Shooter Confidence

An important post, Allen. Building confidence of exactly where every bullet from every rifle one shoots will go at every reasonable distance is a basic requirement for every hunter.

My initial reluctance to make peace with the information of the target shooting hobby at cute ground creatures changed to understanding. I assume many of my countrymen may feel the same emotion at first. Then, when you live in Colorado and you see the many species of rodents and the damage they do to natural and domestic vegetation the shooting becomes part of life.

It seems like me you also believe in having one single load of bullet weight at a certain velocity for each cartridge. That allows the hunter to get to know the trajectory intimately.

In order to get impact velocity for best penetration at our hunting distances (2,400 ft/sec no matter calibre or bullet weight) my aimed-for muzzle velocity is 2,750 ft/sec. In each chambering I look for a bullet weight that will give me this. 180gr in the 30-06, 168gr in the .308W, 150gr in the .303 Brit, 175gr in the .280 Rem / 7x64 Brenneke, 160gr in the 7x57, 140gr in the 6.5x55 and .260 Rem.

For the nearer shots of bushveld hunting I go one bullet weight up in the .30 calibres for 2,600 ft/sec, so 168gr in the .303, 180 gr in the .308W and 200gr in the 30-06 no matter whether it is for impala or wildebeest.

That good shooting practice one gets get on prairie dogs in Colorado us Africans have to do on the heart and brain circles of photo targets of life-size animals:

I do much better shooting at "things" (wee rocks, pine cones, steel targets) than I do at paper. My pal "Geoffrey" says I'm full of it when I say that, but I claim otherwise. Dad and I played a game called "Shoot 'til you miss" then the next shooter got his chance 'til he missed. I think Dad would miss on purpose in the early years when I sat on his knee with him holding the butt stock of the old Remington Nylon 11 as I had to put the stock under my armpit to get close enough to see through it's Buschnell Banner 4X scope. Having great teachers and mentors is another key to confidence.

Allen

You are absolutely correct. There is no such silly acceptable accuracy as "minute-of-deer" - even though spending my free hours in the butcheries of Meeker and Maybell during the hunting seasons, surveying the shot placement by Colorado visitors it seems that folks bring insanely inaccurate rifles along. ;)

Minute of atrium-of-heart should be the minimum accuracy level of any hunting rifle.

I like taking 1 litre milk cartons filled with water or 4" orange clays to the range to have something to shoot at.

The heart shot on the critter in your picture, that's exactly where I try to hit elk and deer. Bust a low shoulder shot and not only will you destroy the joint, but you will also take a rib, perforate the heart and possibly (with a well constructed bullet) get another rib on exit. Dad's theory was, by letting air in both sides of the chest cavity, blood had a better chance of getting out leaving a Ray Charles blood trail if the animal didn't expire within sight of or at the spot the animal was initially hit.

Allen

I suppose one has the choice to find the animal in 20 yards, or find first blood in twenty yards... ;-)

With a good bullet in the heavier categories of each calibre there is hardly any meat damage through the shoulder:

Waterbuck, (elk size):

.375 H&H 270 gr Peregrine VRG-3 Entrance hole.

Exit hole.

rib damage

Muscle wound channel

No doubt it is as much a gun culture thing as is barrel length. Africa hunters love heavier, stronger bullets because heart shots are used here - a behind the shoulder lung shot kudu, gemsbok, wildebeest or whatever will live for hours and in dense savannah tracking may take half a day.

In that very same dense Savannah it will be a very rare occurrence to find a hunter with a barrel length shorter than 24".

My 35 Whelen has a 22 inch spider legged barrel. The shortest one of the lot. American hunters have a fascination with short barrels and how they handle "in the woods". I have yet figure out why and I can't see the advantage.

"Oh, they don't get hung up in the trees" So does my hat but I still wear one.

"They point quicker" That is true, but they are also harder to hold on target without some sort of support.

"They are lighter and easier to pack" Also true, but if you'd lose ten pounds you'd be easier to pack too!!

Short barrels HAH!!!!

