I've Got the Hunting Bug...

I have recently found myself infected with the hunting bug...
I'm not sure when or why this happened. I haven't been hunting since I was in my very early 20s. Me and a friend did a little squirrel and rabbit hunting back then.
Other than my daughter, who bow hunts a little, there is no one in my family that is a hunter. My dad and grandfather quail hunted some in the late 60s.
My wife thinks this bug has been laying dormant in me my entire life, just waiting for the opportunity to take control over me...
It may be the internal desire of self-sufficiency. The desire of knowledge that would help me to support my family if some reason I had to.
I'm most interested in deer, elk and turkey.
The area that I live in is suburban. I will need to do some research to find locations to hunt.
I have plenty of weaponry to protect myself (12ga, 9mm, 38, 5.56, 7.62, etc.) but I don't really have anything for game hunting. I could probably hunt turkey with my 5.56 I guess. I may even try bow hunting for turkey.
I'm looking for advice from some of you experienced hunters for opinions on rifle calibers. 243, 270, 308, 30-06? What about magnums? 7mm, 300, 338? ( I know, probably to much... I like big guns though ).
What about a 300 blackout upper for an AR platform? Is this a large enough caliber to hunt white tail? Unless it was a perfect shot to small for elk I assume.
What about used rifles? A good idea? Anyone have anything for sale?
Any advice will be appreciated.

Opening day morning I always hear the big-bore bad shooters blazing away with their cannons. When you hear them empty the gun you know they missed, or at best, were shooting at a deer they just wounded.

Seen too many guys show up at the range a few days before hunting season, blast a few shells off and think their are ready. They get hung up on the size of the caliber thinking bigger is better, but then they flinch so bad they can't hit what they aim. Bigger bullets don't make up for poor shooting skills. They are more likely to cause poor shooting.

A lot of good sized deer get dropped around here with anything between .243 - 308 by hunters who practice shooting well. Some think the lowly .243 is not "big" enough for deer, but the new ballistic tip hunting bullets give very good terminal results. Recoil is very light, and excellent choices of hunting and varmint ammo are plentiful for it. Daughter just got her first deer with her .243, with a head shot at 80 yards. The Winchester 95gr ballistic silver tip never exited the deer's head, expending all it's energy for an instant kill.

Where you can put the bullet is more important than the size of the bullet.

I's recommend go to a range and ask to try shooting a few calibers your considering, before buying. Then get whatever caliber you can comfortably shoot accurately. My daughter and Melissa both love to shoot their .243. Very comfortable so they shooter them very accurately. I'm bigger and I'm comfortable shooting my 308, which is plenty big enough for anything with hooves, horns, or claws, in the lower 48. The stepson is only 150 pounds and is barely able comfortably shoot a box of shells through the 30-06 his father gave him and he has to really work at staying accurate. With lighter calibers he's an excellent shot.

Once you find the caliber your good with, then experiment to find whichever good hunting bullet that gun shoots accurately. I've seen Winchester and Hornady ammo give excellent hunting results. So,those would be a good starting place to see what your gun likes best.

Then practice proper shooting technique until you can put all your shots into a fist sized area at the distances, and under the same conditions, that you'll be hunting in. Don't settle for the often recommended "paper plate' sized kill zone of deer. In real world conditions, you want to be better than the minimum standard that some hunters are willing to accept when at a shooting range.

Then, well before the season opens, start spending as much time as you can scouting and learning what the critters are doing in the area your going to hunt. As hunting season approaches, get to know the critter's living room, not yours.

Paul

Good advice Paul. One thing to consider for the round size is distances as well. Many of my shots are in the 180 -200 yd range or sometimes more for coyote and woodchucks so I like my .270. It is a versatile round. If go stompin through the woods I take my 32 Winchester special w open sights. In Ky I assume you have a mix of woods and fields? Or is the area mostly open?

Your 12ga with some #4 shot should do the trick for turkey. For rifles I like my 35 Remington. It's a good all around rifle that I use for deer and black bear. It would also be a good gun for elk. It is more of a brush buster, but up here in PA it's perfect. Most people up here won't get a shot further than 100 yards unless they are hunting an open farmers field. However with practice you could definitely take 200 yard shots. Like stated before it's more about shot placement than size. A 30-06 is also a good choice and ammo is cheap and plentiful.

