I read your post and got your not wanting to take away. But the title of the topic gives any Anti plenty of fuel. Yes there is a need. You might not have the need and that' s fine, I don' t have the need for a double rifle in .460 but what the heck... go buy one if you want

FLA/GA nope I have family there ...the heat and mosquitoes are a little more than I can take come hunting season. Lived down there 10 years and hunted GA and Out WEst every single year just to keep things interesting. I usually head down there Thanksgiving and Easter and sometimes during the summer to do some offshore fishing.

BTW the only ELk you' ll find around here are either in Zoo' s or in the Smokies...Hopefully in my lifetime I' ll draw a permit and get one in Kentucky or even here in NC...

Ahhh... NC. Gotcha. My family used to vacation there every summer... I loved making the drive across the border to Cade' s Cove. God, there are a lot of deer there.

TScottW99 - Absolutely... but I can actually make a case for buying a .460 (yeah, I' m going hunting in Africa for a month, going to get a water buffalo), whereas I really couldn' t point to a reason I' d ever buy a semiauto. (personal tastes and ' just cuz I wanna' aside )

Here' s an semiauot advantage that most people don' t realize-
When sound of the bolt cycling is covered up by the muzzle report. If you were to need a quick follow up shot without spooking game before the shot like say for instance if you somehow had a hornet sting you on the back of the neck causing you to jerk your shot causing you to miss a record book buck, cycling the bolt on a bolt action will make enough noise to draw the animals attention to where you are at, whereas the game will never hear your action cylcling with a semiauto.

The first muzzle report alone will not draw attention to you because down range the animal will hear the loud splat of the bullet hitting, brush, trees, or mud in one direction and hear a loud boom coming from another.

You get what you pay for as with anything. A semiauto has alot more moving parts than a bolt action. Producing a semiauto like a remington 7400 or an SKS for the same price as a moderate quality bolt gun isn' t going to get you much in the way of accuracy, or even functionality as in the case of the Remington. A semi auto is a great technological advancement over a bolt rifle and with technological advances comes a higher price for quality. Its almost like comparing a motorcycle to a bicycle.


Shooting from a stack of sandbags will give a well made bolt action a huge edge over any semiauto, but in the real world, not too many shoot their guns like that out in the field. From my bit of highpower rifle experience, I' ve been shooting a carefullly assembled 03A3 Springfield this year, and I have shot nothing but bolt actions in the past, except for using Garands a few times. The 03 is easily as accurate if not more accurate than most of the semi-auto' s including m1a' s and AR-15' s that are not match tuned- I simply cannot compete with them because cycling the bolt in rapid fire requires me to break my cheek weld and reset my position after each shot, whereas semi shooters just ride out the recoil and allow their rifle to come back down to their natural point of aim.

I wouldn' t be afraid to put my stock factory 40xbks up against any semi auto reguardless of the cost as far as accuracy is concerned and it only cost me $1600 canadian when I bought it several years ago..

[][:-] I would think that the reason that people chose the semiauto is that they can waste more ammo.... If you are a good hunter you have no real reason for a second ..... I have shot all my deer with one thought in mind "
1 shot 1 kill.... If I can not completly sure that the shot is a 100% kill shot then chances are I will not take the shot.... But then that is me ..... [8D][&:][][:-][&o]

The reason for all the faces is to my daughter { MEGAN .... She is 4 and wanted to see them }....

My cousin is 86 years old and suffers from arthritis, and is considered a mobility Impaired Hunter. He still hunts but has a hard time working a bolt action, so he now uses a semi-auto. If it was not for the semi-auto, he might not be able to hunt anymore. Good luck.

Awesome reason. Thanks, handloader.

And Daffy, good thing you put in that p.s.... I was beginning to think you were schizo.