Long range hunting

[ruaanfs]

IMHO if you can take a shot and be sure you will hit your target then go for it!! I would love to have that experience so please keep us posted when you do this hunt

[COMPRESSEDLOAD]

As far as I know the 338 is not legal for the big 5 in most African countries. 9.3 or .375 is the minimum bore diameter depending on the country at the moment. Australia has buffalo huntign which is permitted with smaller calibers as far as I am aware.

[Messor]

Things to consider:

Shooting at 500m is difficult, not that difficult but difficult non the less. I do not want anybody to try and make 500m shots from the back of a bakkie, a bakkie is just not stable enough, the wind blows you around and if others breathes too hard you see a difference through your scope.

Now, considering that I might accept shooting from an elevated prone position as the most stable platform, it essentially means you are "hunting" on foot, that in itself creates problems. You hear the word ethically, and one must consider that many a shooter messes up a shot and puts the animal on the ground, down but not out, and that animal lies there until you reaches it, which from 500m away can be a hell of a long time with a 338 hole through your back, that is if you can find the animal in the first place, as many people can navigate on the range but finding an animal in the grass with no reference points can be tricky like hell.

Now, if you start your average 338 lm 250gr bullet at the industry standard of 2950ft/s, then at 500m you are about at 2200 ft/s, with that kinetic energy and the construction of most modern bullets you are not gonna have explosive results, you're going to punch a hole in that animal, and you must be sure to put that hole through the vitals, anywhere else and I don't care about how big that caliber is, our antelope are tough, they are going to run.

Last but not least should your tough african animal decide to run with the 338 hole in his stomach, pray that he runs in your direction, because they can shift ground very quickly. Suddenly you have to take a follow up shots at 800m when you already botched a shot at 500m.

I will not judge anybody on this topic, all I ask is that people judge their own capabilities fairly.

[bchunter]

Aaag don't worry about the ethics police - this is road hunting in Canada....(that's beer the boy is resting his arse on)

[Ludwig]

There are so many myths going around about long range hunting. People try to apply what they know and understand of normal hunting and still assumes everything applies evenly when the range extends beyond 500 meters. When you haven't hunted on distances of 500m and beyond, you should really not make assumptions about the subject.

I used to be an avid bowhunter. It was, and probably still is, standard practise to leave an animal for 30 minutes up to an hour depending on how good you think the shot was before following up. This would give the animal time to bleed out without extra adrenalin keeping him alive for longer while you are chasing him through the bushes. Normally, such an animal would not go far from where he was shot before he would lie down, stiffen up and bleed out. This is considered the ethical approach by all bowhunters I know. Yet, if a long range hunter applies the same principle, it considered unethical?

Another aspect about shooting an animal at long range, is if that animal was in no way aware of your presence before the shot, i.e., by hearing, smelling or seeing you, then the shot will surprise him. He won't just start running off into any direction before he identifies where the danger came from. Usually, after getting hit on such a long range, and any sound of the shot reaching him only quite a while after the bullet hit him and not nearly as loud as when shooting at 100 or 200m, the animal would firstly react to the hit. Usually a bit of a jump and a quick jolt for 1 to 2 seconds. I've seen a few of these animals hit at long ranges become very confused as to what happened. They cannot identify any immediate danger. Usually their herd members are just slightly spooked at what happend, but not running off and this relaxes the shot animal. If he is not dead by now, chances are very good he will fall down in a while or will lie down due to the pain and stiffen up and bleed out. In most cases the animal will provide you with ample time to take a follow-up shot if need be, but you must always plan en execute your hunting for one shot kills, regardless of what type of hunting it is.

It's also important to use the correct bullet construction for long range hunting. It's no good using monolithic or heavy jacketed bonded bullets if your impact velocity is going to be below 2000fps. If you use the correct bullets, a 338LM will be capable of terminal bullet expansion at 1000m easily.

There is a very big growing interest in precision long range hunting in South Africa. The yanks have been doing it for quite a while and proved that it can be done just as ethical and precisely as any other form of hunting. For that reason, we started African Long Range Hunters Association, which together with Gauteng Hunters Federation falls under the CHASA umbrella. Our vision is to promote and educate on ethical long range precision hunting and provide a platform from where hunters interested in this discipline can master the skills and knowledge required to be an ethical long range hunter. I hope in the near future that fellow hunters of other hunting disciplines will acknowledge ethical long range precision hunting as 'n true hunting discipline in its own right.

Regards
Ludwig Meyer
Chairman
African Long Range Hunters Association

[Theron2033]

There are so many myths going around about long range hunting. People try to apply what they know and understand of normal hunting and still assumes everything applies evenly when the range extends beyond 500 meters. When you haven't hunted on distances of 500m and beyond, you should really not make assumptions about the subject.

I used to be an avid bowhunter. It was, and probably still is, standard practise to leave an animal for 30 minutes up to an hour depending on how good you think the shot was before following up. This would give the animal time to bleed out without extra adrenalin keeping him alive for longer while you are chasing him through the bushes. Normally, such an animal would not go far from where he was shot before he would lie down, stiffen up and bleed out. This is considered the ethical approach by all bowhunters I know. Yet, if a long range hunter applies the same principle, it considered unethical?

