Passed up on a shot.

[Grizzly Guy]

To You Hunters who know how to shoot and when to shoot,eg.one shot kill,Congratulations. You are True Hunters as far as I'm concerened.Too bad there wasn't more like You across this country.

 

[BlackLabelBrad]

Has anyone ever felt or wished they had more gun with them sometimes? I passed up on a Buck this weekend because I felt it was a little out of range for my .308 win. I was cursing, wishing I had a .300 win with me for the extra range and power. It was the only buck I had seen all season. Last hour on the last day of rifle.

Can't say I know the feeling, I've never shot a magnum and I'm not confident in my shooting ability beyond 200 yards anyway. Within that range I have confidence that my scoped rifles (.243 Win Handi-rifle and a .30-06 Spfld Mossberg 4x4) will do their job if I do mine. I wouldn't attempt to shoot anything farther than 100 yards with my rifles with iron sights (.308 Win Remington 740 and Russian SKS).

 

[Big Game]

I wouldn't attempt to shoot anything farther than 100 yards with my rifles with iron sight.

Interesting observation! I think the art of open sight shooting is lost amongst most shooters. Most guns come scoped now and don't even have sights. Even the venerable Model 94's and 99's that I see out there are mostly scoped. I still carry a few open sight guns for different applications, but like you said 100 yds is getting to be at the far range of comfortable. Times and my eyesight change everything!

 

[TheSteamingPile]

Good on you OP. I've had to 'waste' at least a half dozen tags on animals that I didn't really want to harvest, but felt obligated to because they'd been shot by someone without enough common sense to let it pass.

My freezer AND the deer thank you.

 

[BlackLabelBrad]

Interesting observation! I think the art of open sight shooting is lost amongst most shooters. Most guns come scoped now and don't even have sights. Even the venerable Model 94's and 99's that I see out there are mostly scoped. I still carry a few open sight guns for different applications, but like you said 100 yds is getting to be at the far range of comfortable. Times and my eyesight change everything!

I'm perhaps a little bit different from other young shooters in that I grew up and learned to shoot exclusively with open sights. My dad was not a hunter and did not shoot much, so he only kept a single shot .22 with open sights and a shotgun for pest control around the farm. I had only used a scope a handful of times before I bought my first scoped rifle almost 2 years ago, the Mossberg 4x4 I mentioned previously. Now that I've gotten a little more comfortable with optics I think I may put a scope on my old Remington 740, and I will probably mount scopes on most of the rifles I buy in the future. I won't bother putting any optics on the SKS or a .30-30 when I buy one, open sights are fine on a bush gun IMO.