Other than departing half a day late for the crop damage deer hunt, the trip went very well. The Ernesto storm up the east coat had us delayed as the friend I was staying with was w/o power...but I grew up camping so this was nothing new!

Anyhoo...we had thirty tags available for us to fill and only an evening and the entire next day to make as much of a dent as possible in the allotment.

Weaponary consisted of my new APS XP-100 chambered in 7mm/270WSM and topped w/ a Burris 3-12x32 BP Handgun scope. The load is 63.5gr IMR4831SC pushing a 162gr A-Max at 2825fps. The drops in the BP scope when zeroed at 250yds are 306, 406, 498 and 600yds.

My host was toting a Savage 116BSS .300 Rummy loaded w/ 180gr Barnes TSX at some insane velocity.

Evening one had us overlooking a beanfield w/ a maximum shooting distance of 400yds. The evening went slow as the deer were a little messed up from the storm. But as dark neared they started pouring into the field. As we watched, one large doe parted herself from the group and was whacking down beans faster than a harvester. The field edge ranged at 377 yards. I chambered a round, settled her between the first and second dots in the Burris scope and started to squeeze. At the shot she folded w/o even a flinch...high shoulder hit. Upon inspection, she was a nearly a full 30yds from the field edge (making her closer to 345-350yds)...still a new person best for me. The 162gr A-Max was caliber in w/ a 2" exit.

Morning of day two brought a very slow beginning. Deer did not appear until nearly 11AM. Two fawns. The hunt was for deer meat for several needy families but the ultimate goal was crop damage minimization...so as Wayne and Garth would put it..."GAME ON!" John ranged the targets again at 377yds but they were just popping out of the woods so we knew they were on the field edge. I settled in with the APS XP-100 and went live. Bracketed the deer between dot two and three and let the big dog eat! A miss!! What?! Deer scattered nervously but remained in the field...shot number two was loosed to the same results...a miss! All of a sudden I realized I was using the wrong hold! Should be holding between dots one and two, not two and three!! This guns shoots WAY flatter than anything this scope has ever been used on and I simply had a brain fart.

Well...even after two grenades sent there way...the deer remained in the field. I obtained another range reading (376yds), used the correct hold and I touched off...the deer jumped about two feet in the air and ran like a scalded cat. Group concensus (and review of the video tape) was that it was a hard chest hit. We gave the deer a little time then followed up. Upon arrival at the hit site we found a deer! Huh?! Mine ran into the woods. The deer on the ground had a 1.5" hole straight through the neck. Closer inspection (and another review of the tape) revealed that I had doubled the two fawns...the deer in front took the chest hit and ran 50yds before expiring while the other simply folded. After my goof, myself and the two spotters failed to see the second deer behind the first. This distance bested my personal best w/ a handgun that was set the evening before.

Evening two was also slow until about 7PM when deer again started pouring into the field. There were 8 or so standing on the right side at 278yds and a lone fawn on the left side at the same distance. The plan was two take at least two deer from the herd then try to get the left side deer before it made it to the woods. As luck would have it...I had a large doe brake from the group and John (w/ the RUM and TSX's) had two deer brake and stand exactly side by side. John had first shot and droppd both deer instantaneously, a seond later I fired and dropped my deer w/ a high shoulder hit...so three deer down! Then John swung on the left side at the same time I did but he got on the trigger faster and put her down for good. So in a ten second span we dropped four deer. Several less fortunate families are eating well tonight!!

Though it would have been very wishful thinking to want to harvest all 30 tags, I think we did very well in the short 1.5 day hunt. Other than my two misses that were fully the fault of the operator, the shooting was very good and bullet performance was perfect. The doubled deer w/ the Barnes was amazing...the front deer was caliber in and 1.5" out, while deer two was 2" in and 3" out.

I took video of all the hits w/ a regular tape camera and I'm going to try and record very short digital video snips w/ my digy camera this AM from the TV screen. Very archaic I know...but I'm not a real tech savvy fella.

now thats gotta be fun dan! cheater cheater......it's too early fer the rest of us

No telling what you will do in the future if you hunt in a larger field

Man, sounds like a pr. dog shoot. Whooee!

What a sweet rig/system u got there Dan.

Quote:

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...All of a sudden I realized I was using the wrong hold! Should be holding between dots one and two, not two and three!! This guns shoots WAY flatter than anything this scope has ever been used on and I simply had a brain fart.

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Man, could i tell u some stories of those kinda brain farts too-- like maybe attempting to use a 2nd focal plane ballistic reticle on the wrong magnification?? Oh yeah, it happened-- more than once, i hate to admit.

One time i was spotting for Mitch when he was using Leupold's Varmint Hunter reticle. I was calling his zeros (and correction) for him on steel at long-range. I'd say, OK, hold 2.4 (stadia) low, and .75 left, and then he'd shoot, and miss the tgt. by a foot both ways. I'd scratch my head, and call correction for him. This went on more than once so i finally discussed it with him, and found out he was counting the center x-hair as stadia #1-- man so much for communication. Here's the worst 1 tho, and hopefully a wakeup call for all those that r shooting long-range. I was hunting coyotes west of Pueblo with a rig that i'd put a Stoney Point turret on (they don't have any revolution indicators on them). I was walking back to the car, and lasered a rock on a tepee butte that stood out at 500-600 yds. something. I dialed the correction in , and let it go-- no impact, so i fired again-- still no impact. Got to thinking about it, and God almighty i had 1 revolution in too many , and the bullets were going over the butte and possibly into a feed lot about a mile away. Sure enuf that's what i'd done, and God what a STUPID mistake that was. Nothing happened, but man what if it had. Almost caused me to give up long-range shooting right there. Hope everybody reads this.

