Home Forums Hunting & Shooting General Big Game 6.5 Creed - moose bullets

In Scandinavia the "moose load" for the 6.5X55 is the 156 and 160 gr round nose. The advent of bonding makes them even better. Norma offers a very good 156 bonded bullet but I fear it may be difficult to find in the US. I use the 156 grain PPU bullet and it has been simply excellent but I have never kills anything larger then a buck deer with my 6.5X54. I have killed both antelope and deer with both the 160 grain Sierras and the 1650s gran Hornady and both (especially the Sierra) broke up to a degree that I would not trust them for something as large as a moose.
Bullets I'd look at are the Swift 140 gr A frame. both the PPU and Norma offerings, the 140 grain Nosler partitions (I have some of these to sell at $50 a box)
and the 160 grain Woodliegh

Maybe. I don't know. I have shot three deer with the Creed and none went down the way they should have. Two of them stood there wounded after the shots and required 2nd shots. The other one ran off and left such a faint blood trail I was never able to find it. I know that is a small sample size but have not been impressed with the killing power of the Creed. All shots were within 40 yards. I have killed deer with 308 Win, 30-06, and 338 Federal and never lost a deer shot with any of those cartridges and they went right down within 30 yards. I may have just been unlucky but I don't see any advantage to the Creedmoor in Northeastern deer woods where the shots are short. I may try the Creedmoor again but I love the way my 338 Federal anchors them.

My experience after this year is exactly the opposite. 3 deer, 1 elk all fell quickly to a single 150 LRAB from the Creed. I've shot alot of deer with various cartridges, bullets, and calibers. The creed with the 150 has been as solid as anything I've shot deer with. The elk to me was telling albeit a sample of 1. Quartering to at 50 yards or so. 1 shot tucked inside the left shoulder. No exit but a blood trail apparently from her nose/mouth Stevie Wonder could have followed. She was literally bouncing off trees within 50 yards and managed 75 yards straight downhill. Of course it was into black timber on a 45 degree angle......

I've shot a 270 with 130-150 grain bullets a fair bit. I think of the 6.5 creed/150 LRAB as a SA 270 because the performance has been identical despite the 200 ft/sec "handicap". I think the bullet and it's terminal effects is the deciding factor in about anything between 6mm and 30 cal.

As an aside, the 270 gives up its initial speed/trajectory advantage by about 500 yards. The creed definitely drifts less at all ranges over 200 despite the 200 ft/sec. If you're into KE, the creed carries more KE past 400 yards than the 270/150 gr.

Use better bullets, or make better shots.

Yup, this.

Really weird. We moved from 308 to 6.5 creed years ago. Probably a hundred animals with each by now. I've never seen any difference between the 2 really. Other than one is flatter obviously.

Deer just dont' take much to kill.

How long did those wounded deer stand around after the shot? Before you shot again? I can shoot deer twice pretty often if I really wanted to or panicked for whatever reason. They simply don't die quickly no matter the case. They may fall over quickly sometimes or at the shot but they are not dead just because they hit the ground. For a heart to stop and or to loose blood pressure, even with a head shot, it takes time.

I used a 6.5 CM for the first time this past season and dropped two WT does with 120 gr Scenar. Both DRT. WT deer are not that hard to put down.

you wanna use a 6.5 Creedmoor and yes its a good cartridge for regular deer go right ahead . i hunt for bigger bucks up north and when i pull the trigger i want that buck to go down called DRT , i hate tracking bucks sometimes those smart old bucks don`t die easy as do bigger elk bulls sometimes a little more power can give you an edge if you can handle the recoil.

The one I shot last year stood there for at least a minute or two while I rooted in my pack for another bullet. I have no idea what the issue was. I am shooting these deer at bow ranges so the shots are always through the vitals (I don't aim for shoulder bones). Maybe I've just had some bad luck but it was enough to make me leery. The two I shot twice would have died anyway but I don't want them standing there suffering until I take a second shot. Maybe I will experiment more. These three were shot with 140 grain bullets so I am guessing the velocity was around 2,600 fps. The only ever cartridge I have used that is slow like that is the 338 Federal and that wallops them. I know deer can be easy to kill -- I personally saw a doe killed with a 22 wmr to the vitals and it ran about 100 yards before dying. I am just stating my experience so far with the Creedmoor. I have quite a few rifles so I've been using other ones recently. I put a McMillan stock on the rifle and a more powerful scope to use it for longer range target shooting. I may give the Creedmoor another try this upcoming year to see if I can get better results.

