Darrin, where did you get that stuff and how much was it for what size bag?

Given that most “deer mineral” is 99% salt, it kills me to pay $20+ for 20-25 pounds of the stuff, but I’m having trouble finding better options any cheaper.

Grouse

Nice pic Kooty. Always nice to see old friends.

We got some mineral sites established on my property now in hopes of increasing the mass. My theory has long been that our area is very mineral deficient, so hopefully theory is proved by practice.

Haven’t got the cams out yet, but probably will put some out this weekend if we have time.

Grouse

In case anyone’s interested, I counted the ammo expended for 1 and 1/2 days on this hunt.

329 total centerfire rounds shot (.223, 22-250).

I did NOT count rimfire rounds, but as we shot with a rimfire for several hours on the opening morning, I suspect we shot nearly 100 rounds.

If we extrapolate a little, that would bring the “per day” average to a figure that’s very close to my longer term average of 150 rounds per shooter per day.

As a note, we take turns spotting, so only one shooter is firing at once for this average. What the guide has told me is that this approach is more efficient in the long run because a shooter who is doing his own spotting is very inefficient. Having a spotter constantly moving the shooter onto a new target as soon as one can be found means significantly more shots, especially when the dogs are spooky and become harder to see.

Grouse

Ralph, I’m with you as far as the funding always being an issue.

Varmint shooting is terrific fun, but it isn’t exactly cheap. Most people ask about the cost of ammo, but to be honest ammo is way down the list as far as expenses on these little safaris.

1. Hotel, meals, drinks, etc – About $700.
2. Guide – $500
3. Gas – $400
4. License – $100
5. Ammo – Roughly $75-100 per day for 2 shooters. Does not include the time it takes to reload or the cost of reloading equipment and cartridge cases, which eventually wear out.

So it’s not hard to run up a $2k tab on one of these little expeditions. All to shoot a few overgrown rodents.

Grouse

So the Axis in .22-250 has always been a 1:12 twist.

Mine seems to be fine in the range Randy mentioned. I’ve tried 50, 52, 53, and 55 grain pills and they all seem to be fine in terms of 100-200 yard performance in that they are at or near MOA.

Now here’s a reason why Superformance may NOT be the answer for your Axis. I’ve worked up loads with 4-5 different bullets and 5 powders for my Axis. Almost without exception, the best accuracy came from the starting (lowest) powder charge! The harder I pushed them, the more spread out the groups got.

That’s my long way of saying that you may want to try other loads as the Superformance may move you further in the wrong direction.

Velocity is not the end all and be all of accuracy. In many cases, you’re talking only 200 or so fps spread between the starting and the max load. I’d rather have awesome accuracy and a little more drop than I would so-so accuracy and flatter trajectory.

One other thing to watch as regards the twist rate and how it stabilizes different bullets. It will not always be evident at 100 yards that the twist rate is unable to stabilize the bullet. Some loads will seem to shoot fine at 100, but then things fall apart at 200 as the instability really effects the flight.

Grouse

 

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There you have it. I just handed everyone an excuse to buy more guns. I’m here to help.

That includes help on paying for it too

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No, you’re on your own there, Randy. That’s the deal, I provide the excuse, you provide the money.

Grouse

Ok, and now to catch you up on Day 2, which was Friday.

Wind and weather entered the equation today, as they often do out west. We had a beautiful morning with a steady 10 MPH wind.

We were shooting a dog town that runs in a horseshoe shape down one side of a long finger-like ridge, around the end, and then back up the other side.

The town had obviously been shot before, but again our mobile approach was working well. We would shoot until no dogs were up within 400 yards, then move so the average shot was more like 300, then work the dogs until they were all down, and then repeat the process.

I can really see how the advent of these shooting benches has made guys less mobile and therefore the dogs have become used to being “safe” outside of a certain range. It changes everything when you can get up and move inside of that range rather than blazing at them at ever-increasing distances.

It was challenging enough in a steady 10 mph wind. By late morning, we were using .22-250s exclusively as we bucked the wind.