Flyer5 wrote:Good advice Paul. One thing to consider for the round size is distances as well. Many of my shots are in the 180 -200 yd range or sometimes more for coyote and woodchucks so I like my .270. It is a versatile round. If go stompin through the woods I take my 32 Winchester special w open sights. In Ky I assume you have a mix of woods and fields? Or is the area mostly open?

Good point. Around here long shots on deer might be 100-150 yards. But, that's more like the shorter end of the ranges of my hay field woodchuck hunting shots.

One rough rule of thumb I've heard of is to use a caliber/bullet combo that still has 1000 foot pounds of energy at the max range you'll be hunting deer. Not sure how well that rule works because it's so rare to be in a situation where shots out beyond 150 yards with even the smallest hunting calibers would drop below 1000 FPE. Around here it's accuracy, or the lack thereof, that makes the biggest difference between quick, human kills, or just wounding game.

Paul

Ky Speedracer wrote:What about a 300 blackout upper for an AR platform? Is this a large enough caliber to hunt white tail?

The smallest caliber allowed in Maine for deer hunting is .22 magnum.I'm sure you would have to be a pretty good shot though.

scoobydoo wrote:

Ky Speedracer wrote:What about a 300 blackout upper for an AR platform? Is this a large enough caliber to hunt white tail?

The smallest caliber allowed in Maine for deer hunting is .22 magnum.I'm sure you would have to be a pretty good shot though.

Here in NYS it's any center fire cartridge, some of which are ridiculously too small to be considered adequate for big game under all conditions,... unless your an exceptionally good shot.

Paul

Sunny Boy wrote:
Here in NYS it's any center fire cartridge, some of which are ridiculously too small to be considered adequate for big game under all conditions,... unless your an exceptionally good shot.

Paul

Wow.And I thought Maine was being a little lax on caliber.lol

The 12 gauge will work fine for turkeys.

Paul made a good point that caliber size doesn't make up for lack of skill...but it does offer you a little more wiggle room for shot that doesn't land as intended, or terrain that makes tracking difficult. I grew up hunting on large fields adjacent to thick woods, and it was not uncommon to take deer at long ranges, or close to a property line that would prevent retrieving the deer if it ran too far. Dad loved his .270 Weatherby, because it had a very flat trajectory and a lot of knockdown power. I preferred a .30-06. Now that dad is older and has some health problems, he prefers a 6.5mm Remington Mag. because the rifle is very light and easy for him to carry.

Choosing a rifle that is suitable for elk changes the game compared to a rifle that is only used for whitetail. Elk may be taken at close range, or at a very long range. If you are paying for a guided hunt and your only shot at that bull elk is a long one, you don't want to be holding a .30-30.

A good friend of ours has taken many large game animals, including a record setting bear in Montana. His rifle of choice is a Ruger One in a .300 Win Mag. caliber. It is a single shot rifle, and he maintains that only having one shot forces you to take that extra second for a well placed shot.

Paul - that was great advice in your post. Thanks!

Just a little more info; Most of my hunting here in KY will likely be in the 100 to 200 yard range. We have elk in the western part of the state which is flat and open and you could easily get a 300+ yard shot. But I wouldn't feel comfortable yet trying to make a humane kill at 300 yards.
I would like to go out west with some friends hunting in the next couple of years once I gain a little experience.
I'm a little over 6' and weigh 200lbs. I have plenty of experience shooting. I'm probably a little better than average "target" shooter ( I can hit a fist sized 1 pound container of tannerite at 300 yards with a 5.56 round all day long... ). But none of these are live targets. So your advice has not fallen on def ears Paul.
I have plenty of time running a 12 gauge with #4. That may be my go to for turkey if I don't use a bow...thanks Muddy and Rob! It's my understanding that has similar recoil to a 30-06?

I know a guy (maybe I should say an acquaintance) that claims he uses his AR with a 16" barrel, 62 grain soft point zero'd at 25 meters and hunts white tail up to 200 yards. Supposedly has taken 4 deer in the last 3 years running that setup. I guess if that's true that would totally back-up the importance accuracy.

