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What works in the field
by John Barsness
If all the qualities of a mule deer rifle were
fed into a computer, it would probably come up with something similar
to John's FN Mauser .270 Winchester that can be fitted with an
auxillary Butler Creek stock for rough country hunting.
Every generation of hunting writers since Teddy Roosevelt has claimed that the days of easy mule deer are gone forever. Why, today's big bucks ("today" being anywhere from the 1880s to the 1990s) are so tough to approach that you'd better get rid of that feeble old .44 Henry (or .270 Winchester) and buy one of those flat-shooting .38-55s (or .30-378s).
I killed my first mule deer over 30 years ago with my dad's .30-30 Winchester and have since taken them with a dozen calibers, ranging from the .243 Winchester to the .338 Winchester Magnum, with bolt actions, levers, single shots and even one pumpgun. I've also seen them shot with everything from the .22 Savage High-Power to the .375 H&H and slain a few deer with bow and arrow, a .41 Magnum revolver and a muzzleloading rifle using iron sights and .50-caliber roundball. I have, however, managed to avoid whacking a muley with a pickup truck. In Montana this is unusual. From these experiences I can only conclude that if somebody wants mule deer venison, they'll find a way, even without a .30-378.
I killed my first really big buck 20 years ago, and in the past decade have pursued mature bucks almost exclusively, both as hunter and guide. Big mule deer can be hunted by almost any means from still-hunting to trail-watching, but their big country seems to be made for stalking, which to me is the most exciting way to hunt in all the wild world.
There is nothing quite like sneaking around a badlands ridge, circling to get the wind on the buck bedded in the sage almost a mile away that you spotted through the 10x binocular. There is nothing quite comparable to crawling the last few yards to a ridgetop, feeling gravel from the last ice age under your knees, waiting to see the tips of those antlers turning slowly in the sagebrush--and wondering whether you'll be able to shoot from your belly or have to take a quick offhand shot as he rises from the sage.
The whole technique is very similar to mountain sheep hunting. Newcomers to either game often brag of cross-canyon shots well past 500 yards. Trouble is, anyone who's done much long-range shooting in the West knows the difficulty of ultra-range shooting in the wind. I've done a lot of varmint shooting with big game cartridges, and a stiff mountain or badlands wind cannot only blow bullets sideways but straight up. It is very disconcerting to take a crack at a rockchuck or coyote and have the bullet land a foot high. In any sort of rough terrain, even in a 10-mph breeze (substandard in much mule deer country), the best 1,000-yard target shooter won't have a clue at any range much over 300 yards.
When people who've experienced this hear stories of 600-yard shots, we usually don't protest. Instead we simply nod, while silently wondering how many "sighting" shots it took or how many gut-shot or leg-broken animals got away before one was tagged. Sure, today's laser rangefinders will tell you the exact range to any buck within 1,000 yards, but there isn't a gadget in the world that can judge swirling canyon winds. If you don't know within a few inches of where your first shot is headed, then in my book you aren't a hunter, but a gambler, and your vacation would be better spent in Las Vegas than on a mule deer mountain.
The longer someone has hunted big mule deer, the more bragging you hear about 100-yard shots. In my last decade of serious trophy hunting I've never shot a buck at over 300 yards. I prefer that as my limit, but under the right circumstances a still day and the right rifle wouldn't hesitate at 400 or a little more. That's what we'll discuss here: stalking rifles for mule deer, suitable at any range from the muzzle to a quarter mile.
A line-up of classic mule deer rifles includes
(left to right) Winchester Model 70 .30-06, Weatherby Classicmark
.300 Weatherby Magnum and Remington Model 722 .257 Roberts.
Most mature mule deer bucks will field dress between 175 and 200 pounds, though many grow bigger, especially in the northern mountains. I've killed several that, on reliable scales, weighed between 220 and 250 pounds field dressed, but I didn't get a chance to weigh the heaviest buck because he was killed 20 miles from the nearest road, let alone a scale. A reasonable guess of its field-dressed weight would be close to 300 pounds, since its chest girth and body length were several inches more than any other deer I've killed: 52 and 48 inches, respectively. The biggest buck ever weighed in Montana went 340 dressed, and 453 pounds on the hoof. A lot of raghorn bull elk aren't any bigger.
Mule deer bones, however, simply aren't as heavy as elk bones, and their skin isn't nearly as thick or rubbery as elk hide. So even 400-pound deer don't require as much gun as 400-pound elk--or, more specifically, as much bullet weight. I've seen a number of elk and mule deer shot with Nosler Partitions weighing between 130 and 160 grains from cartridges like the .270 Winchester, 7x57mm Mauser and .280 Remington. Any of these punch right through big mule deer, even when shot through both shoulders, but you'll often find them curled up under the hide--or even stuck in the shoulder muscles--on the far side of an elk's chest.