I kind of feel the same way. In all honesty, I don't really notice a recoil difference between the Creedmoor and my 308s, 30-06s or 338 Federal. Maybe if I shot them back-to-back at a target range I would notice but none of them have a bothersome recoil. The only gun I have shot where the recoil made it unpleasant was shooting 12-gauge slugs at targets. Those shots can be uncomfortable. Maybe that, and the fact that I am a woods hunter taking short shots, is the reason I don't find any real advantage in the Creedmoor for my kind of hunting.

I hunt big bucks even further north, and bullet placement and construction is the only way to guarantee DRT. The 6.5 CM has DRTd moose, elk, and deer for me and those I hunt with.

My friend and one of his sons have been using the 260 Remington (6.5 Creedmoor ballistic twin) at the camp for close to twenty years. The loads, factory and handloads by me, have used 120 grain Ballistic Tips, 120 grain Accutips (an SST undercover in Rem. factory ammo), 129 grain Interlocks, 125 grain Partitions and maybe others I've forgotten about. The results have been uniformly good.

If you're strictly a rib cage shooter I suggest using a faster moving bullet. Put a 120 grain Ballistic Tip through that chest.

140 NP!!!

I have not been happy with the dead moose from partitions. They have never exited including right weight for MV caliber uses. In fact I've seen them stopped in the 2nd lung twice.

Dead yes. Go anywhere nope. Take a longer than normal time to bleed out the rest of the way, maybe.

But other bullet styles have made the exit easy or at least to under the skin off side.

Just my take from having seen quite a few bulls shot over the years.

YMMV and if you are happy run em for sure.

.
We run a lot of 140 bergers on deer. Ribs only as he says. I have yet to have a single issue with killing deer or pigs with those bullets. The ones shot with 127 LRX aren't flopped quite as quickly yet very dead. But I've never seen a none expansion 140. Usually I'm wishing we would have used the 127s due to extra damage if you accidentally nip shoulder meat in our out.

OTOH if you don't care about meat damage etc... faster and lighter and more explosive usually is more impressive assuming it always gets far enough in the get the job done.

I've shot so many pigs with the 40 vmax in 223 that should NOT work but rib shots and head shots always work so there is that. But the ones I use that on are generally not meat pigs so no big deal on the damages.

This has been a very informative thread - thanks and keep it going!

I'd opine that the Nos LRAB has to be about perfect for deers. They put a golf ball size hole through everything they hit and exit, at least the 3 from last year did. If you're shooting a 6.5, have a look at the 150 LRAB. Some guys report they couldn't get them to shoot. Mine likes both the 142 and 150 under Re16 or H4350.

I haven't heard much about the 150gr LRAB yet, would you be ok deliberately taking a shorter range shoulder/high shoulder shot on whitetail with LRAB (129/142/150) at swede creed speeds? I have an area where even a short run can be a problem, and was leaning towards TTSX or LRX this year.... thanks

There have been far too many elk moose and deer killed up in Northern Alberta with all manner of 6.5 bullets at varying velocities to dismiss that caliber , regardless of the case it came out of .

Cat

In my opinion (with limited on-game experience), the ABLR would probably be a better match for a 6.5 Creedmoor than a standard Accubond. They are designed to expand at lower velocities but are still bonded. The softer bullet should work well with the lower velocity you get from a 6.5 Creedmoor. I have about 100 rounds of the factory loaded ABLR in 6.5 Creedmoor for this reason. I have only taken one deer with it (a doe of about 150 pounds live) and it worked as expected. I used the 142 grain version and it was a full pass-through on a broadside shot with a good exit. My shot was high (a couple inches below the spine) and the trauma to the spine dropped the deer immediately.