shooting issues
 

hi guys where i live there are two big fields on each side of my house. however there is a state road between my house and the one field. my dad wants the hogs in that field shot but when you cross the road they bolt. so since there is about a 1 mile straight strech we wait for no cars in sight and shoot. but we can never hit them. they are about 275 and some are 375 yards out i'm using a 308 that is deadly and have killed hogs at 600 and 650 yards easy. so what we think is happening is the heat coming off the road is making the bullet rise when it hits the hotter air?? what do you guys think

RE: shooting issues
 

Pig fever. You make shots at 650 yds. and miss at 275 ? A .308 sighted in for 200 yds. would still let you aim on hair at 275. Use a good set of shooting sticks and practice.

also re-measure those successful 650 yd. shots........................

RE: shooting issues
 

RE: shooting issues
 

idk all i know is that we always throw dirt on them but can't hit them but when we shoot in the field that doesn't cross the road we do fine. me and my cousin have 308's ands it's all the same story.

RE: shooting issues
 

Do you know where you're bullet is landing, short , long, left or right. Might help people give you an answer. I'm not a long range shooter, 300yds or so is where I draw the line so I cant help you.

You might want to consider crossing the road and trying to ambush them at closer range. At 200+ yds, even if they run, I wouldn't think they would go very far and you should still be able to get a good shot.

Be careful shooting across a road, even if it's legal in Ohio it's still dangerous.

RE: shooting issues
 

Aside from the legality of shooting across a state road I would think you should be able to get a little closer to them for an easiershot.

That being saidand getting back to your original question "is the rising heat from the road causing you to miss" I can pretty confidently say no. It's not going to be enough to cause a complete miss on a hog.

It's either operator error or your not sighted in properly for the yardage you are shooting. You state that you can kill the pigs out at 600-650 "easy" so I would assume you aren't holding Kentucky windage on them and your .308 is sighted in at that distance. If that's the case then you will be way....WAY off at 275-375yds.

Something ain't right and it's not the heat off theroad.;)

P.S. Stop shooting across state roads.

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I would think that shooting across a road would be illegal as all get out. Better check your local regs.

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Guys, although I doubt it, any possibility of the heat waves coming off the road distorting the sight picture when you are looking threw it, and for what it's worth any state I've ever lived in it is against the law to shoot over a state road

RE: shooting issues
 

Throwing dirt on them is a sure sign of shooting a bit short. Sight in your rifle for 200 yds. and just aim at them where you want to hit. Very few shooters who can 'easily hit at 650 yds. would have any trouble hitting at 275 or even 375. To accomplish the easy hit at 650 takes some practice and you pretty much have to know where your gun shoots along the entire bullet path to do it regularly.

Unless you actually laser the range even fewer shooters can estimate range beyond 150 yds. or so. I see people try it all the time out on the prairie.

RE: shooting issues
 

My guess would be the haze of the road is distorting your sight picture. Try and get a better setup.
-Jake

RE: shooting issues
 

I'm going with Ridge Runner on this. Probably a mirage problem distorting your view. But that shouldn't be a problem anyway, because you SHOULDN"T BE SHOOTING ACROSS A PUBLIC ROADWAY. Don't do it! It's illegal for a reason. Don't be the moron that gets his name on the news for being the one who shot a toddler in its car seat because you were so fixed on the hog in you crosshairs to notice the minivan coming down the road at 60mph.

Secondly, I hate to run up the BS flag, but if you can make 600+ yard shots "easy", then 300 yards is a chip shot. If it's not laser verified, I can't believe it. Your theory about heat rising from the road lifting the bullet is bogus. Take a bullet out to the road, stand right in the middle which should be the hottest part, and drop it. Does it fall or does it rise? Since the bullet creates no lift on its own, the effect of rising air is nil. Besides, even if we'd say that it has some effect on reducing the rate of accelleration toward the ground, at say 2600fps across a 24' wide two lane highway, the bullet spends just 0.0092 seconds over the road. Not enough time to significantly effect trajectory.

Mike

RE: shooting issues
 

This is what I was alluding to when I said it's not going to be enough to cause a miss on a hog. I've shot in extremely hot environments where you could actually see the heat waves rising in my line of site and none of it was enough to distort my target for a complete miss. not on a target and certainly not on a hog.


I was thinking the same thing, you would think a 275-375yd shot would be a slam dunk (heat not not) if he's killin them out past 600yds with ease.....BTW didn't he just get this .308?? When the hell was all this long range shooting suppose to be done with it?

Things that make you go hmmmmmmm.

