Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Deer Hunting You can't kill a deer around here with THAT!

Bob,

Funny thing was, the guy with the .300 Jarrett ("winner" of the Biggest Rifle In Camp Award) never did get a deer. He missed at least 3--which just goes to prove, once again, that the "shock wave" doesn't contribute a lot to killing power!

Wow am I ever glad I don't live anywhere near them little tough deer or armadillos. I aint the man I onst wuz and can barely shoulder my 257 Bob/// My life would be in danger
Randy

MD: Friend of mine, a good guy but poor shot,came from NY to practice at my range. He sucked SO bad with his 300 Weatherby I made him put it away and pull out his 270,which he did MUCH better with. I told him to use the 270 in Alberta, which he did.

He STILL missed, but admitted he was just a bum shot and really needed to practice more.....there's a lesson here.

At the risk of generalizing,I seem to run into two types of 300 mag shooters; those who know EXACTLY what they are doing,are very fine shots and very experienced guys; and those who are completely clueless....

Missing 3 deer on ONE TRIP really sucks!What can you say to a guy like that? I'd feel really sorry for him.....

We all should practice more. I agree there are many who figure if they carry a big gun they are real hunters. And many who know and use their large power rifles with knowledge and excellence. The calibre carried does not say anything about the skill level.

When I was a boy men carried one rifle that they knew intimately and shot well. Most were not power houses but game was more plentiful ander under a lot less pressure. A 30/30 was all the gun needed. A bush hunting stalk hunter is still not under gunned with one today.

Randy

I have been told Plains deer in KS., NE., SD., ND., and WY. cannot be killed by the "diminutive" .25-06 and that my .257 Roberts was even worse. Oh and the 8x57 is too rainbow like in trajectory to be good at any range past 100 yards.

As an additional data point my .270WSM is supposedly going to bounce off any Elk and is barely adequate for deer in TX.

Even outfitters get caught in the cobwebs of this mindset.
While scanning outfitter websites for a deer hunt in Saskatchewan or Alberta some of them read 7mm as a minimum caliber. (Which I took as a backwards way to imply no 270's.)

Well, don't tell the moose up here that they need anything more than a 243 to get killed with, cause my wife's first one went down to a 243 Handi-Rifle stuffed with 95 gr Partitions. Shot was almost face on at around 40 yards. Moose died inside of 50 feet with NO LUNGS left.

She is shooting a 30-06 now, but that cow was tasty and netted about 350 pounds of meat. She's a cool hand with a rifle at her shoulder.

Dunno about deer, but .308 is too light for elk in Oregon! So they say.

-jeff

Wow! All this talk of magnum this and improved that leaves me ashamed. You see, I reverted back to Neandethal status. I swore off sights, rests, range finders, nick nacks and doo dads.
I killed my last Ohio doe with a stick and string...

Stupid computer...

John,

How much did it weigh when you got closer?

Or did you mean "shot a buck at 300 yards that field dressed 225 lbs?"

;-)

It ain't only the deer! Older fellow at work told me he used to shoot a 270, but hit a coyote 2 times in the ribs and it up an ran off! Traded that puny 270 off on a 7 magnum, now he never looses one he hits. He liked that so good, he went and bought a 300 magnum. Asked me to check the scope and do a trigger job on it. When he brought it in he hadn't been able find the box of shells he had for it. Said it must of gotten lost when he moved 10 years ago, too bad cause there was still 17 rounds left from that box he bought at the same time as he got the rifle. He likes "130s in the 7 and 150s in the 300 cause they're so fast you don't have to worry about how far they are". Specially on elk

I'd like to know how he field dressed it at 300 yards. Long knife?

It seems that lately deer have become bullet proof not only to caliber specific rifles but also to bullets that are not sold under a premium price tag. I guess I'll have to tell all the deer I've shot with my .308 and .30-06 with Core-loks and Gamekings to get out of my freezer because they really aren't dead until they were shot with a bullet that costs $5.00 apiece.