Dan, keep it coming please . Be nice to read some more about how that rig/A-Max is working.

Sounds like you had a good time Dan!! Nice shooting.

Dan,
What is your next hunting opportunity with your WSM?
Are all of your other SP's going to take a backseat now?

Ernie...funny you should ask! Just had it out on Thursday and bagged a couple varmints. Both were close range...200yds-ish. The A-Max is leaving spectacular exit holes on groundhogs...a minimum of 2" is the norm!

Missed a g-hog at 345yds then Rupe missed the same one a few minutes later at the same range (he was shooting a factory XP in 7BR). When we went for a body check, we found out that they were standing on a long belly between two small rises in the field...so they could have been anywhere from 320yds to 390yds. I could range the near side rise and the far rise but not in between. Next time we will have a different angle to reduce the ranging error...and possibly get out to 500yds. How about it Rupe?!!

Then was out on Friday and busted a few clay birds at 500yds.

Hey Dan - Sure hope you remembered the ice cream on your way home !! You didn't answer Ernies question; so I will - Ernie, I think Dan's new XP is going to be sitting in the front row for a period of time ! Had a chance to talk with my farmer friend and he says anytime we want to use his farm for long range is fine. Haven't received any shipping word on my 22BR, but expect to tonight. Have a feeling that my Smith had a match this weekend. Ordered my dies this morning so I should be ready the early part of October. Dig out your gongs and I'll save some jugs. Sounds like a fun day.

Rupe

Dan,
Pretty soon Steve is going to have you talked into reticle ranging for situations like that. I keep leaning that way myself.
Clay birds @ 500
Soon you will double that!!!
When you do, I would like to see the smile on your face-With your rig it is just a matter of time and opportunity

Impressive shooting Dan. Guys, 1 of the things that got Ernie and i started in this long-range stuff was when we went to the Tactical Rifleman's Comp. up in Gilette. WY back in '04. That comp. was so much fun, possibly even more than hunting itself i thought. That's when we decided to put on SHOTS-- but the tough part of the whole deal was trying to come up with the most portable silhouette target system that would be easy to set up and pick up once the shoot was finished. What we came up with is a system u guys may be interested in for that big chunk of land out east u got there Rupe.

The local junkyard had a bunch of small heat treated pieces of rectangular metal (9X17"), that was terrific for shooting at, but i couldn't drill it for hooks even with a carbide bit. So i had to burn holes in it with a cutting torch (with mom's help Bleieve it or not). If u get 3 pieces of metal stakes like rebar, and a couple copper or galvanized plumbing tees, pound 2 rebar into the ground set the T's on top, raise the T's slightly and slide the 3rd rebar horizontally thru them it gives u a great frame to hang tgts. from, and it's extremely portable.

Here's another idea for portable paper tgts. Get 2 more stakes, and pound them into the ground. Get some 3/4 or 1" pipe conduit maybe 5 ft tall, and attach big cardboard tgts. to them with zip straps along the edges, and then slide the pipe over the rebar. It makes a great portable long-range tgt. system, and u can make it as big as u want. I have 1 that's 5ftx5ft that we've used for real long-range. I used to set up 5 or 6 at a time on some of these ranches when i was testing loads/reticles, etc.

U know there's a really neat sniper-type comp. that's put on out there every year called the Allegheny Sniper Challenge, or something like that somewhere's in West VA i think, that requires reticle-rangefinding, and tgt's are set out at long-range. If i was out there i'd be going to that every yr.-- what a kick it would be.

I just heard today that Darrell Holland's putting on a long-range comp. that's geared toward the hunter too, with reticle-ranging adding points to each station-- MAN i'm going to that 1 for sure.

Hey, how's the zeros matching up with Exbal?

BTW, did u ever meet Don Bower, Dan-- he would've had a field day with your name-HA

I bet u did.

Nice to see that A-Max is working so well for terminal ballistics. I'm hoping my 6.5 WSM will do well on coyotes with the 140 A-Max. I only shot a couple coyotes at anything near LR when i had the 6.5-284 with that bullet, and the furthest was a lucky shot at a little over 400, and it did work well. We'll see what happens when i get it up and running. I really think those A-Maxes are the best bullets for long-range external/terminal ballistics on varmints though with the polymer tip helping with expansion-- i hope. It's reassuring knowing the 162's are working well. Here's the #'s for the .531 BC @ 2825 1000 ft. elevation/50 degrees/50% humidity/1.5" sight height.

1) 200 yd. zero/max trajectory=1.8"^
A) 260
B) 360
C) 450
D) 550

2) 225 zero/max traj.=2.5"^/
A) 280
B) 380
C) 470
D) 565

When i have these kind of zeros that don't match up to even yardages as above, i calculate an interpolative zeroing system for the in-between ranges in 25 yd. increments. For the 280-380 stadia i'd have a 300, 325, and 350 zero on my range sticker. For your trajectory it would be--

280=1st stadia unit (SU)

300=1.2

325=1.5

350=1.8

380=2

This way i don't have to spend any time thinking in the field. I've found this to be a very precise system of zeroing, and it is based on the same system the mil-dot guys use for ranging by interpolatively dividing the space between stadia into tenths of that particular "stadia unit."

Steve...thanks. When I get closer to the hunt and some exact fps numbers, then I'll have you run some more precise figures. We'll also be hunting around 8500ft of elevation...and likely to see temps around 25 degrees.

With a 250 yard Zero, 8500 elev, 25 degrees, 10 mph crosswind

Zero -- 250 yards 2.4
1st plex-309 3.8
2nd plex-416 6.9
3rd plex-514 10.9
4th plex-626 16.4

If you have a set maximum distance we can also setup your BP/zero that way also.
For the mountains I usually sighted in somewhere in between 270 & 300 yards when using the BP system.