Like most things in life the various hunting camps or styles get dividing and pitted again each other. Gun vs bow, dogs vs not, compound vs recurve vs crossbow, hunter vs trapper, etc.
This is truly unfortunate as sportsman and women who invest the most in keeping the conservation going. Too often though the us vs them mentally sets in. Or frankly sportsman are baited into so that it can be used to restrict our opportunities in the great outdoors.
There are two schools of thought on range in the modern era of off the shelve long range rifles, range finders, and optics. All having advances unheard of twenty or thirty years ago. Long range shooting and thereby hunting are in the reach of almost everyone that is interested.
The other side of the hunting coin is guys who limit range and take most of their shots to under 100 or 200 yards. For some of these guys the technology hasn’t changed much from what their grandfather hunted with. And that is fine too, because it works.
Despite what both either side says, neither are wrong, as long as they are personally operating in their ethical competent limits.
The close range guys will joke that they are hunters and the long range guys are shooters. Maybe so, but to consistently make those shots is a very real skill just as getting close enough to a deer that you can touch it, is a very real skill. Both camps have to competent at both. Some are just better hunters and some are better shooters.
Regarding shooting, my personal standard is tested on a 8 or 10 inch metal plate target. If I can hit that target consistently with my rifle under field conditions than I feel confident in taking a shot on game under the same conditions. Those are my standards because it fairly accurately resembles the vital zone of a fair bit of game. You will have to decide on your own metric that you are comfortable.
The other qualifier for hunting, is your bullets construction and impact velocity have to be matched to the game you are pursuing. Without going into a long essay on terminal ballistics and how impact velocity does to bullet performance, I will try to summarize it here. The keys to securing game with a rifle are:
- Placing the bullet in the appropriate place.
- The bullet achieving enough penetration on the quarry reach the depth it was designed to work at.
- For the bullet to either penetrate and expand or penetrate and tumble resulting in consistent harvest of game.
If you and your bullet can not repeatedly and on demand produce those results then you are dipping into an ethically questionable area. Whether the distance is 35 yards or 1,000 yards.
Be honest with yourself and get out there and practice your craft.
-Joseph
Outpost 95 