull moose. My first moose -- 30=06 with iron sights. I was holding at the top line of his back. The sights covered the animal. Uncle said it was a lucky shot. Dad said maybe so, but he must have had it pointed in the right general direction.

Bout 75 yards

Well no fancy shooting or long range story for me. Best standing off hand shot was at a big hog, maybe 250lbs. He was at the edge of a peanut field. shot him with a 308 at 140 yds. Not a perfect shot, a little high, but I got him.