Deer Hunting

[trikerider2oo7]

This is my first year deer hunting and i need some tips if you experianced people would.

[Russell 350X]

Bow:

1) lots of camo, head to toe
2) cover your scent, dont smoke or fart lol
3) have it sighted in for about 15-20 yrds
4) BE QUIET
5) and lots of patience
6) make a good shot
Rife or Shotgun:
1) wear orange, up here in New York anyway
2) cover scent
3) have rifle sighted in for whatever, shot gun for 100-200yrds , and if you carry a pistol sight it in for about 100yrds.
4) BE QUIET
5) and again lots of patience.
6) make a good shot

Hope this helps.

[foster]

Take your firearm to a range and practise, practise, practise.

Don't smoke, fart or cook lunch anywhere near where you hunt. These things can smell like few other living beings on earth.

Wear orange, even if you don't legally have to.

Go with someone who is a very good hunter, shut your mouth and LISTEN and LEARN. Avoid those who party while hunting (nothing wrong with partying after the hunt) or who like to shoot at stuff other than deer. They are not hunters, they are shooters and there is a BIG difference.

Look for scrapes on the ground made by bucks. Find a few of these that in a row, maybe 50 or 100 yards apart, and set up downwind from that line and be quiet. Prepare for possibly a very long wait.

Buy some heat pads, which are chemical pouches that you shake up and theyproduce heat all by themselves with no odour. Cost about a buck for two. Get several. They work. It's no fun hunting if you are unbearably cold.

Wear boots with rubber soles, or entirely made of rubber.

Don't believe every thing you read, even from me. ;)

Good luck.

[TimSr]

3) have rifle sighted in for whatever, shot gun for 100-200yrds , and if you carry a pistol sight it in for about 100yrds.


Im guessing youre a bow hunter! I disagree with your firearms recommendations.

A standard 1oz 12 guage slug drops about a foot at 100 yrds, and a 200 yard shot should never even be a remote consideration. A lightweight saboted slug through a rifled barrel can make you effective out to 125 yards. A standard slug, maybe 100 yards from a rifled barrel, but 75 yards is pushing it from a smoothbore from a sheer accuracy standpoint. Sighting in at 50-75 yards is much more realistic. In Ohio, where trikerider2oo7 and I, are located, the vast majority of shots will be under 75 yards.

I agree with your pistol info if you are talking about a Thompson Contender or something that fires bottleneck rifle cartridges, but in Ohio we are limited by law to straight walled pistol cartridges, fired from revolvers, or single shot. Straight walled cartridges are not great for long range accuracy, and lack energy, so you are limted. A .357 mag is awful low powered, but will do the job if you keep it under 50 yards. The .44 mag has more range, and I can shoot confidently to 75 yards, though it will do the job up to 100 yards, if you dont hit shoulder bone, and stay behind the shoulder. Ive taken several whitetails and a boar with .44 mag. Ive done a lot of work with handloads, and have a load that will do a 6" group at 100 yards off sand bag rest, from my Ruger Redhawk.
A few years ago, Ohio relaxed the laws which now allows use of the .454 Casull for deer. This gun has awesome energy and penetrates the heaviest bone at ranges well beyond the guns accuracy range. Ive never gotten better than a 10" group at 100 yards out of my Freedom Arms Casull, so I prefer to keep shots under 75 yards, though I might do a 100 yard shot under the right circumstances. Ive taken two whitetails, and a black bear with my casull, and its power is impressive for pistol.

Stay away from hollowpoints for pistol hunting deer. They lack the ability to penetrate. Jacketed Flat points are best, which limits expansion, or hard cast semi wad cutters. Use the heaviest bullet for the caliber you can find. The exception is that Freedom arms makes special bullets for this .454 (.45) caliber, and they have a 240gr jacketed hollow point that is an awesome deer bullet. The reason is that its center is hard cast, and not soft lead like in any off the shelf jacketed bullets. (If you can mark it with your finger nail, its lead not cast) I assume the bullet stays in one piece because Ive never recovered one, as theyve always passed all the way through.

[The_dew_man]

well deer season is over now and i had good luck 3 does and a 4x5 buck. i use a remington 270 with 150 gr. shells. we walk to get are deer mostly cattails and trees rows and some corn and sunflower fields. Have some people walk the rows or field and have some people on the other end and someone on the out side to get the deer that run out. You get deer that get up just a few yards in front of you or a hundred yards up in front of you. For the kill zone i try to shot the does right in the head 75 yards or closer and if i see a big buck i try to shot him in the heart / lungs area. the longest shot i have taken is 453 yards had to measure that shot with a wheel.

the only time i use cover sents is when i am bow hunting. this is when i am not loud and try to make it so the deer cant see me and when i use a tree stand about 15 feet up. if u want deer to come in try useing a decoy of a doe feeding in the area of bow hunting

[Russell 350X]

3) have rifle sighted in for whatever, shot gun for 100-200yrds , and if you carry a pistol sight it in for about 100yrds.