Allen

Now I finally have reason to type: LOL ..

You said it - so I am innocent.

Somewhere in the Beartooth forum I long ago posted about the US short barrel culture. It is from the saddle scabbard time.

Now "Handy for snap shooting in the brush" is used. "Quick pointing", as you say they say.

The untouched wilderness of Niassa Province in far northern Mozambique, 7 degrees south of the equator must be the densest bush I've had to hunt in for camp meat in my 55 years of big game hunting. The .416 Rigby (CZ 550) has a 25.7" barrel and not one day did I want anything shorter.

Close (20 yards) encounters with hippo and elephant happens. Meat like waterbuck or sable or red hartebeest allow you 4 seconds to shoot after shouldering the rifle. A steady hold immediately on the heart when the rifle comes into the shoulder is a must.

If that shouldering is a quick pointing action that meat will be away in an even quicker action. :-) Not all the other give-aways combined - like scent, noise, being seen, etc. is as effective a RUN signal as is sudden movement.

I have rifles with barrels lengths ranging from 16" to 26". Each has its place. Sure, I could do it all with a longer barreled gun. But sometimes a shorter light gun is just easier to manage and is all that is needed for a particular situation. I have old back injuries with a lot of hardware from corrective surgeries. Shorter and lighter rifles are sometimes all I want to handle. But, I do realize the limitations of those short barrels. Shorter barrels appear to need lighter bullets. My Ruger scout rifle shines with 150 grain Barnes TTSX, but struggles with anything heavier. With the heavier bullet it is definitely a short range proposition. I can mitigate the issue somewhat by reloading, but it remains just the same. I just ordered a 26" barrel for my Encore in 308 Win. so I can better utilize the potential of that round. I have become fond of my single shot rifles. There are trade offs of course. But I can get a longer barrel in a shorter lighter gun in a single shot.

By the way, are single shots widely used in Africa any more? I would think it would be fine for a hunter with backup. Not so much for a one alone. Where I live and hunt a single shot is seldom a handicap.

Gladesman, welcome to the forum. Single shots rifles are very rare out here - like lever actions it has never been part of the culture. I once had a Ruger No.1 in .270W I wanted to use for culling blesbok (brain shots at 180-250 yards) but it was the most inaccurate rifle I ever shot so I gave it back to the dealer and took a Sako Mod 85.

For plains shooting I see no issue with a single shot as the animal is in view after the shot for longer. Nobody would carry it for hunting kudu and wildebeest, etc. in dense vegetation.

Because the guide here also carries a rifle, and when he sees by the animal's reaction that the shot was too far rearwards of the heart he will certainly anchor it if the hunter does not or can not do a follow up shot immediately. A lung shot animal can go very far and a high lung shot takes long for the chest cavity to fill up with blood and start leaking out of the wounds. In dense vegetation it is a distinct recipe for hard work.

I doubt if anyone would hunt Cape buffalo or lion with a single shot rife even if there is backup. We do not hunt lion over bait - we do tracking and following, and the moment of truth is eye to eye, head-on. The hunter is as much a back-up for the guide as vice versa. With lion the guide will shoot immediately if the hunter's shot did not floor it. By that time the hunter already should have his rifle in his shoulder and aimed.

Please tell us a little about yourself and where you hunt? Again - welcome to the Bullet Behaviour forum.

Is there a particular section of the Chat Forum for personal information and the like?

Gary, start a new post under Reality & Reflection or Habitat & Hunting if you tell about your hunting fields as well. Looking forward to that. Afternoon coffee time here so I shall enjoy reading your story with my coffee. :-)

Well start climbing trees to hunt and hunt from tiny blinds and then you will appreciate a 20" barrel when shooting 100 yards or less. Nothing more annoying than whacking that long barrel on something at the wrong moment! There are places that short barrels rule, don't doubt me.

I agree, but where I hunt, a sagebrush is maybe three feet and scrub oak is 12 - 15 and neither will support me. Ha ha Shots from a tree stand may be (just guessing) 200 max?

