EKM

Nice equipment.
Nice set up.
Nice shot.
Reach out and touch something.
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For those who say, "Yeah, I'll just stalk incloser" because I am a real (ethical) hunter.... yeah right....
That bull was across canyon and climbing UP steep terrain.... quickly.
By the time one drugones sorry arse to the bottom and started up the other side in rifle season, that bull would likelyhave been in the next drainage and/or next county. These aren't whitetails.

More like,
"Yeah, I'll move closer and just try to find something else, somewhere, hopefully."
And that sure can work and nothing wrong with it, but don't confuse it with automatic superiority and possession of the moral high ground.

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Have you everseen the aftermath of a herd of 400-500 pressured elk blundering into a basin full of so called "ethical, "short range" hunters on public land in medium coverwithin about two miles of the road? Sickening. Wounding and intentional abandonment of game on a grand scale. Gutted legal bulls left untagged for something better. Gutted cows left for something else (Either sex tags available in some areas in Colorado.... pop the cow and then while field dressing it, here comes the bull... bang). The bloated carcasses of the ones that were not found (perhaps not even pursued), those werethe first ones we came to since they ran back away from the road towards our positions.

We were taking out the elk we got into (six of them that morning) using horses and coming from5 miles back in....tried hard not to look too far left or too far right.... just look aheadand get past it and getback to the main camp and take care of our little piece of the world. What a slaughter, hadn't seen anything like it before or since.

Short range = automatically ethical?
I don't buy it. Seen otherwise.

Long range = automatically unethical?
I don't buy that either. Seen otherwise.

hillbillyhunter1

Although I agree with you EkM that nothing is automatic and absolute without exceptions. How would you know that those unethical hunters in your examplewere "short range hunters"? I submit that a person,who, may bewilling to shoot at long range, for whatever reason (skill, excitement, lack of ethics(?)), won't normally beprecluded from shooting at shorter rangesif the opportunity presents itself. Long range would never be exclusive of short range. An unethical hunter is unethical, no matter what the range of his current target.

Although as distance increases, a particular shot will eventually cross the "ethical threshold" for everyone, just at different points.

EKM

Answer:
I am very familiar with the zone where it happened. You would be hard pressed to get more than a two hundred yard shot due to the cover and terrain;therefore, many of the shots where much shorter than that. A "short range hunter" is one shooting at short range. A "long range hunter" is one shooting at long range. The hunters preference doesn't enter into it.What is commonly being trotted out is "if you shoot at close range your odds are high and you are ethical" AND conversely "if you shoot at long range your odds are bad and you are unethical."

Trust me, these weekend warriors were a far cry from even vaguely resembling the group in this video. They camp on the same ridge/trailhead area as our base camp and I visit during the scouting week prior to the season. In visiting their camps and talking to them on the trailsall you had to do was observe their equipment (no external turret MOAs, no high end range finders, no finely rigged rifles---definitely notlong range specialists.

It ain't that cut and dried.

James B

I may be the only one but after hunting all over creation for 50 years, I have yet to see a time where it was even remotely necessary to take a 800 yard plus shot at a game animal. Not even to prove some Rambo point to anyone and certainly have nothing to prove to myself. Maybe many have bot seen animals shot and wounded at ranges that didn't allow the animal to be found. While a man on foot or even on a good horse can cover some ground, a wounded animal can make itself pretty scarce in that amount of time. I don't even consider it a matter of ethics as much as just plain common sense. These kind of stunts may work for the one tenth of one percent of hunters who can do this even 60 percent of the time but posting this stuff where the rest of the hunters who can't is just asking for trouble. I have been through this before and I am done harping on it. However the only thing for sure is that these god figures to some of you screw up too and the longer the range, the more chance for Murphy to work his magic. Now flame away . With good practice and knowing all the variables, a 400 yard shot is out at about the extreme limit of most hunters including me IMO. However I love those way out there targets. The kind that don't bleed.

tangozulu

Of couse this video could easily be a set-up. All the commentary was set up after the fact. The guides could have been watching from the far slope and filming while the hunter stalked and shot from much closer.
You tube is famouse for deception.
Of couse no one would post the 10 video outtakes of the animal being wounded and crawling away.

James B

Thats for sure and it happenssome do their practicing on live targets too.

ipscshooter

He must have been using a .243...

James B

No Doubt.Deadly long range elk rifle.

ipscshooter

Hey, they work great on deer, and an elk's just a big deer... right?

gandilamont

If you shoot an Elk at 800 yards with a .338 Ultra mag pushing a 300 grain Sierra matchking at 2770 Feet Per Second, its about the same as shooting an Elk at 300 yards with a 180 grain partition out of a 30-06. If your a good shot,use the right equipment and know your bullet drop Its very ethical.

If you lopping a light bullet with holdovers guessin it might hit the criiter and hoping your bullet will have enough kinetic enerhy to kill it than thats very unethical.