A lot of this bullet proof deer stuff is simply regional demographics. Look closly and you'll see trends:

For instance, have you ever noticed how in areas with high populations of assisted living retirment centers adjacent to large herds of frail, high strung deer, that the .223 is the most popular cartridge of choice? A coincidence you say? I think not!

Big city hunter: = shiney .300 magnum, huge 12-40x64mm scope. s/s barrel with spiral fluting and plastic stock..( the fluting adds nothing to the bullistic advantages of the .300, it just gives the deer something to look at ) The deer of course are brutes that are never killed at less than 600 yards!

Gang banger hunters: = 9mm... any color, as long as it matches the spinner hub caps. Scope optional, but most shooters polled say their too hard to use at night from a moving vehicle.
Rifles aren't normaly used, as you need one hand to hold your pants up. Whuzza "deer"?

Anyway, the list goes on and on... You could color code the states, like they do during election years...color code the rifles too, so you could mix n match for outa state hunts!

This is gonna make a great book!

Reporting in from south Alabama here.

First the one thing that the local online forum experts and behind the sporting goods counter guys here in Bama are certain of is that the .243 will not consistently kill deer. Oh sure they acknowledge that deer have been killed by a 243 but quickly add that a 22 short can possibly kill a deer but that doesn't make it a good deer round. They are fond of saying that if you hunt with a 243 sooner or later you will lose a deer just because you are using a 243. I would have thought shot placement would play a part in losing a wounded deer but apparently not. Nope, sooner or later a deer hit squarely in the lungs will just refuse to die simply because the bullet came from a 243. You see there is this concept called "Margin of Error." I'm no expert on it but apparently it works like this. The bigger and more powerful cartridge I shoot a deer with the farther away from the vitals I can hit him without any fear of losing him. Rifles like a 338 ultra mag allow you to shoot a deer any where and the resulting hydrostatic pulse wave will still race through their veins and arteries exploding their heart, lungs and brain. As you go down in power the kill zone shrinks accordingly. By the time you get down to a 30-30 or 243 the sure kill vital zone on a deer has shrunk to the brain pan and the asending loop of the Aorta. Any hit outside these areas with such underpowered rounds are a complete 50/50 crap shoot as to whether the animal will be recovered or not. That could be important info for your book.

Also, I foolishly based my past rifle purchases on the fact that almost all of my shot's would be less than 150 yards on Alabama deer rarely weighing more than 170 lbs. With that as my guide I thought short action calibers like 243, 7mm-08 or 308 hurling 100 to 150 grain bullets at 2700 to 2800 fps from light weight 22 inch barreled rifles would be ideal. WRONG, WRONG, WRONG!!! Thankfully I have been educated that one must not base rifle purchases on what you will be doing with it 99.9% of the time but instead on what you might do with it once. So, while to the inexperienced hunter, it may seem odd for me to spent the next 15 years shooting small deer at 100 yards with a 338 magnum. I as a newly "In The Know" hunter just brush aside the looks on their uninformed faces, confident in the knowledge that the brown bear hunt I might go on one time before I die will have made this caliber the right one for all my needs.

As the proud owner of a 35 Whelen deer rifle, I completely understand. Look at it this way: as this growing acquired immunity problem creeps into our woods, we will be ready with our new super pills to take care of the problem.

Huh?

Was that Arturo Schopenhauer from the Dominican? Played third base for the Padres a few years back. Good glove but no bat. Same guy. right?

Ever since my anemic loads, from wimpy calibers, out of crappy rifles, started bouncing off of deer, I realized, hey, I coulda had a 338!
Never seen a deer not die when hit right, even a front stuffer squirrel rifle could/will do the job.

I had good success with the 30 calibers . but due to the evelution thing went to the old 45/70 and its been doing quite well. but to stay ahead of those toughazz deer I had a special encore barrel made in the 50/70 caliber. my theroy is when they become used to the newer calibers we have to start over with the older calibers as they can only be resistent to a couple calibers at a time. I presently am building a 64 caliber muzzle loader rifle that should really confuse the heck out of them.