My average shot distance is 35 yards after about 100 samples here in Louisiana and lower Mississippi. Furthest one 300 yards on a pipeline, one at 240 yards and a few around 160 yards. Several point blank around 5 yards and one just past the end of my barrel cancel the few long shots. Hunting African plains game was quite a different venue for me!

I had an elk that close once, scared the beegeepers out of both of us! It was lost calf that I didn't see or hear as my attention was else where. You must regale us with stories of your adventures in Africa.

Killed my big 11 point whitetail in a cutover at about 15 feet. I was hesitant to shoot as I had never shot at anything that close with a rifle. Was concerned about point of aim at that range and very little of the deer was visible. Got if figured out and dropped him in his tracks with an ultra light Ruger 270 Win. Became disillusioned with the 270 and stopped hunting with it, but I did kill a lot of deer with that gun. Bullets for the 270 were the problem in the 1980s.

The close one was scary actually. It was an 8 pt that walked right by the tree I was sitting at the base of. I had noticed he had torn up several of my trail markers earlier so just sat down next to a tree there in the heavy bush. Not long after I heard and smelled the deer, and that itself is rare. He towered over me, and saw me at the same time I saw him. Darn if he didn't look a scary monster from down there. Stuck the barrel out and fired. He stumbled and fled, then some ten yards away he turned back toward me and lowered his antlers. I was preparing to empty my 20" barreled 30 30 into him when he dropped dead.

"Became disillusioned with the 270 and stopped hunting with it, but I did kill a lot of deer with that gun. Bullets for the 270 were the problem in the 1980s."

I need to add onto that, Gary because you voice the findings of the majority of South African hunters.

We never had any calibre that local hunters had no confidence in - the 7x57 has never been used here with bullets lighter than 160 gr and with 175gr its penetration has to be seen to be believed. Same with the 6.5x55 with 160gr bullets. German and locally made bullets have always been able to completely penetrate the low shoulder of any big game. Same with the 8x57 and the .303. Then came the 30-06 and it duplicated the 8x57 to the inch and became the no. 1 big game getter with nobody using lighter than 180gr bullets.

Then came the .264 Win Mag and it was punted out of Nairobi, Kenya as the modern big game getter. It was an immediate and ugly failure because of fragile light weight bullets breaking up on entry, causing massive superficial wounds not reaching the heart or even passing through the first ribs. Had Winchester loaded this cartridge with RWS 160gr ammunition it would have taken Africa by storm. As it was the little 6.5x55 embarrassed it to the extent that land owners banned it for use with very good reason.

At about the same time Jack O' Connor marketed the .270W for Winchester in US gun magazines with such accolades that it became an icon in the USA (he himself mostly hunted with the 7x57 in Africa). It also became another Winchester Africa failure because it was presented with 130gr bullets at 100 ft/sec. faster than the magic 3,000 - which of course was a blatant lie as even today that weight bullet only reaches 3,000 ft/sec at 65,000 psi. Winchester had to lobby the lobbyable SAAMI to rate the .270W as a 65,000 psi cartridge, de-rate the .280 Rem to 58,000psi, keep the 7mm Rem Magnum at 62,000 psi.

That velocity on the little 130gr bullet to this day is the reason why the .270W is considered a wounder in South Africa. Only since Peregrine / GS Custom, Rhino and Barnes bullets in the 150 gr weight class have been available are hunters out here dusting off their .270s. Had Winchester initially presented this cartridge with a 168gr bullet as standard fare its killing ability through the low shoulder of big game would have been on par with the 7x64 Brenneke and the 7x57.

Having said that - the .270W will never be popular here because the most popular one-shot big game killer in South Africa is the .308W with 180gr bullets. With 180gr bullets it equals the 7x57 with 160gr, penetrates and kills exactly like the 30-06 with the same bullet - and with lighter weight bullets it exactly matches the ballistics of the .270W weight for weight. Regarding established numbers it is THE most successful big game cartridge in Africa ever. Period. Why? Because South African hunters shoot big game with it with 180gr well constructed bullets doing one-shot kills all the time. As Gary has experienced - the bullet design and weight kills the game cleanly and not the shape of the case behind it (within reason).

