Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Ask The Gunwriters A Close-in Deer Rifle

StGeorger,

Good stories!

They reminded me of the time I went night-time jackrabbit hunting with some other guys, on a Montana ranch where I'd worked for a while a couple years earlier. We were all in our late teens and early 20s, cruising in two pickups exactly the way you describe, with two guys standing behind the cabs, ready to shoot.

We were in the hayfields along the "crick" (Montana pronunciation) that ran close to the ranch house. I was in the second pickup, and all of sudden the light from the headlights of the first pickup disappeared--but we could still see the tail-lights, though much higher than they usually were.

It turned out one of the old ranch horses had died, and the rancher's father had used a backhoe to dig a grave in the field. But he hadn't gotten around to dragging the horse into it the hole before dark, so the front pickup was angled at about a 45-degree angle into the hole. Luckily, it "dove" in slowly, and only one the headlights needed to be replaced....

I would use my Remington Hepburn in 45-70 , if I was feeling strong that day .

Good iron sighted 94 is always tough to beat in the woods

Got curious about this question after the thread first disappeared for a while.

So looked through the big game hunting notes I've been keeping since 1966, after taking my first deer. The arbitrary cut-off was a maximum of 50 yards, and here are the results from all the deer since then:

Cartridge/ range(s)/ bullet weight(s)
.30-30/ 40 feet and 12 feet/ 150 and 170
.243 Win./ 50, 50, 20, 35 yards/ 100-105
.257 Roberts/ 50 yards/ 100
.25-06/ 50 yards/120
.270 Win./10, 50, 50, 50, 40, 40, 50 130, 150 yards/130 and 150
7x57/30, 42 yards/140, 156
.30-06/20, 50, 50 yards/165, 200
.300 H&H/35 yards/180
.35 Remington/50 yards/200

The closest range, the 12 feet with a .30-30, was accomplished with an old outside-hammer drilling made by Sauer and imported by the original Charles Daly firm, which had both open sights and a flip-up tang aperture sight. But the 10-yard shot with the .270 Winchester was accomplished with a 4x scope.

Buttstock,
I had a buddy in upstate NY who many years ago sent an 870 smooth bore barrel to PA and had it rifled. He cast his own round balls and loaded them in to a shortened, scissors cut wad. I don’t remember anything else but it was an accurate “rifle” and the round balls killed very well.
Best regards,
F01

I must be reading this wrong. I'm only coming up with 21 deer killed inside 50 yards since 1966 ?

I grew up hunting in Oregon, mostly blackmail. My first few were with a Marlin 336 in .30-30, but being young I was sure I needed an '06. The next year I took another blackmail at about 20 yards with a scoped 06 and it didn't work any better.

I eventually settled on a .257 Roberts.
These days I use a .223 just as often as not.

I wish I kept records like that. Do you keep a daily journal? Do you keep a journal of your hunts? I kept one for one season when I quail hunted. I can read it now, takes me back to that day. I see the locations we hunted, the dogs we had then, wish I had kept one for every year I hunted. My wife has kept a daily journal like her grandmother. She can tell you the day and time most everything that’s happened in her life. It’s in Italian, so I can’t read it.

Thumbs up! Another time we were out in the wife's 73 Super Beetle, me, Wade, her and the kid. Drove into a deep bowl between two hills. Trouble was I couldn't get the car out of the bowl. Many attempts but it wasn't powerful enough. Finally, I went up as far as I could on the back hill, threw it in reverse and floored it going backwards. We made it barely. The foibles of youth.

One of my favorite O'Connor books was "Horse and Buggy West." I think you could do the same, and us gun guys would make it a big seller.

hanco,

I have kept records of my handloading and big game animals since around 20, but couldn't call them journals. Instead they record the technical particulars, such as the animal, range, what it was taken with--whether rifle, shotgun, handgun or bow--and either estimated or actual weight. Eileen bought an 800-pound freight scale at a garage sale maybe 15-20 years ago, and we've been weighing most animals since--which has resulted in some interesting information for her game cookbooks.

