Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Elk Hunting Standard Cartridges for Elk

I've heard and read many times that a cartridge in the order of 270/280/30-06 is very adequate for even bull elk as long as the hunter is careful in picking his or her shots and using good bullets like partitions, fail safes and grand slams.

Nobody ever defines what being careful means.

Can you experienced elk hunters give me what you think this means in terms of distance, angles, animal behavior (eg. rutting vs feeding) and whatever you think is an important consideration.

I think being careful mostly means keeping your ranges short enough to be precise in bullet placement and retain enough energy to be lethal. One other thing to consider is the terrain and cover. If you're in more open country with less chance of losing the elk in cover you can "get away" with less gun.

As an example, I knew a guy from Alabama. He was stationed in Washington and was a good hunter. His rifle of choice was the .30-30. He killed a couple of elk with it. The shots were broadside at 100 yards or less.

One evening a 5x5 bull (Roosevelt) swam the river and as he was getting out on the bank he was shot with the .30-30. Water flew from the bullet strike. It was a good hit but the bull made no reaction except to head up the bank. Shot after shot was fired, 5 hits in all, every one in the "boiler room" and then the bull was gone in the heavy brush.

If you've never been to the Olympic Penninsula area of WA it's hard to describe but it was what we call "tangle-azz". The darkness, the rain, and the problem of getting searchers across the river slowed the search down. That bull was never found. The blood was gone, there were tons of tracks and his just blended in.

The guy bought a .300 magnum two weeks after returning from the hunt.

They found the skeleton of the bull the next year. The area had been clear cut and he was laying in a root hole where an old hemlock had tipped over. The hole had been overgrown with brush before the logging operation...a perfect place to hide.

A smaller gun works fine in places where it's more open, or you aren't likely to lose the tracks or bloodtrail due to pouring rain or heavy brush. I don't consider a .30-06 a smaller gun. With some good bullets like 180 or 200 Noslers they dump elk just fine.

Your milage may vary.

My defination only. Careful is knowing without a doubt that you can put a bullet in a paticular patch of hair, and being sure which hair to aim for.

I think being careful means that you know that you have a bullet that will penetrate through and make holes in vital organs from the angle and spot you have to shoot from.
A 270 with 130gr ballistic tips is pretty questionable shooting from a rear facing quartering angle, it might not penetrate through enough elk to reach the heart lungs. A 140gr Failsafe would as long as the shot isn't from 500yds away.
If you can't make a shot that will reach the vitals you shouldn't take the shot with any rifle from any range.
I haven't seen as many Elk killed as some on this forum have, but I have seen a couple shot with a 270 that took extra shots to knock over, but they were in the back of a truck dead right next to one shot with some magnum.............DJ

I think anything over a 300 yd shot is best passed up . Quartering away shots are best avoided, unless you've already put one into the heart/lungs. There's just to much stuff to get in the way of a bullet trying to make its way from the hams to the vitals.
Elk aren't as suseptable to the "bang flop" syndrom as whitetails, and can take a lot of punishment. I've seen them take as many as 6 hits from 300 wby.
Picking a bullet with good sectional density to help with penetrating hide and muscle, break ribs, and or leg bones is a good idea, but thousands of the buggers died from well placed shots with ordinary bullets before it became common knowledge that nothing less than a premium bullet will do.
Shoot as much gun as you accurately and consitently can, don't take silly desperation shots , you'll be fine with the "standard" cartriges.