As an interesting aside, the guide had warned us to keep our eyes down when walking in this area as there were rattlesnakes. He wasn’t kidding. We had just set up the tripod and I looked beside us and there coiled up in the shade of a milk weed plant was a 3 footer! Yikes. He was quickly dispatched with a .223 round, but a good reminder that the guide wasn’t joking. I have now seen a rattle snake on every trip I’ve been on for the past 3 years and every one has been at close range.

Unfortunately, at lunch the black clouds appeared on the horizon. By 1:30, it was evident we were going to get wet it was going to be sooner rather than later.

We had just pulled up stakes and started back toward the ridge, over which was parked the truck, and over the top comes the guide with the truck. He had seen the lightening and thought it best to come get us least we were foolish enough to keep shooting until the storm was on top of us.

We drove out to the main road, not wishing to wait and watch the two-track road turn to gumbo. And within a few minutes it was obvious it was game over for the day. The rain POUNDED down. Then it blew. Then it rained harder. And so forth.

Not only was there no chance of shooting more that day, but the next day was obviously in jeopardy as well. The forecast was for a cold front to come through with low clouds and highs in the upper 40s.

And that’s exactly what we got on Day 3 (Saturday). 42 degrees and low clouds. Certainly NOT the weather that’s going to make the prairie dogs stand up and get shot at. To make a bad situation worse, rain was on the radar and headed our way. After the 2.5 inches we had the previous day, we knew it was all over. You can’t drive around the boonies in GumboLand after that much rain. Not going to happen.

So we headed home at 7:00 AM yesterday. That’s the way the game is played, you can pick your guide, time of year, etc, but you can’t pick your weather.

A few other notes that I think are worth passing on to anyone out there thinking of heading west to harass the varmints.

– This shooting is tough on rifles. Again this year, I had multiple gear failures. My .223 Axis magazine broke the retaining clip off the back of the magazine. It’s spring steel and it just snapped off. So I was shooting a single shot Savage Axis for the rest of the day. Luckily, a gun shop in the town we were staying in was a)open late, and b)happened to have one. So problem solved.

– Possibly related to the magazine problem was my Boyd’s thumb-hole stock. The laminate wood around the retainer where that steel clip latches has torn away. I only noticed it last night when I got home, but failure was imminent such that I wouldn’t be able to keep the magazine in place.

Both of these issues brought home to me the importance of bringing multiple rifles and preferrably in the same caliber so if a gun goes down for the count, you can swap and you can feed the backup gun the ration intended for the original.

There you have it. I just handed everyone an excuse to buy more guns. I’m here to help.

– In conversations with our guide, he noted that his shooting parties had been PLAGUED by AR failures the last two years. Since many hunters have now switched to AR platforms, it has become evident to him that many ARs are breakdown prone and often the owners did not thoroughly test the ARs before bringing them out to hunt.

The most common problems were magazines that caused jams and discovering that the AR did not function well with newly bought bulk ammo picked up just before the trip. Add to that the fact that 3 of his hunters this year already have had catastrophic action failures of various types that damaged the ARs badly and certainly beyond field repair.

AR users, it sounds like if you plan to shoot it at all, you better have it thoroughly tested WITh the exact mags and ammo you intend to shoot while hunting. You should also have a backup rifle.

I’ll post some pictures as soon as I get them downloaded.

Grouse

Ok, time to get caught up on reports.

Yesterday was awesome. Bright sunny day and low winds. For the first time in many years we got some .22 rimfire action in the first town. They were in a stock enclosure area and obviously hadn’t been shot at much.
Next we moved to a town right by the highway. I was not keen at first as my experience with towns in plain sight is that they get pounded even if they are on private land.

Well boys and girls here’s a lesson in today’s prairie dog hunting. Fortune smiles on the mobile hunter. Carrying only a Caldwell tripod and a folding Turkey chair, we were able to move down into the town and then we rested a rise to fin another town on the far side that even the guide didn’t know about. We had to quit only because we shot the 200 rounds we were carrying!