I'm probably considering a Savage 111 trophy hunter with a Nikon 3 - 9 x 40 scope with a BDC reticle. either in 270 or 30-06.
You can pick these up new for $500 or just under.

scoobydoo wrote:

Sunny Boy wrote:
Here in NYS it's any center fire cartridge, some of which are ridiculously too small to be considered adequate for big game under all conditions,... unless your an exceptionally good shot.

Paul

Wow.And I thought Maine was being a little lax on caliber.lol

Yup, defies logic,.... but then, so do a lot of things in New York.

Paul

[quote="Ky Speedracer"]Paul - that was great advice in your post. Thanks!

Just a little more info; Most of my hunting here in KY will likely be in the 100 to 200 yard range. We have elk in the western part of the state which is flat and open and you could easily get a 300+ yard shot. But I wouldn't feel comfortable yet trying to make a humane kill at 300 yards.
I would like to go out west with some friends hunting in the next couple of years once I gain a little experience.
I'm a little over 6' and weigh 200lbs. I have plenty of experience shooting. I'm probably a little better than average "target" shooter ( I can hit a fist sized 1 pound container of tannerite at 300 yards with a 5.56 round all day long... ). But none of these are live targets. So your advice has not fallen on def ears Paul.
I have plenty of time running a 12 gauge with #4. That may be my go to for turkey if I don't use a bow...thanks Muddy and Rob! It's my understanding that has similar recoil to a 30-06?

I know a guy (maybe I should say an acquaintance) that claims he uses his AR with a 16" barrel, 62 grain soft point zero'd at 25 meters and hunts white tail up to 200 yards. Supposedly has taken 4 deer in the last 3 years running that setup. I guess if that's true that would totally back-up the importance accuracy.

I'm probably considering a Savage 111 trophy hunter with a Nikon 3 - 9 x 40 scope with a BDC reticle. either in 270 or 30-06.
You can pick these up new for $500 or just under.[/quote]

Yes and there's a Savage rebate for those models, too.
My daughter and Melissa both got Savage Trophy with Nikon BDC scope back in Noverber, but in the short action model 11 .243. With the sale price and the Savage rebate, they paid much less for theirs with a scope, than I paid even 15 years ago for my first model 11 without a scope. And the Nikon BDC scope that comes mounted on it is a very decent scope.

Plus the new Savage adjustable AccuTriggers on their model 11's are better than the Rifle Basics aftermarket adjustable triggers I have in my older Savages (before the AccuTriggers came out).

I think you'll be very pleased with it. Wonderful guns to shoot and that's what the daughter just got her deer with.

I have older Savage model 11's in .223 and a 308. The 308 I got primarily for deer, but I wanted a suitable caliber if I ever want to go for bigger game at longer ranges. I've shot the 7.62 (308) in the service (M-14) and my stepson's Remington 30-06. However, when I started looking at the stats for 308 vs 30-06, there's not a lot of difference in down range performance, so I went with the 308. Very glad I did with a sporting weight rifle, because there's a noticeable difference in recoil between my 308 and my stepson's 30-06.

Paul

Any opinion on barrel lengths? 22" vs 24"?

Thomson Center Encore.. it's a single shot but if you do it right that's all you need.
Pistol grip an pistol barrel it's a pistol. remove stock with 3 bolts, push out pin, put on rifle stock, push pin in on a rifle barrel, an it's a rifle. Muzzleloader,12/20 gauge, rimfire, pistol or rifle barrels from 6"-28" almost any caliber you could want.
Scope mounts to barrel so zero stays set when changing back an forth

Not for nothing, many years ago I did a masonry job for a non hunting friend who had a Remington model 700 in .243 Win. When it came time for him to pay up I simply said the .243 & we are square. He agreed. I then gave it to my son who has since killed over 50 whitetail & several hogs. IMHO the most underrated big game cartridge of all time. In the words of the late great Jack O'Connor " A gut shot deer with a .375 H&H is still a gut shot deer". Shot placement is paramount!!! good luck
Jim