First thing is dont take "Texas heart shots". Hunting comes in many forms and situations. Hunting in heavy brush, most shots will not be the ideal and some animals will be lost regardless what you are shooting. This caliber thing is a conversation starter more than anything else and everyone should shoot what they are comfortable with. There is no one rifle for all things that's why we have many rifles, pistols and shotguns. If we all liked the same thing everyone would have the same wife and automobile. I was a warden in NM and have seen animals killed with almost everything. The little 22LR poaches many animals every night everywhere there are animals and the spotlight is the only giveaway as to where it's happening. -- no <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/frown.gif" alt="" />

Those hard to kill bulls are usually ones that have just been run, climbed a mountain, or in the one case swam a river or lake. When they get thier adrenaline flowing , it takes a lot to put them down. If they are not spoked, and no adreniline is flowing, most calibers from .270 up will put them down bang flop as some say. I know a guy tha kills regularly with a 25-.06. Not my choice, but he does it.
My choice is an .06 with heavy bullets. I have killed elk from 15 yds up to 340 yds with them and the elk have gone down right now, and I usually kill one every year. If you are pushing bullets to high velocities, as magnums do, stay with the premiums, if not, most of the heavier bullets that Sierra, Hornady, Speer , etc will do the job, as long as they are placed in the right spot.

My rifle of choice for next year in heavy timber, just for a change, is a 44 mag carbine shooting full loads of hard cast bullets

There is a good conversation going on this site right now about the .270win specifically as an elk cartridge.
https://www.24hourcampfire.com/ubbthreads/showflat.php/Cat/0/Number/377087/an/0/page/0#377087

I personally prefer the .300mags as a nice minimum for elk. There are 2 distinctly different types of elk, old mature bulls and all the others. If you are after a bull elk I believe you�re going to want a strong hitting caliber because pound for pound a bull elk is one of the toughest animals around. Of course hunting elk is the same as hunting anything else, in that shot placement is the single most important factor, but I believe in using plenty of gun as insurance against a not so perfect shot. The more tissue you damage in the wound channel the better, especially marginal shots. Not everyone agrees you want/need a heavy magnum for elk but you can read more about that in the mentioned thread.

Great Elk talk, problem is it gets me fired up to go hunting and it's only January!

I posted on the thread regarding the 270 on elk. While I know it will work, if I am headed elk hunting it isn't my choice. I would much rather have my ruger #1 338 win with 250 gr nosler partitions (hard to go wrong with 300 mag and 200 partitions though). I shoot the 338 very well in field conditions; so why not have shot placement, large caliber, and lots of energy....

I agree with 300wby, big bulls are almost a different species than the "other elk", they are big and tough.

Just my 2 cents

Eric

It means don't punch him in the guts.

Poke a hole in the right spot with any of the big three, using a good bullet, and he'll be pushing up daisies.

What's the experienced opinion on the 308 Win for Elk?

Load it with 165 gr bullets and enjoy the elk meat.

Both of my sons have taken elk with the .308. Every time they used the 180-gr. Nosler Partition @2600 fps. Bulls were shot from 80 to 150 yards and made complete pass-throughs, with the exception of one bull shot at 100 yds., where the bullet could be found just under the skin on the far side. The farthest any bull traveled was about 40 yards. Pretty satisfactory performance, I'd say.

I�m with Ranch 13 Quartering away shots are best avoided; I can�t believe anyone would take this shot unless it was at a wounded animal.

Personally I will let the animal walk away if this is the only shot it gives me. I see no since in shooting the hams or whacking it in the gut too much wasted meat if you hit the hams, and I don�t like the taste of gut. Just a bad shot IMO.

If I don�t have a good shot I don�t shoot probably the reason I can say that I have never lost an animal.

Am I reading something wrong? A quartering away shot allows placing the bullet near the rear rib and through both lungs to the front of the far side shoulder. Seems just about perfect to me.

As a matter of fact, I shot both my Moose and Caribou that way in Newfoundland this year with my 30-06 and 180gr. Core Lokt Ultras,with perfect results. Moose was just over 200 yds. and went about 30 yds before falling over. The Caribou was under 100 Yds. and collapsed at the shot. Bullets passed through both animals. Neither shot hit any of the abdominal cavity.

If you're talking about a shot from an angle more to the rear where the angle requires bringing the hams into play, I agree completely. That, however, would not be a quartering shot.

