This year’s hunting trip to the Great American West was (another) success, venturing forth heavily armed into the lovely country in south-central Wyoming, amongst the sagebrush flats and quaking aspen. The view from our line cabin:
Another look at the countryside:
To my eyes, admittedly raised in the flat and arid regions of Texas, this is some of the loveliest land around.
I was hunting on Battle Creek Ranch, along the Colorado/Wyoming border. The ranch family was exactly like most every one I have ever met: taciturn yet friendly, with no hesitation whatsoever to help neighbors and even virtual strangers such as myself. The well at our line cabin was clogged with silt (it has been droughty for a few years), so we were offered (and used) the showers at the ranch house. We stored two deer carcasses in the family’s meat locker, which in turn provided the opportunity for a familiar (to me, as someone raised in ranch country) scenario. I knew there was no way that the rancher would charge for this service (as he had every right to do), but I also knew it was incumbent on me to offer to pay. Sure enough, he waved me off, but making the offer allowed mutual recognition of the favor he was doing for me. Civil society in action.
The mule deer hunting was extraordinary. The ranch of over 10,000 acres has 6 hunters for one week a year (although, to be sure, a few more jump the fence), leaving the deer herd unpressured and with a good number of the prized older bucks. In fact, we saw a handful of bucks that were obviously well past their prime, with snow white faces and racks of antlers that were clearly on the decline. Seeing genuinely old deer such as these is quite rare, and a good sign that you are into top quality deer habitat and a well-managed hunting program.
My guide was a fire-breathing hunting nut, who also happened to be a long-haul trucker and a former cook on a nuclear submarine tasked with SEAL team insertion (you meet the most interesting people while hunting). We ate well (crawfish jambalaya, breakfast quiche) and had plenty of entertainment. The rest of the hunting crew ranged from colorful to civil, with one exception who kept mostly to himself after screwing up my first stalk on a mulie by blundering around the mountainside like the big-city lawyer he was.
I tagged a very nice mule deer one evening just as the light was going down and a storm was rolling in. We spotted the deer from our vantage in the sagebrush at the foot of the mountain, just as he was coming out to feed in the evening. He was 650 yards away, requiring that I make up as much ground as I could before we lost the light. This turned out to require about 400 yards of hands-and-knees crawling through the sagebrush, periodically easing up to confirm that he was still about. At one point, I had to crawl past group of cows, who objected to my presence and stood in a half circle around me staring at me in bovine indignation. When I checked the deer, he was looking back in my direction, incidentally giving me a breathtaking view of his headgear, and heading into the woods, leaving me to meditate on the iniquity of cattle, the price of replacing a half-dozen head, and the stupidity of pissing off a man with a high-powered rifle.
My guide assured me the deer wasn’t really spooked, so we finished crawling to a point that offered some good cover, and spent the next 40 minutes minutely glassing the treeline. With five minutes of shooting light left, the big boy moseyed back out of the cover and offered up a good shot at 250 yards. My confidence in my shooting was shaken by a miss the evening before at 450 yards (even though I zeroed my rifle, it was shooting 5 inches high), but 250 yards is, literally, point-blank range for the 300 Winchester Magnum that I lug around. And I do mean lug; it weighs just over 12 pounds, but it shoots into less than an inch at 100 yards, so what can I do?
He dropped like a stone, which was a very good thing as we would not have been able to blood trail him in the rain, which started 5 minutes after the shot. The old boy will feed my guide’s family this winter, and by March the taxidermist will be done and I will be arguing with my wife about where to hang the mount.
Not to mention planning my next trip.
My guide was a fire-breathing hunting nut, who also happened to be a long-haul trucker and a former cook on a nuclear submarine tasked with SEAL team insertion (you meet the most interesting people while hunting).
My experience is that you meet the most interesting people while blogging, too.
Nicely done. Have you tried the WSM or the WSSM yet, by the way?
Wonderful job.
The time I spent in he midwest was the most rewarding of my entire life. Very interesting people. Genuine America, that.
Have you tried the WSM or the WSSM yet, by the way?
Not yet. I need, um . . . want, no . . . need, dammit! a lighter rifle for “mobile” hunting. The .300 Sendero I haul around now is great for stand hunting, but it is a load for carrying around the mountains, so I am in the market for a new rifle. I’ve been thinking about the new short magnums, but I’ve about decided to pass on them and get a lighter rifle in .300 Win. Mag. again.
The .300 is a great round, with great ballistics and terminal performance, and has a well-deserved reputation for consistency. Plus I have a safe full of ammo already. The new .30 cal. short magnums basically deliver the same ballistics in a different shaped case. The very marginal improvements in theoretical accuracy from the short case will be pretty academic for my shooting in the field, so the heck with ’em. The .300 has done me well, and I’m sticking with it.
Maybe next year. Thing is, Wisconsin is about to pass a concealed carry law, so I also need a new pistol. *sigh* So many guns. . . .
MMMM,venison!!
Never mind those
marketing gimmicksShort Magnums.If you’re going to be hunting small-medium game like whitetails at less than 300 yards (which is very laudable), get a rifle chambered in a decent long-case non-magnum (eg. 6.5x55mm, .25-06). The rifle doesn’t have to be heavy to handle recoil, the quarter-inch bullets fly flat and arrive with authority, and the deer fall just as dead.
Just my opinion. Void where prohibited.
I wholeheartedly agree with Mr. du Toit. The WSMs are just gimmicks.
The As a kid, I started out felling at distance blacktail, whitetail and muleies with a 243. At 13 I got my first bear (a 335lb blackbear at 225 yrds) with it. At 15, I decided I wanted to move up to 308 and have hunted and felled elk at up to 575 yards with that caliber ever since.
I am wanting to move up to a 300WM or the like someday, but I can currently hit consistantly well out to 1000yrds with the 308.
Kid,
Sounds like a challenge to me. How about pronghorn antelopes in Wyoming next fall? I have a buddy who’ll put us up and help us get out-of-state tags.
Your .308 against my 6.5mm Swede — loser buys the first round.
Robert, feel free to join us, as long as you point that blunderbuss in the other direction: I’m deaf enough as it is.
Since the Deerminator has a 26″ barrel, it is not that much louder than a .308, and does not have a particularly sharp report, so you’ll be fine, Kim, I’m sure. 😉
I am certainly not in the analog kid’s class as a shooter, and if I decide to get something other than a .300, it will be a .308, which is ample for the bear and elk that my hunting rifles need to be able to knock down. Still, I like the extra flatness and punch of the .300 round. I’ve gone back and forth on .300 v .308 for years now. The simplicity of only having a couple (well, no more than several) calibers in the gun safe has its appeal as well.
To make matters worse, Wisconsin is about to get a concealed carry law, so I also need a new pistol. My Para P-14 has many virtues, but “lightweight” and “concealable” aren’t on the list. Two new guns (one with a scope) are too much for one year’s budget.
And, I need a turkey gun – I can only skate by bumming other people’s shotguns for so long. It gets to be a regular Abbot and Costello routine in the turkey blind when birds are on final approach.
So many guns, . . . .
(Link) If you are interested, I can help you with getting out of state tags anywhere for anything you would like to hunt.