Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Rifles The "I just want 1 big game rifle for N.Am." dilemma

Hey
I finally got in to my original account

Randy

I believe I will put a gun in the classifieds tonight...

Dude, guns are a hobby. Get yourself a nice club or rock or something, but don't go public with this kind of rational thought, it's dangerous for the rest of us lol!!

Love your sig line, Dave. A lot of people think theirs don't stink.

The "I just want 1 big game rifle for N.Am. you came to the wrong place my friend!

"I just want 1 big game rifle for N.Am"

We all probably seek this Holly Grail, but for most, this quest ends up being a moving goal post with us leaving a carnage of rifles in our wake.

Best:)

Well said, GaryVA!

Thanks for this story fyshbum. Reminded me about where I got the rifle bug from, and my Ol' Gramps that came before him... OT

what are you guys going to be selling? i might be buying

Ruger 30 stainless wood for Canada only.

Agreed...

99% of my hunting has been in SD or MN and the vast majority of that anymore is with a bow, but I have enough deer rifles to pick a different each day for a couple weeks. Are they needed, NO... But there's always the dilemma on which one to take along?

Going on my first guided hunt this coming spring, Black Bears in B.C., maybe a wolf and the possibility of a grizzly? Have a .338 I'll bring, but I'm debating about what else to bring? Thinking about also bringing my bow?

What was the point of the post again?

There is something to be said for one wicked accurate shoot anything and everything rifle. You'll get really good with it. I'm using the same .270 that I use to shoot marmots out past 700 yards for elk. I sold 4 guns last winter to fund another Cooper and this is what I got. It has beautiful upgraded AAA+ Claro walnut, inlayed swivels, checkered bolt, deep, rich blueing. It's the rifle I've dreamed of since I was a kid. I love a beautiful rifle that shoots sub 1/2 MOA. For months I was as happy as a man could be who now owns the perfect rifle, but just this week I read Cooper is going to come out with a model 56 chambered in magnum calibers. Crap, just when I thought I had found rifle happiness and gotten over an 18 year magnum habit. I NEED one of those! Yes! Oh God HELP ME! Rifle madness has come upon me again! I NEED another Cooper, a .338, or maybe it will be a 7 mag either way it has to be a Excalibur because my other 3 are custom and western classics. Oh, Oh, and I NEED a NULA, a .243 because I sold my Kimber to buy the last Cooper... I'm sick I tell you! I can't help myself, and I don't seem to be outgrowing it. I'm 51 years old for heavens sake! I need help, but... that would cost... about what it would take to buy another rifle... ya that's what I need... another rifle... I swear... this will be the last one....

Beware the man who only has one rifle - he probably knows how to use it.

I found a way to have my cake and eat it too on this one. It's called a Blaser R93.

Whether I'm shooting .22LR, .270 Win, .338 WM, or .416, I have the same stock fit, same trigger, same action feel, same scope height. As many specialized calibers as I want, but always the same familiar rifle.

Good advice and very true.....

For anything less than dangerous game I prefer to use the same rifle, cartridge and load for everything..

That would be my old Win M70 30-06 with 180 GR Nosler Partitions.

Might be 'too much' for smaller varmints, and some might consider it a little 'too light' for game such as large moose, but within realistic ranges it will do the job on just about anything.

When you use the same rifle and load for everything you learn it's trajectory and wind drift under various conditions and ranges without having to memorize trajectory figures for different cartridges and loads.

I have never found this to be true. Most of the guys I know with only one rifle shoot very bad and shoot thier deer rifles 3 or 4 shots per year.

Dink

Interesting how many people like the Blaser, a funny looking rifle with interchangeable barrels, and how many don't like the Encore, a funny looking rifle with interchangeable barrels.

Bruce

The Blaser looks like a real rifle, the Encore is just ugly.

I was (and still am) a certified rifle looney. Have a couple of problems though. One is that I'm a southpaw, so there's not a lot out there to choose from. Over the course of about 15 years I went through a lot of rifle trading. Ended up with a very, very nice collection of factory lefthand rifles.

One day, I woke up and decided that I would sell off all the rifles in my collection that had no sentimental value (save 2).

I sold several Remington's 700's, Winchesters 70's, Ruger 77's, and Savage's.

My plan was to take the money from my sales and fund a custom rifle (which would become my goto whitetail rifle) and a nice sxs shotgun.

I ended up with a NULA in 260 Remington and a Weatherby Athena 20 ga.

Problem is, I've now decided that I'll hunt with the NULA and use the two rifles I didn't sell (A Tikka T3 in 270 and a Ruger 77 in 30-06) as needed....PLUS (here's the kicker) I've started collecting Ruger #1's, 16 ga. shotguns, and sxs shotguns....LOLOL

I can't win for losing!

It is indeed an affliction: this rifle looney thing.

Treat it for what it is, have a gun that is your "goto" gun and partake in the insanity....LOL

Ken

and kill 4-5 deer with those 3-4 shots.....

IME two kinds of people own and shoot one rifle....the weekend warrior types who leave the rifle in the corner of the closet until 5 hours before opening day for a "range check" for zero(no spotting scope,no rests,mixed lots of different factory ammo,you get the picture.....)

OR, wily old veterans who have been through the mill, have hunted widely,know rifles and know precisely what they are doing with it.

They have long since shaken the loonyism, stopped "guessing" about what a 260 does that a 7/08 doesn't;know the capabilities of their rifle and its' load intimately......these guys no longer ask silly questions like....."which is better, the 270 or the 280?",............or give an indifferent shrug and politely change the subject......they know such questions come from rookies.....

I have known a few people of great experience who drained down to one rifle(or maybe one spare in the same caliber).

They were outstanding field shots,and simply did not miss on any hunt I watched them go on.....stuff from Maine whitetails to grizzly and moose fell to the same 270 or 30/06 or 7 Rem Mag,etc....toss in sheep, caribou,elk, mule deer, etc.....and a pile of African plains game from eland on down as well.....


They learned a long time ago that the secret to success is in good shooting with great bullets,and not in a bunch of paper bullistic tables,minor differences in bore,diameter,energy quotients,wind drift tables,and TKO formulae...their eyes glaze over when confronted with such stuff.....they don't have to look at bullistic tables because they already "know" what the rifle will do.....and when some savant comes at them in a lather, telling them that a 300RUM is meant for "extra insurance" with sloppy and indifferent hits,and their 30/06 or 7x57 is an inadequate elk rifle,meant just for deer,they just go hunting....laffin'