Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Rifles The PERFECT woods loafer's rifle from rabbits to deer?

My buddies Jim and Dave were over yesterday PM and while we were sitting around the table in the gun room, we were talking about what would be the perfect woods loafer's rifle.

Jim is a native Nebraskan and since he grew up shooting small game and birds along the edges of creek bottoms and shelter belts, he said that he'd opt for a combination gun in 222 or 223 under a 16 or 12 gauge with screw-in chokes with a Leupold 2-7x in QRW rings and a Weaver base.

Dave was raised in Cincinnati, OH, and hunted mostly around his Grandparents' farms in Boone County, KY. He said that he'd opt for a Remington 7 stainless action, McM Compact Edge stock, and 19" #1 contour stainless barrel with a 1 in 8" ROT in 223. Dave says that a Leupold 2-7x will work for him too.

As much as I like combination guns, I think that they are mostly too heavy for a woods loafer's rifle. Make mine a Remington 7 stainless with a McM Hunter Edge and a 19" #1 contour stainless barrel, 1 in 8" ROT, in 223. I'll go with a Leupold VX2 2-7x33 too.

What would be YOUR perfect woods loafer's rifle?

Jeff

My first thought was a Marlin 1894 in 357mag.

In TX you are as likely to cross a hog as anything else, so I'd opt fer a little more mass out the end. How's about a 70 featherweight in 7x57 and just to be different on the scope (I'd have picked the same as everyone else otherwise) FXII 2.5x20 UL.

+1 on the 1894 in 357 mag.

If I was in the survival mode, or the woods mode, I'd get one of these and never look back.

124 grain 9mm FMJs for rabbits and such, 158 JHP or 180 hard cast for most everything bigger than a dog.

A John Wooters .25 Copperhead. .222 Rem mga opene up to .25 I think. A very good article in Handloader Magazine describes it.

My first was a Savage 219 in 30-30, no scope. Light, easy to carry, and loads of different energy levels are easy to make.

Now it is a Contender carbine with the non-bull barrels. Your choice of calibers.

Bruce

My woods loafing rifle for the past dozen or so years has been a Ruger 77/22H .22 Hornet. It has taken everything from squirrels to deer & hogs without any drama.

That said, my "perfect" woods loafer rifle would be a CZ 527 modified with a 3-position swing safety, a staggered internal magazine, and an 8" twist .222 Rem. barrel, stoked with 70gr Speer's at 2,750fps. I doubt that I will ever posses such a rifle.

A rifle for loafin around in the woods from rabbits to deer?

Make mine a light, fast, and an extremely handy 16.5" barreled Ruger compact (35.5" OAL) in a 260 Remy.

Slap a light and compact Leupy scope on it and I`m in biz!

Not sure if it was Larry Koller that coined the term "Woods Loafer" but his choice and one of mine is the 250 Savage.

I could stay up late at night comparing a 99 lever to a lightweight Mauser probably with a mannlicher stock and 20" barrel. The 2-7x scope would suit me fine.

A 257 Bob would be hard to beat too, and if I wanted to be modern then it would be in a NULA.

I would +1 on that choice. One in 44mag might not be a bad choice either. You could load 44sp in lead for rabbits and the 44 would probably be a better deer rifle and could even work for bear, if it/you had to. Prolly not a bad home defense gun either.

I'd go for one of the 16.5" trapper models that you don't see very often. Nice thing about the 44 is that you can cast your own bullets. 357 too, but I think I'd rather have a 44, all things being equal.

How bout a Marlin 1894 in 256 Win Mag shooting a 65 gr. TSX....

I think a 44 Magnum levergun would work fine for that type of work. Make mine a Browning B-92, but a Marlin 94 will do nicely.

I think a lightweight single shot 45-70, with a hand full of 2 1/2" 410 shells would be about right! Don

Perfect Woodsloafer

.223 with 56gr. TSX

Take the 3 round mag and a 2,5x FX UL Leupold

A Rossi Mod 92 Winchester clone in 357 mag. With peep sights. With camo duct tape. As a matter of fact, it should look exactly like this one!