You also don't need any set number of foot-pounds. Ever since somebody dreamed up kinetic energy as a guideline for killing power--probably before Teddy Roosevelt ever dreamed of mule deer--we've been bombarded by minimums for big game. You'll hear anywhere from 1,000 to 1,500 foot-pounds as necessary for large deer. Sometimes we're even subjected to yet another (yawn) formula for exactly how far away you can kill a deer weighing X pounds with Y bullet at Z muzzle velocity.
Trouble is, most of this doesn't have anything to do with reality, especially with today's bullets. About three years ago I saw a big-bodied mountain buck hit by a 75-grain Barnes X-Bullet from a .243 Winchester. The bullet entered the rear of the rib cage, cut one of Elmer Keith's silver-dollar-size holes through both lungs, broke the far shoulder and ricocheted off the limestone talus beyond. The range was close to 400 yards, so the bullet was carrying only about 800 foot-pounds of energy. Yet that buck went down as quickly as any buck I've ever seen killed at any range with any cartridge.
For open country, this Ruger No. 1 7x57 Mauser
is an excellent choice.
That tiny bullet worked because it expanded and penetrated. Expansion is the bigger problem at long range, so if you're planning on shooting at 300 to 400 yards, look at the terminal velocity rather than foot-pounds. According to Barnes, when started at 3,400 fps, their 75-grain 6mm will still be going about 2,200 fps at 400 yards. Most modern spitzer bullets will open up reliably at 2,000 fps. That's the number you need to look at: Is the bullet still traveling at least 2,000 fps at 400 yards?
On mule deer, the penetration problem is pretty easy to solve. With conventional spitzer bullets, such as Winchester Power Points, Remington Core-Lokts, Sierras and Speer Hot-Cores, muzzle velocities not over 2,800 fps work best. This may not sound like much, in these days of the 7mm STW and .30-378, but if you pick the right bullet, terminal velocities will stay above 2,000 fps at 400 yards. A 7mm bullet in the 139 to 145-grain class, for instance, will reach 400 yards traveling at just about 2,000 fps when started at 2,800--and that's at sea level. Mule deer are hunted at higher elevations, where the bullet will retain even more velocity.
This perfect velocity range, by the way, is one big reason the 7mm-08 Remington and 7x57 Mauser make such superb deer cartridges. The other is lack of recoil. Perfect shot placement plus perfect bullet performance equals clean kills. At these velocities, you don't really need controlled expansion bullets, though of course they don't hurt, especially the easy-expanding Nosler Partition.
I'd avoid conventional boat-tail bullets, however, for really big deer. Once I jumped a forkhorn buck from a badlands draw in northeastern Montana. He bounced up the far slope, and I started in with my .270 Winchester, missing the first shot but timing the second for the bottom of his bounce. The 130-grain Sierra boat-tail caught him at the rear of the rib cage, leaving the jacket at the entrance hole. The core went into the chest cavity and killed him, but it only weighed 31 grains, which isn't enough to rely on for a bigger deer.
Plus, you don't gain much in trajectory with a boat-tail at ranges of 400 yards or less. The 145-grain Speer 7mm, for instance, comes in both models. Let's start them at 2,800 fps and sight in at 200 yards. According to the No. 12 Speer manual, the flatbase will be 22.7 inches below point of aim at 400 yards, while the boat-tail is down 22.1 inches. Six-tenths of an inch! Wow!
Of course, no modern, with-it rifleman would be caught dead hunting deer with a measly little 2,800-fps load. Conventional wisdom suggests at least 3,000 fps to really flatten that trajectory curve. But even with your rifle sighted 3 inches high at 100 yards, the standard long-range practice, a 7mm Remington Magnum shooting the same 139 to 145-grain bullet is only about 6 inches flatter than a 7mm-08 or 7x57mm Mauser going 400 fps slower. I'd suggest switching to X-Bullets or Partitions in the magnum, just to make sure everything holds together on a 50-yard buck.
I have never had any problems with the .243 Winchester on several eating-size deer, but for really big bucks have come to prefer more bullet weight, though not as much as some hunters. Most of my trophy deer have fallen to 120 to 160-grain bullets, in cartridges ranging from the .257 Roberts to the .280 Remington. As far as I can see, given enough muzzle velocity to expand at 400 yards, one kills about as well as the next.
Of course, my .257 Roberts handloads push a 120-grain bullet at over 2,900 fps from the 24-inch barrel of my old Model 722 Remington. Hornady's 117-grain Light Magnum load also breaks 2,900 fps in the same rifle. These and similar bullets in the .25-06 Remington are probably a safe minimum for big mule deer. The .270 Winchester and .280 Remington are all you'll ever really need, and 140-grain loads from Rem- ington's .260 and 7mm-08 and similar handloads from the 6.5x55 and 7x57mm will do just as well. There's nothing wrong with 150 to 165-grain bullets in the .308 Winchester and .30-06 either, but neither kills any better than the .270 Winchester or the nonmagnum 7mms.
In my experience the 7mm magnums are more than some of us can handle psychologically. Too many 7mm magnum shooters think all they've got to do is get a buck in the scope and pull the trigger. Because of this personality quirk, I've seen far more mule deer wounded and lost by 7mm Remington Magnums than .270s.
