In 40 years of Elk hunting I have seen no proof of that outside of my own camp. I have helped follow a whole bunch of bulls shot by a whole bunch of people with everything from .220 swift to 30-30's and all the big guns included. When I was young people used what they had and many guys did not own multiple rifles. They had "A" hunting gun. It was used for everything and was usually lacking for something unless the guy was a hand loader and had the inclination to make it work. Nowadays the notion that any of us hunts for meat is a joke. Unless you live on a ranch and can shoot an Elk without moving from your front porch it costs more to hunt big game then buying beef. When I was young that was not the case and guys used to shoot lots of stuff that was not up to the task and took the shots they got. It's nice that you have witnessed such restraint.
Actually thats what I was trying to say. I mentioned before, the people who grew up hunting with the only rifle they had tended to take more care zeroing and marksmanship. Ive seen plenty of people zero their new guns in on a tin can at 100 paces in the woods till they hit it and call it good, no idea what their grouping is.
Sighting in days at any range is an eye opener as to what many guys call sighted in.
.220 swift is illegal for elk, in Oregon just sayin
Not in all states. I think its legal in Montana.
you are correct, I looked it up, there are no caliber restrictions for big game, regs say to match your caliber to the game hunted. that's just dumb imho.
edited
As it should be. they didn't even think about such things 50 years ago.
my grandpa had many stories about the 264 win mag. one of my favorites being when he took it on a guided canadian moose and elk hunt. the canadian guides laughed and gave him a hard time until he dropped a moose dead in his tracks. wasnt much funny about it after that.
That is a good story. The 264 worked for me on 3 moose. When I lived in Alaska for a short stint, some people turned their nose at me for carrying the 264 but they were not locals. I shot a nice moose up there with it and it dropped at the shot. Most of the locals were carrying 270's and 06's for moose. Big bears on the other hand, they carried 338 Winmags or a 12ga shotgun with slugs. I used a 348 Winchester. My best memory of how tough moose can be was on that same moose hunt. I shot my 264 and my buddy used a 378Wby. My friend shot a moose with the 378Wby. It was a good shot. I can remember watching the blood glistening down the front shoulder and the red mist on the opposite side spraying the brush. The big bull did not even flinch or twitch, it just stood there. The moose was dead, he just didn't know it yet. After a couple more mouth fulls of grass he finally tipped over. I looked over at my buddy and said, maybe you need a bigger cartridge and gun. We both just started laughing.
correct me if Im wrong, but I might be making an correlation here... werent the older cup and cores notorious for coming apart? It seems like back in that day it would make sense to use a bigger caliber if the projectiles tended to separate? This might be where we get these traditions of bigger is better that still linger on today.
Your kind of correct. In the day, it was not necessarily a bigger bullet ( larger diameter) but a longer bullet because they did come apart, 6.5 x 55, 7x57 and even the 30-40 Kreg are proof of this for shooting such large game including elephant, in the right hands, plus a lot were military bullets which most were full metal jacket or solids of some sort, so the rule of thinking was if you have a heavy bullet for caliber, (doesn't matter witch caliber) it would punch through the animal and as it shredded it's jacket and lead, there would still be enough at the base to continue punching through. That witch is old is new again. Hornady is doing the same thing with their ELD-X. If you cross section their bullet it's just a traditional cup and core with thin jacket. The one benefit of a cup and core has is that it will expand at low velocity as it's been doing for 100 years, but if it's sectional density and length are long enough (heavy weight) yes you may lose 60% of the bullet but 40% still may be left to penetrate. That's why I always shot the 140 and 160 grain bullets out of the 264 because they always, for the most part, stayed together at high speed or through the animal. I am playing with the 160 grain bullets in my 6.5 PRC right now and have had good results. When it came to large calibers, that's why the 220 grain 30 cal. bullet is still with us. Now with such good bullets to choose from you can go lighter weight for caliber like the 165 for 30 cal. 130 grain for 6.5 cal. But it is all about good shot placement and a good bullet. Now back in the 1800's large diameter bullets where king because they made big holes and created lots of blood loss. They lacked the speed for hydro static shock and flat trajectory. I've tested all the old ones good penetration at certain ranges but they were not near as destructive as the new smokeless powder smaller calibers that came out in the 1890s. Hence why all the old Black powder cartridges only but a few are still with us. And I can say from personal experience a heavily loaded 4570 with smokeless powder and a good constructed bullet is still not as good as a 300 WinMag pushing a heavy bullet at 3000 ft./s. on Buffalo. However, there is something to be said about a very large caliber bullet moving at a medium rate of speed on large critters such as the great Bears or African game, frontal diameter plus medium velocity at close range equals excellent stopping power.
I used a eld-x 143 grain in 6.5 creedmor last year and the bullet didn't have enough energy to exit on a 3 point whitetail at 100 yards. I recovered just the base of the bullet... It looks like it more exploded than expanded... My thought with your brothers elk is that if it hit a rib on the way in there wasn't enough of the bullet left to create a devasting enough wound channel....Obviously the creedmor and prc aren't the same... But my thought is it's not the caliber but the chosen bullet...I think a bonded PSP would be better.? That way when it expands it's more likely to stay together?. Has anyone on here had better luck with the eld-x 6.5mm bullets?
I am not good at this electronics stuff so I hope the picture came through. The first year I use my 6.5 PRC I used an ELDX because I couldn't find any Nosler 140 Accubonds to load for it. I did not trust the bullet from the get-go, the elk I shot with this bullet recovered was in the neck and broke the spine. ranged at 307 yards. Again I wanted to shoot him in the neck and hit the spine to put them down right there, in case the bullet wasn't a great performer there's a little less muscle to get through to break the spine. The bullet as you can see did not exit, the bull was quartering towards me. I dang sure was not going to try a chest shot, I know the cartridges limitations just like my 264. Now I have used only the 140 grain accubonds for elk with a 6.5 PRC and I have had no issues. However, even though I don't shoot the ELDX anymore I was surprised at how well the dang thing held together. but like I stated earlier I've seen bullets fail by not opening, I've seen bullets explode that's kind of the trick with cup and core bullets is you can't rely on them 100% of the time even bonded bullets you can't rely on 100% but I've seen more success with the bonded bullet tan a cup and core.
I had the same experience with a Hornady Interlock on the last elk I took. The interlock ring on the Interlocks is much lower to the base than the eldx, and the base was all I was able to recover. The base stopped at the hide on the farside, the front half of the bullet exited the elk, it was a nice easy broadside double lung shot meatsaver shot at 100yds, the elk ran maybe 100yds at most and died.
the state cops don;t enforce the game laws in idaho. that would be fish and game dept. " coordinates" I don't need no stinkin coordinates
I wonder if with a smaller caliber you would be better off making sure you have better penetration and expansion being secondary? Would an animal die faster with a slightly bigger hole in one lung or two holes in each lung? I don't have the answer though I would think more holes would definitely leave a better blood trail? I'm still learning when it comes to hunting so I'm kind of just asking "out loud" I definitely don't want any bullet bouncing around in there. I'd rather it go through and through.