Our guide told us at lunch that we were shooting less than his average hunters, but hitting far more because we weren’t confining ourselves to large benches that are hard to move.

Later we moved to a town that was at the bottom of a large bowl. Shooting down from above, we just wrecked dog after dog. I went on a 5 for 6 run right off the bat with the 223 Axis. I flipped them. I ripped them. It was awesome.

Update on today’s hunt later.

Grouse

Well, we are safe in the mote in western SD after an all day drive. Unfortunately, its raining. Hopefully we won’t get too much tonight.

As a side benefit we stopped by a sporting goods store in Mitchell. And what should my eyes see on the shelves? Could it be? Yes!!! Varget powder! !! The first I’ve seen in 2 years. I was a good boy and only bought 5 pounds–not even enough to replace what we’ll shoot on this trip. Still a great find.

So the fun starts tomorrow. Stay tuned.

My father lives 5 miles form my property and his digital rain gauge has 2.7 inches from the rain Monday afternoon into early Tues morning.

We were out working on the property on Sunday and we got a new gate installed on Sunday. The ground is very wet almost everywhere. We’re trying to avoid cutting ruts on our road in, but it’s hard as every low spot is soggy as all getout.

And man oh man are the mozzies and ticks going to be NASTY this year. Bring your gallon jug of Muskol or Deep Woods Off. You’re gonna need it.

Grouse

Update on the ATV hunt.

I’m seeing so many for sale that I decided to pass on the 3000+ miler. Main reason was that I’m seeing wheelers in the same age group with 1500-2000 miles for within a few hundred bucks of the price this guy wanted. Main problem now is getting time to go out and see them all. Guys are being a little liberal with their descriptions to try to attract metro area buyers. One guy said he was “just outside of the north metro.” I figured that meant Forest Lake, etc. Turns out his address mapped as just south of Pine City!

Other reason was the color. No, really. It sounds lame, but this is a hunting machine and property management machine and I’d much rather have camo or the dull green and this one was the bright yellow. I like a low profile.

Question for everyone: Where can I get the compression specs on Polaris ATVs? I’ve found several sites that list the ratio 10:2, etc, but not the PSI which is what the checkers read in.

Many thanks.

Grouse

Can I be the first to offer a case of good beer to first person who goes out and drops trou in front of Kooty’s camera?

This offer good only to the first iDo’er and we must have proof that Kooty actually received a picture of you slapping your bare @ss cheeks in full view of his WunderCam.

Also, I think it would be great to send a series of bizarre animals in front of his camera. Goats. A camel. Something in the water dish that looks vaguely like a mini Loch Ness Monster. That sort of thing.

Grouse

Grouse

My uncle has 1600 acres of corn and beans and he always says that what happens in the spring matters way less than what happens in the summer. His observations are that during good summer growing conditions with sun and moisture, crops and conservation plantings can easily make up for late planting date.

He also has a good point in that seed germination is driven by soil temps, so even if you could plant in January, that doesn’t give you a head start because the seeds are just going to sit there until the soil temps are right.

Grouse

What’s the cell phone bill on something like this, Kooty? 20 pics an hour get sent? That seems to be a lot of data.

Nice toy–errr–I mean “tool”, though.

Grouse

Thanks for the advice guys.

Yes, the price was clearly reflecting some extra miles. I’m with you ben, the going rate for the 2004-2005 ATVs seems to be in the 3000-3500 range with the mid-1k miles.

The guy seems really motivated to sell, so he might just consent to a mechanic evaluation.

Grouse

Yes, I know asking for less rain is always risking calling down a whole heap of bad ju-ju, but…

This is getting a little crazy.

Grouse

Randy, I was wondering if I could just get away with a consumer camera with a 50x zoom. Does it need to be OPTICAL 50x or is a digital 50x good enough to get decent resolution?

