what ammo to buy 30-06
 

ok so as of now I am planing to buy a stevens 200 30-06 tomorrow. with a camo stock and a bushnell scope that comes bore sighted for $400. This will be my first riffle, and first time hunting.

This will be my white tail dear hunting riffle. I will be hunting in the woods so I should not be doing any long shots

so there are all these different grains. is the gun rated for a certain grain or is that up to me. what do you guys recommend.

what about brand what do you guys recommend "easier on the wallet the better" I am planing to sight it in, double check it right before its time to hunt, and hunt.

I'm sure my gun likes different bullets better than others but I don't have the money to try different kinds right now. I will try different kinds for next year when the funds are better.

I would think pretty much any thing is good enough as long as im sighted in for that shot and not doing any super long ranges, but I guess I don't really know.

A standard bullet, 150 or 165gr would be my recommendation to start for a 30-06 deer load. Remington core-lokt or Federal power-shok have worked good for me, and are amongst the more inexpensive factory loads available. I recommend you get started handloading as soon as possible. The equipment will pay for itself in ammunition savings quickly and then effectively start to pay you.

Different calibers are able to handle different weight bullets well, but pretty much anything you buy off the shelf should shoot ok. Like you say there will be some that work better or worse for your rifle, but your contribution to the inaccuracy will probably be more than the contribution of the rifle/ammo once you're off the bench (I know it's true for me). Agreed on 150 or 165 grain for deer.

The .308, .30-06, and .300 Win Mag all fire the same diameter bullets with different case sizes, so they have different amounts of powder they can put behind it. If someday you were going for bear and wanted something bigger you could easily shoot 200 grain bullets, while a .308 really suffers when it gets up there. And a .300 win mag could go even higher.

Remington core-lokt in 150 grain are what I use, but any of the major brands will work fine.

I'd say 150 or 180 gr federal power shoks, see which one your gun likes best.

I like the Hornady factory loads best.

For "woods" hunting with the -06 I have always liked shooting the 180 grain Remington Core-lok...I killed my first deer with this load from a Remington 742 semi-auto.

I have seen some bad results with Winchester Powerpoint and Silvertips in the 150 grain loads with up close shots (around 20 yards).

The best overall (any range) loads are probably the 165 grain loads...

Shoot a few differant brands and loads to find out what shoots best thru your -06,my Tikka likes the 180gr Remington Core-lok so I bought 20 boxes of matched ammo(same lot number)witch will last me a looooooong time..