Another aspect about shooting an animal at long range, is if that animal was in no way aware of your presence before the shot, i.e., by hearing, smelling or seeing you, then the shot will surprise him. He won't just start running off into any direction before he identifies where the danger came from. Usually, after getting hit on such a long range, and any sound of the shot reaching him only quite a while after the bullet hit him and not nearly as loud as when shooting at 100 or 200m, the animal would firstly react to the hit. Usually a bit of a jump and a quick jolt for 1 to 2 seconds. I've seen a few of these animals hit at long ranges become very confused as to what happened. They cannot identify any immediate danger. Usually their herd members are just slightly spooked at what happend, but not running off and this relaxes the shot animal. If he is not dead by now, chances are very good he will fall down in a while or will lie down due to the pain and stiffen up and bleed out. In most cases the animal will provide you with ample time to take a follow-up shot if need be, but you must always plan en execute your hunting for one shot kills, regardless of what type of hunting it is.

It's also important to use the correct bullet construction for long range hunting. It's no good using monolithic or heavy jacketed bonded bullets if your impact velocity is going to be below 2000fps. If you use the correct bullets, a 338LM will be capable of terminal bullet expansion at 1000m easily.

There is a very big growing interest in precision long range hunting in South Africa. The yanks have been doing it for quite a while and proved that it can be done just as ethical and precisely as any other form of hunting. For that reason, we started African Long Range Hunters Association, which together with Gauteng Hunters Federation falls under the CHASA umbrella. Our vision is to promote and educate on ethical long range precision hunting and provide a platform from where hunters interested in this discipline can master the skills and knowledge required to be an ethical long range hunter. I hope in the near future that fellow hunters of other hunting disciplines will acknowledge ethical long range precision hunting as 'n true hunting discipline in its own right.

Regards
Ludwig Meyer
Chairman
African Long Range Hunters Association

What would be the ideal bullet construction , while having a good BC?


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

[Ludwig]

Usually, bullets that fragment violently at high velocities and still manage proper expansion when impact velocities are low. I prefer the Hornady A-Max bullets while others have had very good results with Berger VLD bullets. Sierra Matchking bullets are a bit unpredictable. Sometimes they manage to properly expand on low impact velocities and other times they react like a FMJ, just punching a hole through. For this reason I do not trust SMK's, but there are others that swear by them.

[zakiwi]

Things to consider:

Shooting at 500m is difficult, not that difficult but difficult non the less. I do not want anybody to try and make 500m shots from the back of a bakkie, a bakkie is just not stable enough, the wind blows you around and if others breathes too hard you see a difference through your scope.

Now, considering that I might accept shooting from an elevated prone position as the most stable platform, it essentially means you are "hunting" on foot, that in itself creates problems. You hear the word ethically, and one must consider that many a shooter messes up a shot and puts the animal on the ground, down but not out, and that animal lies there until you reaches it, which from 500m away can be a hell of a long time with a 338 hole through your back, that is if you can find the animal in the first place, as many people can navigate on the range but finding an animal in the grass with no reference points can be tricky like hell.

Now, if you start your average 338 lm 250gr bullet at the industry standard of 2950ft/s, then at 500m you are about at 2200 ft/s, with that kinetic energy and the construction of most modern bullets you are not gonna have explosive results, you're going to punch a hole in that animal, and you must be sure to put that hole through the vitals, anywhere else and I don't care about how big that caliber is, our antelope are tough, they are going to run.

Last but not least should your tough african animal decide to run with the 338 hole in his stomach, pray that he runs in your direction, because they can shift ground very quickly. Suddenly you have to take a follow up shots at 800m when you already botched a shot at 500m.

I will not judge anybody on this topic, all I ask is that people judge their own capabilities fairly.

I agree with everything in this post ...

I seriously considered getting into this game until I recently (2013) shot an animal across a valley with my 7mm Rem Mag ... The distance was only 250 yards ... Not really a long range shot, but still it was a difficult shot and I felt great about it. Both my hunting partner and I saw the animal drop 2-3 seconds after the shot ...

It took two of us 3 and a half hours to find the animal, and unfortunately the meat was tainted after lying in the stinking hot sun for that period of time. I suppose ... for myself anyway ... I realized that whilst I'd still like to shoot paper at long range, there were simply too many things out of my control to justify shooting animals at long distances. (Not that this shot was particularly long, but it graphically demonstrated to me how things stacked against you the further out you got ... In this case, the terrain worked against us, and the longer it took to get to the animal, the weirder things looked)

I absolutely understand the buzz that you get of hitting a target at 500 ... 600 ... 800 ... Or even 1000 yards, but I actually get that same buzz when hitting steel or shooting a decent group on paper at that distance ...

Anyway ... Not judging anyone ... Just sharing my experience and views.

[Theron2033]

To kind of revive this thread; What type of energies are a recommended minimum for Springbok or Impala ?
and ; does Sectional density have anything to do with "killing power" at long range?