Re bullets, it’s split up a little. The Tikka 22-250 likes Hornaday V-Max 50 grain. My .223 Axis likes Nosler ballistic tip (orange tips) also in 50 grain. I use the same bullet for my .223 Contender pistol, but with a different powder.

I’m still in testing phase on the new Axis .22-250. Varget and the V-max 52s show the most promise so far, but with the Varget supply officially gone, I’m now testing XBR, 760, and even kicking it old school with 3031. I have 50 test rounds loaded for this weekend, I need to settle on a load so I can get the last 300 rounds loaded.

Grouse

I wish I had the patience, equipment, and time to do videos of the shoot like Randy does. It would be terrific to have them, but shooting decent footage of a p-dog getting splatted from a quarter mile away is dang difficult and requires some real gear. And I’m just not that patient, all that putzing with gear instead of shooting is not my thing.

I’m hoping the rain doesn’t wipe out our shooting. Things can get ugly if it rains out on the plains.

Also, I’m hoping we don’t have any gear malfunctions. Last year I had a .223 case head separate in the chamber. Of course, not being an AR guy, I don’t carry an extractor with me everywhere I go, so I had no way of getting it out.

So here’s a shout out to Steve, my brother in law over in the UK. I know he reads this site and he was with me last year on the trip.

Steve made a great suggestion that got the .223 back in action. After we got back to the hotel, he suggested we put the barrel on top of a towel full of ice and chill it down. Hopefully this will contract the metal and make it possible to slide the split case out.

So after 20 minutes, I ran a brass brush from the muzzle down and the separated case fell out. Victory! That was a real win as it was the only “light” varmint rifle we had with on that trip, so we would have shot through our “heavy” ammo supply a lot faster and probably would have had to quit early.

Grouse

Grouse

Pretty much what I suspected, but thanks for confirming.

I think we’re just going to plant clover, mostly as a science experiment to start to get up to speed on using our equipment and to see how things grow in our area.

I think I’ll couple this with getting some soil tests done from this area and from the areas where our future plots will be. I know the soil in this area, generally speaking, is acidic, so lime will almost certainly be required.

Grouse

Even in season B a few weeks back, the birds were widely spread out and compared with what we had seen in the weeks before the season, a lot of turkeys headed to parts unknown.

I don’t know enough about turkeys to know what to attribute this to. My suspicion is that the harsh winter and slow, late spring inserted a new variable in the game.

Best of luck.

Grouse

 

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I would not use such a light bullet on a moose. I am thinking a 160 grain (minimum) Swift A-Frame. I prefer the 175 grain Swift A-Frame for your hunt. Maybe the Speer Grand Slam 175 grain.

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My read of the OP’s situation is that he’s confined to factory ammo. Are A-Frame bullets available in any factory loadings right now?

One of the problems with the 7 MM is that there is so much focus on deer-sized bullets in the 140 to 150 class. Heavier bullet loads are much harder to find, especially on the store shelves as factory loads.

Grouse

Appreciate the tips Joel.

Given the weather situation the past few years, I’m tempted to move back to Season C next year. Keeping in mind I’m in Pine County so on average it’s 5-10 degrees colder there every day compared to the Cities.

Time is a factor, to be sure. Scouting this year was cut way back by the amount of snow that was still on the ground even as of the A season. More scouting would have helped, to be sure.

Grouse

I was up working on the property this weekend.

You can really tell where the grass is greening up. It’s wherever you see a deer standing!

One 35 acre field had 12 deer standing in it feeding. Including a yearling that looked TERRIBLE. Poor little thing was scrawny and ash-gray colored. They were all on a hillside that is obviously catching the sun and greening up faster.

So nice to see some deer out there, but this is in an area where the deer have good access to spillage from cattle, so I’d expect that these deer fared better than the average.

Grouse

That’s what I was thinking too. You’d have to be on a slope like Mt. Everest in order NOT to have standing water right now.

Grouse

Yes, factory ammo costs ARE significant these days. No doubt about it.

But you have to compare that against the “opportunity cost” of a moose hunt. Which, for most of us at least, would be a relatively rare opportunity.