Im guessing youre a bow hunter! I disagree with your firearms recommendations.

A standard 1oz 12 guage slug drops about a foot at 100 yrds, and a 200 yard shot should never even be a remote consideration. A lightweight saboted slug through a rifled barrel can make you effective out to 125 yards. A standard slug, maybe 100 yards from a rifled barrel, but 75 yards is pushing it from a smoothbore from a sheer accuracy standpoint. Sighting in at 50-75 yards is much more realistic. In Ohio, where trikerider2oo7 and I, are located, the vast majority of shots will be under 75 yards.

I did exagerate a bit when I mentioned 200yrds :D But we have shot my dads Mossburg 500 w/ a rifled barrel and 2.5X scope, with his handloads at 100yrds accuratly, but the .44mag shoots with a 2.5X scope 100yds decently, not the greates tho. Dad handloads his own .44mags so they have more punch than factory so they go out farther.

[TeCaTe_MaN]

....a bullet that goes all the way through is wasted energy...you want the bullet to sortof expand and knock the piss outta that deer or whatever...but you dont want it to explode and ruin meat or go all the way thru and waste potential knock-the-piss-out-of-it energy :D
i dont hunt BTW but my friends do and this is what i hear

[TimSr]

"Knock down power" is a theory thats good for personal defense and human targets but doesnt apply to big game, because its rare to immediately knock a deer down with anything. In most cases you will be tracking it, sometimes only 20 yards, or it may be a few hundred yards. Its easy to loose a deer in 200 yards of thick brush. You are right about a bullet passing through being wasted energy, but exit wounds leave a much better blood trail, while entrance wounds sometimes hardly bleed at all, and if you must choose between wasted energy or an exit would, the exit wound is far more desireable. When hunting with a pistol, which is very low power compared to rifle rounds, bullet selection is crucial to achieve this.

[AirManCam]

I'm goung to have to disagree. Out of the 28 deer I shot 16 of them dropped in their tracks. Thats using a 30-30,270,bow,muzzleloader :D

[YTZ250#1]

[quote="hondaatc185S200E"]
3) have rifle sighted in for whatever, shot gun for 100-200yrds , and if you carry a pistol sight it in for about 100yrds.


Im guessing youre a bow hunter! I disagree with your firearms recommendations.

A standard 1oz 12 guage slug drops about a foot at 100 yrds, and a 200 yard shot should never even be a remote consideration. A lightweight saboted slug through a rifled barrel can make you effective out to 125 yards. A standard slug, maybe 100 yards from a rifled barrel, but 75 yards is pushing it from a smoothbore from a sheer accuracy standpoint. Sighting in at 50-75 yards is much more realistic. In Ohio, where trikerider2oo7 and I, are located, the vast majority of shots will be under 75 yards.

I agree with the slug drop,but not your yardage consideration.With the rite gun and ammo a 12guage shotgun can easily shot over 200 yards.
while sighting my savage bolt action with federal sabat premiums 3'',
I was able to poke a nice pattern of holes in a paper plate at 319yards.
Granted at that range the knock down power is considerably reduced,but
at 200 yards they are dead as hell.We can't hunt with rifles where I hunt so we build shotguns to shoot like rifles.

[trikerider2oo7]

im using a 20 guage shotgun 2 3/4" rifled slug, smooth bore barrel

[TimSr]

Shoot some paper targets, so you know where its shooting. Youll also find that some brands of slugs shoot more accurate in some guns, and that usually the more open chokes do better. My Winchester 1200 with the Defender barrel likes Federal rifled slugs pinting tightest, though a little low, and with Rem and Win slugs shooting a little higher but not as tight. Youll probably want to keep it under 75 yards for accuracy reasons, which is most likely what youll get in Ohio anyways.

[YamaChuck]

I'm sitting here reading all this crap about "knock down power" and shooting shotguns 100's of yards and just lmao. I don't mean to knock anyone's word but let me offer my experience. Firsat of all, shotguns were never meant for long range shooting. I have to agree with tim Sr. Only a shotgun with a rifled barrel should be used for a shot of more than 100 yards and then not much more than that. "Shotgun Only" hunting areas are designated that way for a reason. Not enough room for rifles.
Knock down power doesn't mean jack. Any well placed shot with a firearm is all you need. I don't recommend using a pistol though. Hit the vitals(lungs/heart area). You'll be successful. Dropping a deer on the spot may be nice but like Tim says, doesn't always happen. After all you're supposed to be hunting right? Not just shooting a deer and hoping that it drops in a heap. That shot to the vitals area is your best shot. 90% of the time you'll will do minmal damage. I help to run a friend's meat cutting business. We average anywhere from 4 - 10 deer a day.(skinning and proccessing). I usually do most of the skinning and get to see first hand how much damage is done by shots. The vital area is the shot you want. Anyway, happy hunting guys. And hunt safe.