FWIW:

Good Old Colonel Cooper once commented:

The 338 is a fine elk round. So is the 30-06. If you cannot fetch your elk with a 30-06, you can't do it with the 338.

Point being a 30 Caliber hole is sufficient. Everything else is shot placement. Shot placement required practice. And the 308 Win/30-06 is more conducive to practice than the 338.

A poster above made a point about a bull escaping with 5 shots from a 30-30 in the boiler room (presumably a double lung shot).

I doubt a 338 in the boiler room would have made the difference. Lung shots require a certain amount of time between the hit and the death. Lung shots are reliable, but do not break down the skeleton of the Elk.

A broken shoulder MAY have stopped the Elk in the story. Of course, It may not have.

A 338 in the shoulder, has a very good chance of stopping an elk. But nothing is perfect, not even a 375 H&H shooting 270 grain A frames at 2700 fps, will guarantee that the Elk would have been stopped. The odds are higher with the 375. But certainty arises ONLY if the bullet hits bone.

This is a long way around to answer the Original question: What is "being careful?"

The answer is:

1-Practice, Practice, and more Practice with your rifle.

2-Then develop a good knowledge of Elk anatomy and shot placement.

3-Then, get a range finder and learn how to use it and how to judge distances.

4-Then stay within the range limits of your Rifle AND your shooting ability. A 338 can kill an elk out to 350 yards. But very, very few shooters can hit an elk at that distance from a field position.

ANyway, thats my take on being careful,

Your Mileage May Vary,

Good Shooting,

BMT

I've taken elk with Arrows, 3006 and 300 Win. Its kind of amazing how quickly a broadhead bleeds out an elk. I think that confirms the shot placement advise. At the same time a 300 win hits a large animal very hard, and I am convinced it puts even a smaller elk down for the count faster than a 3006. I have not however had to track any of my elk farther than 30-40 yards, cause they where hit in the heart and lungs. No I don't carry a stop watch into the woods with me, but even the big bulls seem to lay down a few steps sooner and drop their heads a few seconds quicker when hit with the heavier round. Does that matter? Not really. A 30-30 or a 32 win spl will take a little time to do it's magic, even with a solid hit, but thats ok if you know what your doing. I've spent alot of days/week of my hunting time tracking blood trails made by guys I was hunting with or hunters I bumped into out in the woods. A lot of dark purple blood (liver) or little drops in the snow (could be anywhere on the edges) are a hard way to get your elk. I believe the guys that do the scouting, work up their loads and practice have a much lower shot to elk ratio regardless of the pea shooter or monster mag they use.

I should add I have tracked more wounded elk shot with 7 mags and 338's than any of the other rounds. But around here alot more guys seems to hunt with 7's and 338 anyway. I don't think anyone would dream of saying either of those rounds are not excellent elk medicine. What I do see are guys showing up at camp with less than a box of rounds through their rifle all year. Or worse yet a borrowed gun they have never shot. I find the more I hunt, the fewer new people I like to hunt with.

To me, careful shot placement means having the time to make an aimed shot at an animal that is presenting it's vitals at a distance you are practiced sufficiently to ensure a hit.

Bigger holes are better, but only if they are in the right spot on the animal. That's a platitude: what it really means is don't shoot a bigger gun than you are willing to practice with, unless you use a practice gun, or download your practice rounds.

Shooting is an acquired skill. Without practice, you don't acquire it. It's a lot easier to practice with a 308 than with a 338. Therefore, in many cases, the 308 is a better elk killer. JMO, Dutch.

Killsoft - "What's the experienced opinion on the 308 Win for Elk?"
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My cousin, who has lived in the west for 40 years, Idaho, Colo., So. Dakota, Mont., and Utah, has killed 22 bull elk with his pre-'64 Win. 70 Featherweight .308 Win. Also an Idaho Shiras moose. He is a good hunter, and a good shot. He's had no problem with his .308 and elk.

FWIW. L.W.