Scoped Deer Gun For You, YES OR NO??

[Lawdwaz]

OK guys and gals..................I noticed a few pics of dead deer shot with un-scoped shotguns in the "Heaviest Deer" thread.

 

I would quit deer hunting (ok probably not) if I had to hunt with open sights on a shotgun or rifle.  I've used a scope FOREVER!!  I've never killed a deer with either a shotgun or rifle with open sights, NEVER.  ML, yes but not the other two.

 

Since 1980 I've been a scoped gun guy, how about you? 

 

Scope or no scope?

 

If not, why?

 

 

[Pygmy]

Back when Christ was a carpenter, I killed quite a few deer with shotguns, using a plain bead, a double bead, and open rifle type sights.

I have only ever used one muzzleloader, an early TC Hawken, and used the open sights until my eyes would no longer allow it, at which time I switched to a tang peep sight, which still works well for me. I shoot quite well with it, even offhand, although I've never taken a shot beyond about 75 yards with it at game.

The only deer I ever shot with an unscoped rifle was taken with my Garand M1 with the issue peep sight.

All that said, I started using a scope on my shotguns in the late 1970s and never went back to opens. The scopes I have used on my shotguns are El Paso Weavers in 1.5X and 2.5X... All of my centerfire rifles except the M1 have scopes, in fact none of them have open sights.

Day in and day out, a scope is a superior sighting device.

[Sudzy8]

Scope for me. I grew up shooting woodchucks with a scoped .22. I'm terrible with open sights.

[greensider]

i hit to many sticks i did not see when i was a youngster i would never use a gun without a scope unless i was only shooting in a field

[PeltHunter]

I can see, for some, hunting without a scope. What I can't see or agree with, is, in this day and age hunting with a smoothbore barrel. Personally I hunt shotgun zones with a 220 Savage bolt with a 40mm 3-9 Nikon Slughunter

[WNYBuckHunter]

Ive killed a bunch with iron sights and a bead on a shotgun. Open sights on my first 2 muzzleloader deer too. I have my iron sight Marlin 30-30 that I take out on drives, but havent had an opportunity at a deer with it yet. Maybe this year.

[Lawdwaz]

OK, good info. 

 

This thread seems familiar.......have I posed a similar thread in the past????  Sorry if I have..............

 

I'm curious to here from Buckstopshere.  He posted a pic of a beauty while holding an Browning A5 with open sights.  Curious if he ever went to a scope with a shotgun but I assume he uses a scoped rifle now but Lord knows, I've been wrong before.

 

IIRC growie doesn't use a scope. Chime in girl, it's darn near dark.  Too late to be monkeying around outside. 

 

Others?

[deerpassion]

I've killed a few with smoothbore open sight shotgun but the were 50 USA and in... Bought a mossberg 500 rifled cantilever barrel with fixed power scope on it to extend my range with confidence .... Rifles always scoped ... Muzzy have done both...

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Edited September 30, 2015 by deerpassion

[ants]

I shot open sights from 1979 until 1993. Back in the day the feeling of most of the hunters I knew, old timers especially, was that scopes would fog or break and that you couldn't get a fast enough sight picture. I took a lot of deer with irons on my old shotgun, a couple rifles and a muzzle loader. Then in 93 I got a rifled slug gun and I friend convinced me to put a scope on it. I did and I wish I did it from the beginning. Scopes ever since.

[Dinsdale]

Just depends on where I'm hunting (hunt in both shotgun and rifle areas) and my mood....

Still take a 20ga smoothbore 870 pump out with a single bead bird barrel; filled all my tags many years with that gun. Added a scope once and threw the whole mess away after one time out; just didn't feel right.

Many of the rifles wear QD mounts and have sights, more often then not the scope goes on; but this year I'm gonna hunt one particular rifle without, just because I never killed a deer with that gun and open sights.

[GreeneHunter]

Been shooting a Winchester 30 30 with iron sights for over 40 years , never used a scope ..... but that's just me !

[nyantler]

No

[Fletch]

For the first 15 years I used nothing but iron sights and took plenty of deer. The last decade or more my eyesight has deteriorated from that wonderful 20-10 and I shoot all scopes. Shotgun, rifle, muzzleloader and crossbow. I am not sure with my eyes if I could shoot worth a dang without a scope past 50 yards!!

[chrisw]

Scopes on all of my deer guns, even my hunting revolver wears a red dot.

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[Mr VJP]

Close range guns like my M1 Carbine, .30-30 and 20 ga slug gun have open sights.  Even my Talkeetna .375 H&H is still open sights, and I hope it gets to hunt Grizzly in Alaska one day.  I like the Williams Fire Sights the best as they really glow and are easy to see when action is fast.

 

Some rifles just handle better without a scope.

 

My regular deer rifles have scopes, as do my varmint rifles.  Basically, any long range shooter has a scope on it.

 

[Cabin Fever]

I gotta have a scope. Magnified too! 

Edited October 1, 2015 by Cabin Fever

[DirtTime]

Used both. Had a Mossy 500 with a scope in 12, and Remmy 870 in 20 with a slug barrel and open rifle sites. 90% of the time I grabbed the 870.

Rifles I have always used a scope. I did have an old 06 with a peep site, but at the time I had that I also had a Remmy 7400 in .270 with a Bushnell 3x9. The .270 was what I carried in the woods.

 

I am thinking of adding a lever 30/30 to the cabinet, and I will not put a scope on that.

 

I guess it just depends on what you like and are comfortable with. 

[ATbuckhunter]

Scopes for me on my rifles. Although I just got a new rifle and don't plan on putting a scope on it for quite a while. 

