keith meador

i really have no argument here. i have used a .243 for years and have never lost a deer. i have never killed a deer with a 30-30, but have seen several dead deer as a result of its use, evidently, it worked as well.

i now have a 300rum and a 7mag. i have harvested deer with the 7mag and have yet to shoot a deer with the 300rum, but im anxious to try it out.

i use the 1000ftlb rule. if the bullet energy drops below that level, the deer is out of range. that being said, if the weapon i am using has 1000ftlb of energy left at 450yrds, i will take the shot. i have taken several deer past 300yrds with 100gr sierra bullets out of a 243, and the end result was success.

are we overgunned? probably. will the big magnums and the ultra mags perform better than the smaller non magnum calibers? definately. i think a lot of folks just use what they want. i like trying different things on deer. is a bigger gun overkill, i will just say that it will kill. dead is dead.

at what point do we determine that a gun is too large, or that a particular bullet is incorrect for deer sized game? i hunt only whitetails, and very seldom do we have deer over 170lbs, with 90 to 100lb does being the norm as of late. i like the 7mag for the extended range it offers me, and the ability to finish at the end of a 400yd trip. the 243 will definately do the job, but, i have had a few deer, that dropped in their tracks, but had no exit wound, and a small entrance wound. could i have recovered that deer had it run? maybe, maybe not. i hunt open field almost exclusivly, and have the opportunity to stretch the legs on my guns, and welcome the opportunity. i am not a ballistics expert, but i educate myself on the rounds i use, and shoot them at longer ranges to prove to myself the ballistics tables, velocity, and trajectory are correct. i shot on the service rifle team in the military with the m14 and m1a. we shot frequently at 600 yards and i have had the privalage of shooting some 1000 yard matches. very imtimidating to say the least. most of our guns are capable of shooting the distances with some level of accuracy, if we spend the time to shoot them and get a load that works, the only limiting factor is the 1000ftlb rule that i use.

i do not take careless shots, and do not take a shot i feel i cannot make. i probably shot more rounds in the military on the rifle team than most people shoot in a lifetime, (the average deer hunter) excluding some of the folks on here who shoot very often.

am i overgunned, i sure hope so. i want a humane kill.

as for jack conner, i, to my knowledge, have never read anything he has written. i have had the great opportunity to meet carlos hathcock at the winston p wilson matches in little rock arkansas prior to his death. he was truely a great man, and very knowledgable about shooting long range.