I was speaking to a guy at the gun club last fall and he was shooting a Weatherby mag in prep for elk. The shells were over $100 for 20.

However… As he rightly pointed out, he would spend about $700 on ammo to get ready and then $250 for two boxes to take with him. That total outlay would represent a relatively modest percent of the outlay for this hunt. With airfare, shipping costs to get the meat home, mounting of the head/antlers, etc, the hunt was almost certain to go over $10k.

Not to mention the fact that he wouldn’t be doing this hunt again for a long time, if ever.

I think you have plenty of selections to determine what is worth pursuing as far as the most viable load for this hunt. I should have pointed out earlier that I do, actually, think it’s possible to over-think this issue.

As I wrote earlier, PLENTY of moose have been felled with far less gun than you are using. So the difference between a 150 grain and a 160 grain is getting into hair-splitting territory.

For years, my go-to load for the .30-06 was a completely boring, been-in-production for decades, 180 grain spitz. BOARING!!! No ballistic tip, no bonded, no coated, no dancing, no singing, no talon-expansion, tax and license extra…

But the thing was, and still is, that in my old (and again completely boring) 740 Woodsman autoloader these things are tack drivers! No, really! I just used the word “tack driver and 740 Woodsman in the same sentence, which has never before been done on the interweb, but I’m not joking. They are that good.

So my point is find the right load and stay with it. Technically, I would agree that a 180 out of an 06 is more than is strictly necessary for deer. However, from 1985 to the early 2000s, I ruined the day of more than a few bucks with a regularity that, were I a deer, I would find very alarming. That load is just that good, so I’m not inclined to mess with it.

Good luck.

Grouse

Is there any chance of putting stuff in the ground with it being this wet?

It’s so flippin’ wet in northern MN that we’re not even going to drive in to my property because I don’t want the roads tore up. We walked in last weekend to inspect things and mark the location for some new gates, but operating any equipment is a “no”. In the past 3 weeks, they had 21 inches of snow and over 10 inches of rain.

I can just tell that if I go in there, we’re going to leave ruts that will be there forever. And that doesn’t take into account some of my trails have “puddles” across them. Puddles that are almost 3 feet deep.

Give us a report as to what you can do.

Grouse

 

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Ok grouse! If you were going on this moose hunt and using the 7mm would you use the 140 or 150gr. ballistic silvertips? or would you go with something else!

now keep in mind ive shot several other brands of shells including federal superX remington and hornady threw this gun and the silver tips are considerably better shooting threw my gun than any of the others!

thanx

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Combining what you’ve tried with your outfitters advice, here’s what I’d try if it were me going on this moose hunt AND I was limited to factory ammo.

Obviously, first and foremost, it has to shoot well in your rifle. Since we’re not getting into what rifle, what barrel, what twist here, these are all “in theory” ideas.

First, your outfitter seems to indicate that on this hunt , more is more when it comes to bullet weight. So at the very least, I would try the 150 g Silvertips as a fist step.

Then, you say you’ve tried other BRANDS, but have you tried other LOADS with bullet weights over 140g?

Personally, in a 7MM class rifle I would start at the 160 grain loads like the Winchester Accubond CT and others in the 160 grain class.

Don’t get blinded by the bling of high tech, singing and dancing bullets. Remington’s CoreLokt bullet has been bringing down big game for decades. So has some of Winchester’s older offerings. Old bullet designs are often old because they have proved that they work. A lot of safari guys are using bullet designs that are a half century or more old.

I would say try the 150 gr Silvertips and pick 2 other loads in the 160 grain class to see how they work. Say one Winchester offing and one other.

After that, it’s all down to what seems to work.

But going back to my earlier point, REALISTIC PRACTICE IS KEY! Don’t get fixated on tiny benchrest groups. That’s load testing, not hunting practice.