The last was a very big buck that had followed some does onto the snowy top of a ponderosa-edged plateau above the Yellowstone River. My hunter and I were sitting in the edge of the timber about 400 yards away. He assured me he could make the shot and, unlike some 7mm magnum shooters, had done OK while sighting in two days before. He got down in a steady prone position, elbows dug into the snow and breathed out. At the shot the deer started spinning in his tracks, and then we heard the whop of the bullet coming back. I said, "Shoot him again!" The hunter said no, one big seven bullet was all any deer ever needed. About that time the buck stopped whirling and trotted into the timber. The only blood we found was where he'd been hit, and there were so many deer tracks in the timber that we never did find him. That sort of blind faith is common among 7mm magnum fans and has given me a rather jaundiced view of the round, even though I've used it myself on several deer with perfect satisfaction.
The heavier recoil of even bigger cartridges makes precise 300-yard shooting too difficult for most hunters, but if you can handle one, a 7mm STW, .300 Winchester or Weatherby Magnum, .30-378 or even a .338 Winchester or .340 Weatherby Magnum will all do the job. I've used the .300s on mule deer, but prefer the .338 with 225 or 230-grain bullets, since it doesn't chew up as much meat. All you need is one of those dollar-size holes through the lungs, not a bloodshot front quarter. Come to think of it, most of my favorite mule deer loads come out the muzzle at 2,900 fps or less, whether 120-grain bullets in the .257, 140s in the 7x57, 150s in the .270 Winchester, 160s in the .280 Remington, 165s in the .30-06 or 225s in the .338 Winchester Magnum. Before the rut even big bucks taste just fine with more flavorful flesh than smaller deer, and less velocity equals more shoulder steaks.
The real problems with 400-yard shooting are not trajectory and energy but accuracy and the shooter. Few of the hunters I've guided have shot their rifles at any range past 100 yards. This is unfortunate, because trajectory tables don't often match reality, especially in factory ammunition, and long-range accuracy is hard to gauge from 100-yard tests.
A few years back I ran some extensive tests with Remington's then-new Extended Range ammunition. The rifles were a custom .280 on a Remington action by Dave Gentry, a Mark X Mauser in 7mm Remington Magnum and a Ruger 77 .30-06. At 100 yards all three shot spectacularly with three-shot groups running 3/4 inch or even smaller. I sighted all three precisely 2 inches high at 100 yards, then shot several groups at 400 yards. You'd think that with the similarity in 100-yard accuracy all would do about the same at 400, but the 7mm Remington Magnum and .30-06 only kept their shots in about 8 to 12 inches, while the .280 Remington stayed under 6 inches consistently.
This was from a benchrest; in the field you'd stand a fair chance of wounding or even missing a 400-yard buck with the .30-06 or 7mm, despite the tight 100-yard groups. Incidentally, all three loads dropped more than the factory trajectory tables claimed, probably because none came close to factory muzzle velocities, and this was on an August afternoon at 6,500 feet above sea level.
Such long-range results come as a shock to many hunters, especially those with a zealot's faith in trajectory tables. I remember one who could recite the computer print-out of his .300 Winchester's path to the tenth of an inch, all the way out to 500 yards, but since he couldn't keep his shots inside 6 inches at 100, I saw to it that we crept within 175 yards of a buck. Even then, I had my old .257 Roberts ready for back-up. Luckily, my computer hunter flinched in the right direction and broke the buck's back just behind the rib cage.
As for scopes, I've shot too many deer at over 300 yards with 4x scopes to say they won't work, but really prefer 6x in a fixed scope. My variables are usually set at 6x, too, and I can't recall cranking one higher, but more magnification can come in handy at 400 yards when you're trying to pick a brown deer from a brown butte or want to make sure you're shooting the right buck from a herd. I have witnessed that particular mix-up; luckily the wrong buck was big enough to satisfy the hunter.
I like light rifles in the mountains and steep badlands, in particular my Model 20 7x57 from Ultra Light Arms, at an ounce over 6 pounds. Such rifles are not only easy to haul up and down the ridges all day, but light in the hands when still-hunting the lodgepoles. On the plains an 8 or even 9-pound rifle isn't bad, if that's what you like. That old Remington .257 Roberts weighs about 8 1/2 pounds, all up, and I've carried it across the rougher parts of eastern Montana and even some in the Coues' deer mountains of Arizona, but as I get older the lighter I like them.
All in all, if you threw everything into a computer under a program headed "Perfect Mule Deer Rifle" it would probably print out a light .270 Winchester. Somebody named Jack O'Connor suggested this a few decades back, but as we all know, big mule deer have gotten a lot tougher to hunt since then. So we'd probably have to switch from Jack's 4x scope to, oh, a 2-7x. Then we'd be well prepared for the superbucks of the millennium. I mean, they're bound to get even tougher on the far side of the year 2000.
Copyright (c) 1997 Mark Harris Publishing Associates, Inc.