I started keeping journals of major hunts around 20 years ago, making notes each day. They've also helped considerably when working on stories, because like many "mature" hunters I don't remember details quite as well as I used to! Or perhaps as well as I thought!

StGeorger,

Now that's a funny story!

Have been thinking about doing one more book, though might not be able to stop there. I also like Horse and Buggy West a lot, but some (including Eileen) have suggest something more like O'Connor's The Last Book.

Somehow I missed this thread when it first posted. I'm glad it got bounced back up to the top. Great photos & stories. Thanks for sharing!

The same. I hunt in areas where the terrain doesn't vary widely. So I have the luxury of being able to pick the right rifle for the type of shot I'll probably encounter. I know that other posters in this thread have to account for a much wider range of varying possibilities where they hunt.


I can identify with this post: My 6,5x55 is a Ruger #1S & my larger bore is a .405 Winchester 1885 Traditional Hunter with a Marble peep sight. The last deer I didn't put in the freezer was in some high grass on the edge of a bog outside of Morrilton, AR. It stepped out into the gloom of dusk right after sunset as I was doing 180 degree scans of the woods & I almost missed it because it blended in so well. While I was trying to determine if it was legal in the low light (it was!), it took a step behind some brush and evaporated like a ghost.


Here are my two rifles for close hunting: An Uberti 1885 in .303 British & a Ruger #1 RSI in .275 Rigby. I use Hornady 150gr Interlock SP bullets in the .303 & Rigby 140gr Interlock SP (also loaded by Hornady) bullets in the .275 with a Leupold Big Bore 3x20 from their custom shop. So my Ruger is very similar in description to Sell's rifle and I can see why he liked that particular setup. Both of my rifles have slender forearms that feel particularly good in my hands. They both go to my shoulder naturally and point well. The Ruger at 36" long is the shortest rifle in my safe (this comparison is true as long as the stock on my Wilson Combat in .300 HAM'R is fully extended). I pulled the Weaver quarter rib off of the Uberti & replaced it with a plain rib for iron sights only.

Woods still-hunting carbine: Ruger 77/357 w/ aperture sight



Factory Federal 158 gr. JSP works surprisingly well, from rabbits to deer.




GR

I have a group of #1's that would qualify, 35 Whelan, 405, 450/400, 375 and a custom High Wall in 38/55. All are short and handy.

Had one of those as a 77/44 with a little red dot sight, fed 300 gr paper patched pure lead.







Dead Deer

My “close-in” deer rifle…..ain’t a rifle! 🤔 If close-in shots are expected, I’ll be using my S&W 460 XVR! 😉 memtb

The Sako Mannlichers would be great

John,

I have read somewhere the H&BW caused a lot of hard feelings among the descendants of some of the Arizona Territory families that JOC wrote about, so you might want to think twice about writing your version of H&BW.

John Wooters was a fan of Sako Mannlichers for hunting the East Texas woods.

The majority of trackers and still-hunters who I know or have known favored lever, pump, or semi-auto actions when hunting in tight cover unless they were hunting during a muzzle loader season and were limited by law to a single shot. As a group they felt that bolt action rifles were slower to cycle for follow up shots. One of my still-hunting mentors, Thelma, shot a Remington 600 in 243, but she moved through the woods like her Abenaki ancestors and shot like Annie Oakley, so most any buck that she went after was living on borrowed time. Thelma was a meat hunter, so she went for big bodies and cared nothing for antler size or shape.

Agreed! Unfortunately for me, I don’t think I’ve seen a Sako Mannlicher (like the recent 85 Bavarian Carbine) in a left-handed model (if one was ever available) & I’ve seen them rarely in right-handed models. The Mannlicher that slipped through my fingers was a nice Dakota 76 chambered in 7mm-08. Somebody at the auction wanted it way more than I did. But I think it would have worked well for the hunting we’re discussing.