Then Winchester aficionados brought the .300 Win Mag out here with fragile 150gr bullets and Remington aficionados brought the 7mm Rem Magnum with 130-140gr fragile bullets and both these in a short time again rose the spectre of the .264 Win Mag - as being wounders par excellence. Why? Silly light-weight bullets of useless construction. Both these cartridges are excellent performers on big game if the correct weight and design bullets are used for the case capacity: 220 gr for the .300 WM and at least 175gr for the "sevumag". Again, as Gary alluded to - silly weight and design bullets gave many cartridges a bad name in Africa.

By the way: one particular shooter holds the new and previous three SA Hunting Rifle Group Shooting records with four different calibres: recently a .300 Win Mag and 220gr PMP factory ammunition (.16 inch three shot group at 110 yards) and previously 30-06 with 220gr (.18"), a .308W with 180gr (.184"), and a .222Rem (.188" ). Only commercially available hunting rifles are allowed, shooting is over a front X-bag rest (supplied) and PMP ProAmm amunition is bought at the range.

Regarding bullet failures: Winchester is mainly the culprit with cartridges that got a bad name because of poor bullets but Nosler with its Ballistic Tip and breaking Partitions is regularly the cause of repeated frustration and embarrassment. Until US manufacturers generally can design a bullet that does not discard parts of itself inside the shoulders and ribs of kudu, wildebeest, eland and all the other nine elk size animals, and even the seven deer size animals, and which cause such massive meat damage apart from wounding as happens, US hunters visiting Africa will do well to load Barnes TSX or buy the South African designed Peregrines and GS Custom from the USA suppliers. Swift A-Frame is another excellent choice - the locally manufactured PMP African Elite loads the Swift A-Frame.

Added: When using the heavy bullets in each calibre the Hornady Interbond/Interlock and Federal Fusion regularly prove themselves on Africa big game too.

Swift's Scirroco II is as good as the Accubond in many 30 calibre rifles. I have quite collection of recovered bullets but not a 180 grain Scirroco from the 30-06AI or a 250 grain Hornady spire point from the 35 Whelen. I will have to take pictures of them and post them as some of them may surprise even the most skeptical.

Allen your photographs will be very beneficial here to prospective visiting hunters because you as an individual do the same shot placement as we do - into the low shoulder for the heart and not behind the shoulder.

By the way, I mentioned in an earlier thread that South Africa has giraffe populations that are way above the maximum levels. A lady PH and I need to remove 21 of these big animals in the northern part of South Africa and here is a chance for US hunters to obtain for a very affordable cost a full flat skin that will cover a hunting cabin or large lounge floor.

Cartridge and bullets? Nothing lighter than 286gr in 9.3 mm, 300gr in .375, 400gr in .416, 450gr in .458. Muzzle velocity not slower than 2,400 ft/sec at the weights mentioned and weight retention ability not less than 95%. The bullet must be able to stay nose-forward all the way. A wounded giraffe charges off blindly and demolishes everything in its way.

This is the confidence the shooter must have in his calibre - a 340gr Rhino bullet from a .375 H&H penetrated the giraffe's 1" thick shoulder skin, the shoulder muscle, the scapula, a more than 1/2 inch thick rib, cut the pulmonary artery, broke through another rib, broke through the opposite scapula and muscle and came to rest against the opposite skin and retained 99% of its weight:

400 gr Peregrine VRG-3 from a CZ 550 .416 Rigby went through the inside low shoulder bone of the Cape buffalo (boss in the photo), through a rib, demolished the heart, broke an opposite rib, broke the opposite shoulder and bulged against the opposite skin from where it was cut and washed. Weight retention was 100%. That makes for shooter and calibre confidence:

This is all the time repeated in the .30" (180gr) and 7mm (170gr) cartridges on normal big game with Rhino, Peregrine, GS Custom and US made Swift A-Frame bullets.