RE: shooting issues
 

I have to agree that the heat is not a factor. Possibly mirage as previously stated.
And as for shooting across a public road. In PA the game law states that you CAN shoot across a public road if the path of the bullet is above the flow of traffic.
From the PGC site:
Road Hunting
It is unlawful to (1) hunt from a vehicle; (2) shoot at a turkey on a public road or right-of-way open to public travel; (3) shoot across a road unless the line of fire is high enough to preclude any danger to road users; and (4) alight from a vehicle and shoot at a turkey until the shooter is at least 25 yards from the traveled portion of the roadway.

RE: shooting issues
 

So then he'd better make damn sure that that bullet is higher than 13'6" above the road surface when it crosses the road, IF he's hunting in PA. His profile says he lives in Ohio.

Ohio game law states: "It is unlawful to shoot from, on, across, or along a public road or highway." (Ohio 2009-2010 Hunting & Trapping Regulations booklet, Pg. 34, available at www.flipseekllc.com/wildohio2009hunting.html )

It is also illegal in Iowa and Minnesota. I'd wager that at it is illegal in most states. It's also not a very good idea.

Mike

RE: shooting issues
 

Not to mention the fact that in the reloading forum he posted that he just got the rifle. I imagine that he hasn't even had enough time to get to know it yet. No mention of what scope he ended up putting on it or how it's zeroed. I also have to cry foul about hitting at 600-675 yds no problem and then can't make the shot at 275.

RE: shooting issues
 

I shoot pigs all the time at two thousand yards acrossthree roads and never had a problem. You just need to practce!:D

If your seriously shooting across the road you need to stop. It's just not worth the risk. Even if it's a seldom traveled road.

I also think you need to get a range finder. I think you will be suprised at how far 600+ yards really is with a rifle. I consistantly make 600 yards shots everytime, when my target is Mother Earth.:D

RE: shooting issues
 

I don't think hot air will make the bullet rise. But it can cause mirage, so the targets will appear to move around as you are aiming at them. Hot air is thinner than cold air, so your ballistic coefficient may increase due to hotter air. This would make the bullet retain velocity better, but the effect would be miniscule.

RE: shooting issues
 

I suspect that hot air is the central issue for this topic (and not from the road).

RE: shooting issues
 

You need to sight in you rifle in "ideal conditions" at a rage were you are confidant. and figure out you're bullets trajectory so you know how much it drops at ranges past you're zero. A mirage will through you off every time until you figure it out. If you're going to keep talking long shots you might want to put out some wind flags at different ranges so you can see what the wind is doing and more importantly so you can see what angle the mirage is "moving." Then go practice and keep notes of how far left, right or high you aim and where you hit. Practice.

RE: shooting issues
 

[
I was thinking the same thing, you would think a 275-375yd shot would be a slam dunk (heat not not) if he's killin them out past 600yds with ease.....BTW didn't he just get this .308?? When the hell was all this long range shooting suppose to be done with it?

Things that make you go hmmmmmmm.

[/quote]

Well just to clear 1 thing up i have had a ruger 308 for about 6 years nows. and i only take the shot cause i have my cousin spotting for me and the reason we can make the long shots is cause i have taken tons of time in find a true 1/4 moa load and i know where i can hit at 600 yds. and for you tho's calling B.S we got 1 of the hogs at 771 yds.thursday afternoon. what it accually was was that the scope was wrecked i sent it away to burris and the said there was a malfuntion in it. so i put on a brand new leupold me cuz had and 2 hours later we got the hog at 771. AND YES THAT LASER CHECKED. SO to Clear things up I now have 2 308's a ruger and a reminton 700 spss. and also threw the leuopold scope you don't get that many heat waves and we got 6 hogs thurs.

RE: shooting issues
 

i see what you are sayin about the road i can under stand that and i respect what you say but sayin that i can't make the shots it's just assuming things. also assuming that i'm shooting my new gun is too. like i said above i have more then 1 .308 i don't see why you guys assume somethings but oh well also i'm glad that burris has a lifetime garuntee cause i will be gettin a new fixed scope in a few days. but i hope this subject can be dropped i relized what i did wrong by shooting accross the road. and if any of you guys are interested in a lil bit i plan on puttin pics of the new .308 up.

RE: shooting issues
 

Dude i just said i have a ruger 308 i have not even got to get my new one dialed in yet and just for a shorter subject i didn't say it took 9 shoots to get it dialed exactly in sorry you find it so hard to buy that someone made a good shot and you can't say nice shot man. we clicked the scope up 19 clicks from where it was and was a lil low and left the pig would only run in the hole for about 10-15 sec and come back out. so on the 9th short i hit him right in the chest. i'm sorry that seems so far fetched but yes it does happen and if your wondering i'm loadin up 110 gr. varmiter. bullets with 4064. idk wat the veloicty is cause i can't afford to buy a conograph. but trust me my .308 did it and if that sounds out of the world you can talk to my cuz who this year took 1 at 811 with his 6.5x55 sweedish. and 1 at 711 with his 25-06. and about your B.S flag u can cut it down sorry where i'm from we aint afraid of a long shot.

