Pygmy

I only heard ONE shot before legal hunting time this morning.. The last few years, since rifles have been legal here, I've generaly heard 15 -20.. Back when shotguns were required, I might hear 50-60 shots before legal shooting time. Overall, it was a pretty quiet morning. A few shots here and there. Can't say about the afternoon..I shot a buck at 11;15 and after that I was on the ATV for awhile retrieving it and left the woods at about 1:30.

Congrats to the young deerslayer.. I'll be interested to learn why the gun did not fire..Strange stuff...

Sorry, double post.

Remington M700 Mountain rifle in 7mm08 with Barnes TSX 120 grain handloads... Scope is a Burris Fullfield II 2 X 7... Choice for open field shooting..Winchester M70 lightweight in .280 Rem with Leupold fixed 6X and Barnes TTSX 140 grain handloads... Fun gun. I carry it a few days per season when I feel like GI Joe.... 1943 Vintage Garand M1 with 150 grain spitzer softpoints and a handload that duplicates original WWII ballistics.

Yep... mine is " I Used to Kiss her on the Lips, But it's All Over Now", by Slim Quail and the Chicken pluckin' Five...

So, everyone should be required to have the same level of PASSION for deer hunting ?? That's BS.... I would have quit spending my $$ on Pennsylvania tags due to ARs years ago if it were not for the fact that I can usually draw ( and fill) two doe tags down there.

SWEEEET !! If you ever decide to part with it, remember, I'm your long lost son...

You have the name wrong... McCarthy Hill state forest is in 8X near Addison and is excellent hunting. Hunting pressure is light after the first couple of days. Some big bucks come out of there every season. Pinnacle State Park adjoins it and is also good hunting, but is limited to bow or muzzleloader. McCarty Hill state forest is farther west and I know nothing about it.

With my centerfires my barrel is always fouled when I hunt because I always fire a few rounds to check zero prior to season, and then don't clean the rifle until after season. With my muzzleloader the barrel is clean. I have never seen enough difference in clean vs. fouled to make any difference in a hunting situation. I have noticed that ( with one of my rifles in particular) the first COLD barrel shot is further out of the group than subsequent shots, but again, it has never been enough to make a difference.

I gave up smoking while hunting. I kept spooking deer everytime I dropped my bong out of the tree....

I'm sure the partition will work fine... I just mentioned the TTSX as another good option for fairly small caliber and high velocity. Good luck Saturday !! I'll be shooting Barnes TTSX 120 grainers at about 3000 FPS from my 7mm08 M700 mountain rifle.

Very cool...The Nosler Part. would make a great deer bullet.. You may also want to try monometals such as the Barnes X series . They work best at high velocities that your AI case is capable of. Talk to Lawdwaz about that...

It's my lucky condom. Trouble is, it's a PITA to take it off and then put it back on everytime I have to pee. It's getting kind of ratty after 50 years, like the one I've been carrying in my wallet since I was 14.

The kids did the right thing. There are many people out there who are alive simply because it's illegal to kill them.

In order for a 180 grain .30 cal. bullet to break up it would have to hit something more sustantial than a twig or small branch. Examing the hide after skinning should tell the story. Nice round holes indicate an intact bullet hitting nose first..Jagged cuts or oblong holes would indicate fragentation or deflection before striking the deer. Two bullets exiting the same hole ? Certainly possible if the entry wounds were that close together.

Good advice, Philo.. I see that you even have an orange TRACTOR...<<smile>>....

It makes me so uncomfortable when people talk about intentionally breaking the law. I NEVER break any laws...Well ALMOST never. There was the time when I ripped the " Do not remove under penalty of the law" tag off my mattress... I felt SO cheap and guilt ridden that I took the mattress out behind my neighbor's barn in the dead of night to burn the evidence. Then there was the arson charge....How the heck did I know that the burning mattress would set his barn and woodlot on fire ? Oh yeah, I almost forgot the time I got charged for indecent exposure for waving at that troop of Girl Scouts in the Walmart parking lot... I got the ticket as soon as I got out of the hospital... Who would have thought that den mother had a black belt in Karate..??.. Anyway, other those couple of little incidents, I NEVER break the law...

Negotiations are currently taking place.... Thanks for asking and wish me luck !!.... P.S. I hope that expensive piece of turqouise jewelry I brought back to her has the desied effect....hehehe...

Congrats to your FIL's buddy... Looking forward to seeing the pictures.

Thanks Steve, and thanks to Lawdwaz for posting the picture. It's hard to see all the garbage on that right beam, but there is a droptine, a couple of stickers and a dagger, and the mass is exceptional..Look at the diameter of the main beams where my hands are. The antler burrs are close to 4" in diameter. I had no idea he had so much cool stuff when I shot him...Just took my guide's word that he was a nice buck. When I walked up to him it was like ground shrink.....In REVERSE !..... However, he was no more a trophy than the other 4 bucks taken by my campmates the same week...All 5 were great bucks.. 2 non typicals and 3 very nice 4x4 typicals.. Elk hunters in camp also did well..4 bull hunters took 4 nice 6x6 bulls, the best scoring about 320. The only hunters who struck out were two elderly gents, both in thier 80s, who had cow elk tags...They saw lots of bulls but cows were hard to find. I only wish they had been with me the morning before I shot me buck..I snuck upon a little draw hoping to head off a buck deer and came upon a herd of elk..10 cows and a couple of raghorn bulls.. Would have been easy pickins if someone was there with a cow tag.

Much ado about nothing... You are much safer in ANY state land opening day of deer season than you are walking across any street in any city of the state any day of the year. Wear your orange...Use common sense... You may be shot dead, but then again you may be struck by lightning also... If you want to fret about it so much that it ruins your hunt, that is up to you..

What Biz said..... I just got home early this morning...I took a dandy nontypical buck with 10 scoreable points on the right and 6 on the left and good mass, scoring around 180. My buddy took a similar non-typ that scored around the same and even had large, gnarley spilt brow tines. The other three deer hunters in camp shot very nice typical 4 x 4s, from 26" -28" wide all scoring in the 170's. I'll try to get some photographic evidence on here after I get unpacked and settled in . Great hunt.

Two of the shotguns I use are a Winchester M12 16 gauge made in 1936 and a Browning A-5 20 gauge made in the late 50s. My centerfire rifles are all fairly recent, vintage 1988 or later, except my Garand M1. The reciever on the M1 is dated 1943. Since nearly all Garands have been rebuilt, I don't know the vintage of the rest of the parts. I have a number of other military rifles that date back as far as 1917, but I've never hunted with them.

Good job, Joe !! Congrats to you and Dad...Meat on the table..!..

Kinetic energy doesn't kill animals...Tissue destruction does., especially if it is in an area with a lot of blood vessels, like the lungs. Your 180 grain bullet most likely blows through the deer most of the time, expending a good share of it's kinetic energy on the landscape beyond. However, the path of destruction that it leaves kills the deer, and the exit hole aids any tracking that may be necessary. That, in my opinion, is a good thing. The "kinetic energy" boys want a bullet that expands ALL it's energy inside the deer. That works fine too, if the bullet hits in a vital area, like the ribcage. But the cause of death is STILL destruction of vital tissue. Within reason, kinetic energy figures don't mean SQUAT, as long as the bullet has the ability to penetrate and disrupt vital organs at any reasonable angle.