Well in Montana the woods Loafer rifle would either be a .220 Swift or 22.250 in a short action with a fast twist barrel.

While neither one is the perfect griz stomper they will do the job with the right premium bullet.

Here in Montana we have everything from gophers to griz and everything in between. You never know what you'll run into here.

Oh ya, for a scope of good 3 to 9 power is about the best choice.

I don't know, maybe other's idea of a "woods loafer's" weapon is different than mine. To me, that describes an activity where one hunts through the woods with no particular target in mind......but ALL targets accepted. If it runs, crawls, flies, jumps or swims.......it is fair game and a potential meal.

I did a lot of this in years past where I would hunt down a creek bottom taking any target of opportunity. If a rabbit broke from the brush.....he went into the game bag. If a coon or squirrel ran up a tree....he became part of the stew that night. If dove or quail happened by.....they too became a night's meal. If a duck flushed from the creek......roast duck was that night's meal. Snapping turtles that sat too long on a log.....turtle soup was always welcome. And if, by chance a deer or hog wandered close......many meals would follow.

For most of this type hunting the prefered weapon (and still probably one of the best choices) was a double shotgun with buckshot in one barrel and squirrel shot in the other. A cousin had another gun that all of us boys lusted after.....a Savage Model 24 with a .222 barrel over a 20 ga. shotgun. That gun was SWEET for a mixed bag hunt and the .222 gave it a range advantage over the buckshot we used. Primarilly because of the sometimes "oversize" hogs we encountered.....we all agreed that the "perfect" combination would be a .30-30 or .308 over a shotgun barrel, but we never saw one even though we knew they existed.

Now days, when I go on a "whatever shows up" type walk/hunt I mostly take a Savage Model 23 chambered for the .25-20. It is GREAT, doing little damage to edible small game and giving me more "reach" than the shotgun. It IS a bit light for deer/hogs, but that hasn't kept me from taking a number of each with careful bullet placement. Because of the possibility of a bigger (250+ pound) hog showing up, I normally also carry a .45 Colt revolver on my belt.

The disadvantage to this rifle/revolver combo is that you give up a lot of shots on birds. Doves and quail must be spotted while they are sitting and duck must be "stalked" while they are still on the water (this type hunting isn't about "sport" it's about collecting supper the most effective way you can).

For that reason I still think we had it right 40 years ago. A shotgun/rifle combo like the Model 24 or a double shotgun backed up with a good revolver is still the "perfect" woods loafer's weapon.......they can do it all!!

For me the term "woods loafing" has always meant just kind of wandering around in the woods early autumn, looking things over, getting ideas about where and what to hunt and trap and carrying a rifle to knock off targets of opportunity but not being real serious about it. My "woods loafer" rifle is a '94 Marlin .25-20 with a Leupie 1-4. 86 grain Remington FNSP's at 1600 do whatever needs doing without a lot of fuss and bother.

my woodsrunning gun depends on the season, if during deer season i make sure it something that has enough whompability for that.

i'm a contender carbine fan, and i set up one of mine for utility use while filling feeders, running the fences, working food plots, etc.

It is a stainless lightweight tapered shorty in .357max with a ghost ring rear & fiber optic front. i am ordering a matching barrel to go with it in .30reece, which is the .357mag necked to .30cal, sort of a chunky .256winmag. neat little round that gives 32/20+ performance using cheap brass, but has a more solid shoulder for headspacing.

It weighs right at 4 pounds with the factory tupperware stocks...very handy.

I read an article a few years back on this very subject by Francis Sell. He really was a wealth of knowledge on deer hunting but in this particular article, he favored the 25-20 to match this description. He shot deer with it too and an elk also as I seem to recall. Seems a bit light to me even for small deer.
I think from what I have read here in this thread, considering that this is to be a rifle for the woods, a lever action in .44 magnum would be hard to beat.
I used to own a Ruger Vaquero in .44 Magnum and I handloaded for it at .44 Special velocity. It was very pleasant to shoot.
The truth is, while I am hunting, I am armed specifically for the game that I have in mind. If I'm just out for a stroll I feel no need to carry a weapon here in the Maine woods.
Different strokes I guess. I might feel differently elsewhere.