Once you have your load, practice with it from REALISTIC shooting positions. Standing with improvised rest, shooting sticks (if you intend to use them), etc. Again, I think most hunters VASTLY underestimate how much practice it will take to become proficient in real-life shooting situations out to 300+ yards. Anyone can shoot a 1 inch group at 100 off of a cement bench with a stack of sandbags. Change to 100 yards resting against a tree and all bets are off. But you’ll find a lot more trees in the woods where the moose are.

As a hunter, IMO, you are far better off being well practiced with reasonably accurate ammo than you are being able to shoot micro-groups off a benchrest with tack-driving ammo.

Grouse

The reputation of moose is that they are not exceptionally hard to bring down. I would note that this is not from personal experience, but rather the notion I’ve formed from reading and conversations with hunters and guides.

While I wouldn’t recommend it in the modern day, PLENTY of moose have been felled from the North Woods of Maine and all across the country using nothing more than the .30-30.

For years, the .270 was often referred to as the classic moose chambering because it combined enough hitting power with flat shooting properties. I say this to illustrate that certainly a 7MM is a perfectly capable moose caliber.

I don’t have any reasons why the Winchester Silvertips wouldn’t work for moose. A controlled expansion bullet of any flavor is going to do just fine on medium skinned big game like elk and moose.

Now we go from the objective to the subjective.

While it is fun to shoot at long ranges, I don’t think that kind of shooting can teach you much about what you need to know for this hunting situation.

First, I would say you are far better off being practicing situations you are likely to encounter in the field. Everything from 50-100 yard offhand or improvised rest shots to shooting off of shooting sticks at distances up to 300 or 350. Being rock-solid in these situations will bring much greater benefits than shooting extreme distances off of a bench because there aren’t many cement benches conveniently placed in the moose woods.

Very, very few people can reliably and consistently hit targets at >400, much less 600. I shoot thousands of rounds every year at targets and at p-dogs, and I can tell you that under realistic field conditions my chances of a first-shot hit at 400-500 yards on prairie dogs is about 1 in 6 or 7 on that sized game. Now I’m sure there are plenty of guys that can bring that all the way down to 1 in 3, but that is still not acceptable IMO when it comes to big game. It’s one thing to miss a prairie dog by 4-6 inches at 400 yards, it’s another thing to wound a big game animal at the same distance.

Back to bullets. My thought is this: Have you considered heavier bullets? While a lighter bullet like the 140 gives you a better trajectory at long ranges, that may not be very relevant for your hunt. I would personally start at the 150 or 160 range for moose-sized game.

I hunt whitetail with a 7 MM handgun (7-30 Waters) and even there, I’m using a 130 grain. So for moose, I’d step up as far as is practical.

If you’re using a outfitter I would ask what they recommend. It’s possible that they would recommend the lighter flatter shooting bullets, or they could say go for bullet mass as most of the shots in their type of hunting are at close quarters.

Just some thoughts, hope some of this is useful. Best of luck.

Grouse

What a great story, and I’m glad the girls enjoyed the hunt.

The good news about the skunk is that you discovered it before the 4 of you were all settled in the blind together, all snacking on deer sticks. “Dad, something smells funny…”

What a terrific story.

Grouse

You know, in the pump gun space, I think you’d have to be pretty unlucky to get a bad one. The Nova, 887, and SXP, and most other pump guns on the market today, are variations on old, time-tested designs.

Now that doesn’t mean bad manufacturing, bad quality control, or bad luck can’t conspire to produce a lemon, but overall this is an area where I’d say brand should take a back seat. I’d buy the fit and ergonomics that appeal most to you.

Shotgun fit is so individual and so important because of the nature of wingshooting. Everything is an uphill battle if the fit isn’t there for you personally.

Obviously, it’s always better to buy from a local dealer so you have someone to deal with in person for after-sales support. And you never know when you’ll need it, it can be when you’d least expect it. I shelled out a significant sum for a Browning Superlight and what do you know, the barrels had a lump of solder stuck in the rib right out of the box. Sure was glad I could just take it right back to the dealer rather than hassle with trying to ship a gun back.

Grouse