Wildwoodjk wrote:Posting a photo of my deer this year. Nine points and big enough. 120 yds with Hornady 325 FTX. The Rio Grande is extremely accurate, and I am very happy with my set up with a Redfield Revolution scope and the Hornady ammo. Small bullets tend to bounce off the deer we have in MO in the north edge of the state! Took out the heart and both lungs and the buck still ran 25 yards before it took its last leap. After, the field work and getting this back to camp, one of the guys in our group hit a deer with his 308. He had blood but didn't want to push the dear as he wasn't sure how well he hit it. After 2 1/2 hours, three of us went after his deer. River on left, wood line middle, and grain fields on the right. Jumped it in the woods 100 yds from where he hit it. It got up and ran. Nice 8 point. I happened to be the closest to it, but having filled my tag, I didn't have my rifle. We found blood where it was laying down in a log pile. We tracked the blood trail for 2 hours+ and 2 miles through the woods, on game trails before losing the trail at a marsh adjacent the river. I am amazed at how much blood we tracked with our 2 mile pursuit and 5 hours after the shot and this deer still got away! Wile E Coyote only benefitted!
This is a thank you to all who post on the site as it is a great source of information. The Rio Grande has proven itself. Now if I miss a shot in the future, I can only blame it on operator error.
If you travel out of state for whitetail, you should come to Missouri and help make the roads safer!
Check out Missouri Conservation Department for public land. That's where I was fortunate to take this buck.
Congrats on the fine buck
Wildwoodjk.
Healthy looking animal.
I forsee some fine eating in your future.
Those Hornady FTX bullets are earning fine in the feild reputations for being dead-on accurate and
"anchor-em-on-the-spot" whitetail deer killers and the factory Hornady FTX ammo is quite inexpensive by premium ammo standards.
The more ballistically efficient FTX bullets also ameliorate some of the 45-70's inherent range limitations extending the effective range on big game for "average" skill shooters to beyond 200 yards.
I saw a big bull moose felled by a 325 grain FTX from a 45-70 Guide Gun near Timmins, Ontario, Canada at a range of approx 185 yards that dropped 20 yards from the point of impact and the lungs looked like the tomato paste sauce you put on your spagetti when the animal was opened up for feild dressing.
Nothing as frustrating as knowing you made a good shot and going to the impact site and finding nothing there but a few drops of blood.
I cite
on-the-cheap cup & core bullets that separate from their cores as the culprits in many of these cases. If you're shooting 30 caliber and smaller rifles you need to make sure you are using good quality bullets. I'm constantly amazed at hunters who insist on the very best premium brand rifle and scope combos (Browning, Sako & Leupold all the way) and then cheap-out on a $12.99 box of dime store ammo that lets them down at the critical moment.
I have a Browning BLR take down rifle in 450 Marlin with a Leupold 2-7x33mm scope on top and plenty of the factory Hornady 325 grain FTX ammo that pushes the FTXs to 2200 fps for a muzzle energy of around 3500 ft-lbs. The
super-slick & smooth as churned butter BLR 450 shoots 3-shot ragged hole groups at 100 yards with amazing consistency with the Hornady factory 325 grain FTX ammo. I'm going to give the BLR 450/Leupold/325 grain FTX combo a good in-the-field work out next year and then maybe I'll knock down a buck as nice as yours instead of the overgrown jackrabbit I shot this year.