[NFA-ADK]

Only if I have to shoot out past 80 yards, otherwise no scope.  I use both but really need a scope past 80-100 yards.  That is why I prefer the lighter 44 mag in the trapper model 94 in the ADK.  Most shots are less than 70 yards and that gun is easy to handle 5 miles or more in hand.

[wolc123]

I switched to a scope about the same year you did.  The year prior, I did take my first deer (a "button-buck), with open sights, using my granddad's Ithaca model 37, 16 ga slug-gun.   Looking back, I think I may have actually been aiming at a "twin" running in front of it.   I don't think I led that one enough, and the slug hit the close-following deer perfectly thru the front shoulders.  It all happened so fast I cant be sure which one I shot at.  My uncle, who was with me at the time, still talks about that shot all these years later.  The shot definitely contributed to some overconfidence on my part.   My luck ran out when I missed a closer shot at a big-antlered, slow moving, buck a few weeks later.   I don't know if it was "buck-fever", or if I just did not bring the rear sight up enough and shot over his back.   That was the last deer I missed with that gun, since getting a 1-1/2X Weaver mounted on it all those years ago.  

 

The following year, I got my first antlered buck with it when he stepped out of the brush, right below my stand.  I put the crosshair on his front shoulder, pulled the trigger once and that was all she wrote.   That gun/scope combo holds decent groups to a little under 100 yards (aprox 6" dia), using Winchester foster slugs.   I took my largest antlered buck ever with it, about 10 years later.  My first shot at that one was a bit over a hundred yards.   The shot struck him low, breaking a front leg up high.   God helped me a bit then as he so often has.  The buck had been struck just above the hoof, in an opposite diagonal rear leg about a week prior, which left him with just two good legs.  Most folks know that a deer on three legs is nearly as fast as one on four.   Two legs is a different story.   A lot younger and faster then, I had no trouble closing the range and finishing him with a neck-shot from point-blank range.  I never would have taken that initial long shot without that scope, but getting that buck still took some more of that "special" help.

 

I took my second largest-racked buck, again with that same gun/scope at point-blank range, and again with some of that "special" help just a few years ago.   My Bible slipped from my hands with about 5 minutes of legal shooting time left.  I climbed down to get it with the loaded gun (sorry to the safety police).  Immediately upon reaching the patch of brush at the base of the tree, a flock of turkeys landed right on my position.  They were the pawns for the wise old buck who thought their superior vision would keep him safe.  He got the surprise of his life with that shotgun blast to the neck.  I wonder why that Bible slipped from my hands when it did? Coincidence maybe?  Roughly a hundred other deer have fallen to that and several other gun/scope combos over the years.

 

I have killed and recovered in the neighborhood of a hundred deer with various gun/scope combos.  I have also missed a couple and wounded one that was later killed by a friend.   I also lost one that I tracked for a long distance, but was not able to locate until the crows led me to the carcass a week later, half eaten by coyotes.  I don't remember all the details of most of them.  I have only ever shot at 3 other deer with open sights, since that first miss so long ago.  I killed them all.  First was a big doe that stepped out of the brush, standing broadside in a shooting lane at about 70 yards.  The slug hit her in the neck, killing her instantly (I had aimed for the front shoulder, so it was about a foot off).    

 

Second was a nice 8-point that arrived on the scene and stood over a doe I had dropped with my scoped ML about 3 minutes prior, again at about 70 yards.   I had my "backup-gun", a 12 ga, Remington 870 with open sights and a short, smoothbore deer barrel up in the stand (same gun used on doe up above).  This time my slug hit right where I aimed, on his shoulder blade, putting him down right next to the dead doe.  

 

The third one was another somewhat messy kill.  The conditions for a scope were bad with a cold rain falling all morning.   I was in my warm ground blind armed again with the 870.   When the rain stopped, I walked over to and climbed up into a tree stand, overlooking a clover plot.  Soon a young buck stepped into clover about a hundred yards out and began munching.  I had a nice rest in the stand, and an empty freezer late in the season.   I took the shot.  The buck looked up, then resumed feeding.  I noticed a spot of mud fly beyond the buck where the slug struck so I knew my shot was high.  Using the standard "artillery" method, I aimed lower on my second shot, this time seeing mud fly in front of the buck.  I had him "bracketed" now, and the third shot struck home, putting him down with a high shoulder hit.   Again, not real pretty but the job got done.

Edited October 1, 2015 by wolc123

[Huntscreek]

I started out iron sights on my shotgun and killed a lot that way. I started hunting with a hasting rifle barrel but just did not like a scope on it, went red dot. Now on my Rifles all are toped with scopes.

[wmig2]

I'm a scope man for sure. I think my marlin 22 from when I was 14 is the only gun I don't have a scope on.

[chiefbkt]

Scoped for sure! But my old faithful has see through scope mounts so I can use both.

Chiefbkt

[Fantail]

Scope on the rifle but muzz has so far been just sights. Turkey gun has the tri-viz sights, I do like them. Slug guns sights or red dot. Thought about a scope if I get a rifled barrel for the 12 or 20 but honestly where I usually hunt I don't need either.

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[Elmo]

Scoped.

 

Here's my own reasoning on it.  I owe it to the animal that I use the most accurate and lethal implement I can comfortably use.  No knock against those who are proficient with iron sights to make clean ethical kills.  Just me personally.  I think I'm good enough without glass on top but I'm much better with the glass so I'll pick the glass every single time.  I don't ever feel the need to challenge" my shooting skills at a live creature.  I happily satisfy that urge on paper.