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+1

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You know another thing I find disturbing about this whole thing, is not just that shooting over a public roadway is a stupid idea that displays a distinct lack of judgement. And it's not the fact that I think he's lying about the distance of the shot given the bullet used and the scope adjustment stated (once a spitzer bullet goes sub-sonic, it destabilizes and accuracy disappears). What bothers me more than all that is that it would seem that he's using live animals literally for target practice when he obviously doesn't know what he's doing. He said he needed 9 (NINE) shots to finally kill the one hog. Basically he took nine pot-shots at a live animal hoping to finally connect. This strikes me as the epitomy of slob hunting. The odds of wounding an animal are astounding, and the fact that he finally (after NINE SHOTS) got lucky and connected with a solid hit is just that, nothing but luck. IMO, a truly responsible hunter would be SURE of his rifle, load, trajectory and wind call and confident in his ability to make a clean kill before he'd EVER attempt such a shot... let alone 9 of them. Ridge Runner caught a lot of flack for his 1350 yard shot on a deer, but the fact is that he know PRECISELY what his rifle will do, and as I recall he did fire a spotter to verify his dope, but he shot it at a rock, not at the animal. That's responsible long range hunting. Just blasting rounds down range until you connect is an example of the worst type of slob hunter and gives other hunters a very bad name.

Mike

RE: shooting issues
 

Great posts RR. For the record taking 9 shots to hit something is not LR shooting in my book. Dialing in and knowing where your bullet is going is LR Hunting. anyone could watch how the dust flies and keep adjusting. Buckey, the best thing for you is to back it off a little and work up some charts and practice on non-live targets. I understand that they are just hogs and they are a nuissance, I know all about nuissance animals, but it's still an animal and you owe it the respect of a good clean kill...... Word of advice....don't even try to argue with RR about this stuff.... he knows more then you or I can prolly ever hope to know...altho I'm working hard to catch up with him haha I only need about 20 more years of experience I think.
-Jake

RE: shooting issues
 

Wow, Thursday afternoon you guys shot a pig at 771yds. with the 308 huh??
That sounds awfully familiar to this statement by you.....

The problem is you posted this back on the 11th! andyou claim to have shot a pig at 771yds only it wasa 243. So are we now to believe you guys killed two pigs at the EXACT SAME DISTANCE of 771yards???:eek:

So not only am I to believe you have killed two pigs with two different rifles at the exact same distance of 771yards you also want me/us to believe you own two 308 rifles, a Ruger and now your new Remington yet in your very own post you're asking others what's a good scope for a 308 back on the 10th! Not only would you KNOW what a good scope was, you would have stated that you OWN a Ruger .308!

Instead you write this.....

So you've killed a pig at 771 yards with a .308 but feel the need to now ASK what a good scope is for your new .308?? huh??

Back to the .308...you say you have a Ruger .308 yet you ask this question in yet ANOTHER post...

Again, why in the hell would you ask if the .308 isa good shooting round if you already own one AND have killed a pig with it at 771 yards????

BUCKEYEhunter140,

Congratulations on the new Remington .308, I really mean it. I know your excited because you just got a new gun. I get excited every time I get a new one and I've got enough to keep a small gun shop well stocked for years, but please take a second to think about what you write. Thereare folks here who know a whole hell of a lot more about long distance shooting than you or I will ever know. Ask them questions and start gaining information and knowledge about it and perhaps one day you will be able to make that 700+ yard shot and won't have to....well lets just say "fabricate" a story about it.

Deal?

RE: shooting issues
 

Buckey, my post may have come off a lil wrong. There is a wealth of info on this forum. Most members also will answer questions over private messages as well....in the two or three years or however long its been that I've been on this forum learning I've pretty much stretched my range to hitting at 400 yards everytime. windage, elevation, I learned it all. A lot of what I learned was from the likes of RR and the other shooters on here. They know more than I could hope to know for now. But if you start reading and asking questions and practicing you won't need 9 shots to hit a pig. Be honest and LEARN from the people that know what they are talking about. This site can be a great tool. Set goals for yourself. By the end of the summer I'm hoping to stretch my range to 500 yards. and hopefully 600 on deer for next season....after that I'm gonna invest in a new rifle because I'm really stretching my .30-06 right now. sorry if my last post seemed a lil harsh, but theres some good guys here, and a lot to be learned if one will just listen.
-Jake