Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Rifles What did you kill your first big game animal with?

Whitetail buck at 10 paces with an Ithaca Model 37 20 gage and slugs. He had eluded many other drivers and standers on that drive. He really shouldn't have tried to come past me. I killed him twice, once on the dead run and then again before he could hit the ground.

That was in 1997 and the unfortunate beast was a small to midlin cowhorn spike. Used my Model 94 30-30 made in, unfortunately, 1995.

5pt (eastern count) WT buck at 75ish yards. Savage M110E in 243 Win with a handloaded 100gr Remington Core-Lokt.

6 point Pennsy white-tail with a 50lb Hoyt Olympian recurve bow back in 1957.

Remmington 600, 6mm. Blacktail doe. Hit it in the neck, darn near tore the head clean off.
Virgil B.

.300 Savage 99R with a tang peep. I shot a nice 4x4 mule deer.

I was twelve and it was 1959.

Dancing Bear..Cool!

Wish I had my 99R in .300 and we could use rifles back then in Maryland in '60..

Mine has a 2.5X Lyman Alaskan and is vintage '54..
Great rifles and great cartridge! Jim

Fall wild turkey
12 gauge Ithaca 37.

A nice doe with my Marlin 1894 357mag when I was 7yrs old. Funny thing my cousin just used it to kill a nice 8pt this year. Nice deer, went about 10yrds and dropped.

It was a Winchester Big Bore Model 94 in .444 Marlin. The animal was a wild Vermont boar. Very memorable hunt, with dogs.

1972 a Remington 742, 30-06. Georgia Whitetail buck.

Marlin 336 in .30-30. Shot a mature doe 5x at about 25 yards, knocking her down. Shot a smaller doe that was with her, one shot, one kill. The mature doe got up and ran...I reloaded that rifle so quick that my buddies said there were, ....forgive me..."11 shots, sounded like a machine gun"...they said there was no break between the reports like it had gone full auto.

Well, I could swear I hit that doe at least 5 times, but she kept running off. We trailed her a mile, never did find her. Looked like someone ran through the woods, slopping blood out of a five gallon bucket.

I lost faith in the .30-30 that day, despite my reloading speed. When we drug the little doe to the road, some ol' boys rolled up and said, "one shot one kill! good job. Did you guys here some moron around here with a machine gun? he shot like 12 times without stopping. one shot, one deer, 2 shots, no deer....12 back to back shots, a big MO ron" My buddies looked at me and I said, yeah, we heard that. Must've been some idiot...i've gotten better since then, i promise.

Fellow Campfire Members:
On the 2nd last day of 1975, on the northern edge of the Rift Valley in Kenya, I shot a hartebeest with a borrowed .30-06 Model 70 with a 4X El Paso Weaver.

First deer was a 3point whitetail in 1976, with a Model 100 in .308.

All the best to you all this Christmas season.
Dwayne

Small spike whitetail with my Model 99 chambered in the ol' .300 savage. The guy had belong to my grandfather but I feel blessed to call it my own now.

I don't know how much better. I hear tell it took about 5 308's a year or two ago.

I shot my first two deer with the same gun. It's a Marlin 336,30-30. My Dad Gave me this gun when I was about 10 years old.
That was about forty years ago. Boy time goes by fast.
I still take that good ole gun for a walk in the woods now and then.
HD

Blacktail buck, 6.5X55 using 129 gr. Hornady in front of IMR 4350. The combination still works.

Did quite a bit of shooting before I actually went big game hunting. I well remember shaking like a leaf as I took aim with my Husqvarna Model 5000 in 270 Winchester at a nice black bear about 150 yd across a field of oats. Had stalked him for almost an hour and he looked HUGE in the scope!

I also remember the load I was using: 130 gr Win Silvertip, 62 gr of the old Hogdgon surplus 4831, in Win brass.

The bear dropped at the shot, got up, turned and ran about forty yards, then dropped and never moved. My heart was pounding as I approached him, and I can distinctly remember my disappointment as the bear shrunk in size the closer I got.

He was not a small bear at all, but not nearly as big as I thought he was. That was forty years ago. There has been a lot of big game go into the freezer since, but none were any more exciting than that bear.

Ted

'94 Winchester .30-30 carbine, with a Redfield receiver sight.

It was a gift from my Dad, when I was 11 years old. I still use it regularly, and appreciate it more every year.

The first victim was a nice, fat whitetail doe, shot from about 150 yards. Dad was right there, by my side. The next morning, I bagged my first buck (a 5-pointer), from about twelve yards. Those were some good times, for sure.

1995, second year hunting with my father, 243 win. in a Ruger M77 tang safety topped by a 3-9x40 Bushnell allowed me to take a 3 point whitey in an area south of Malta, MT called White Rock.