Watched another Bear hunt in Alaska.

[tj3006]

Not Kodiak this time.
   These guy's piss me off. Long range hunting for Grizzly bear is in my opinion unethical. 
    This guy with a 300 Rum, was about to take a 700 Pluss yard shot at a moving un wounded grizz, to hell with that, I clicked that guy off my screen quick.  I have seen Deer limping in the woods during elk season, and can't help wondering if some idiot didn't shoot him from a half mile away, thinking because, his cartridge uses half a LB of powder, and he paid 2 grand for his scope , he is Carlos Hathcock !. And that's a deer, a wounded grizzly even in a sparsely populated area like Alaska is a danger....tj 

[bula]

Was an episode or three on "hybrid" giant bears on one of the critter channels. The episode on browns/cave bears or short faced bears, took them to an island nearby Kodiak. The "1st Nation"  guide, expert everything, ex-yada yada shows up to the boat with a full on Mil-Spec sniper rifle. Very long barrel, CAN, and a miniature observatory of a scope. Rifle as long as he was tall. To search for bears in the dark timber. Yup, had to change the channel. 

[bigbrowndog]

I do enjoy watching neophyte’s utilize thermal or IR in the “mystery creature” shows. So much IR light bouncing back off of foliage that you can’t see 6 feet, or seeing improper focus and visual contrast from thermal optics, It is comical. On the LR “hunting” , I refer to that as shooting and not hunting. For me reasonable and ethical hunting of truly wild animals takes place at distances that the animal is able to utilize its senses to detect, evade and escape you. That distance for me is inside 250 yards, I have taken game beyond that distance but do not refer to it as truly hunting, 4 animals beyond 300 yards in 40 years of hunting big game. Hunting should be about pitting your abilities against the animals abilities, not atmospheric conditions. Just my .02 cents.

Trapr

[kevshell]

Aug 7, 2022 10:29:18 GMT -5 tj3006 said:

Not Kodiak this time.
   These guy's piss me off. Long range hunting for Grizzly bear is in my opinion unethical. 
    This guy with a 300 Rum, was about to take a 700 Pluss yard shot at a moving un wounded grizz, to hell with that, I clicked that guy off my screen quick.  I have seen Deer limping in the woods during elk season, and can't help wondering if some idiot didn't shoot him from a half mile away, thinking because, his cartridge uses half a LB of powder, and he paid 2 grand for his scope , he is Carlos Hathcock !. And that's a deer, a wounded grizzly even in a sparsely populated area like Alaska is a danger....tj 

I had that same conversation with a few people lately. If you can plink steel at 700 yards, 1000 yards plus.....cool. to me that's not hunting at those ranges. Personally I'd rather take an open sight lever gun into the mountains and limit myself to test myself but also get the experience. Make it hard. Get out and see the bowels of the wilderness. The days we've seen no animals have been some of my most memorable.

I agree with you 1000%.

[jeffh]

Playing "sniper" on a game animal is kinda low behavior in my book.
Pretend on the range;
Pretend in a video-game.
If you really need to kill something in that manner, join the military, endure the training, take your lumps, hope you make the cut and do it, but it's really kind of sick to play that way on game animals.

[kevshell]

I will add one point of clarity to my opinion. It only applies to game animals. If you can rid the earth of groundhogs and wild hogs at 1000 yards (ethically)....go for it.

[bula]

Yup, us and Yosemite Sam agree on varmints.

[jfs]

Watched a show with hunter shooting an elk at 700+ yards. By the time they got to the elk they were talking about what they were having for the next day`s dinner.... 

[bula]

i do understand that some game and terrain types will require longer shooting most of the time. I haven't been on those kinda hunts, I'll try to not judge, my POV skewed by being a woodlands hunter. Game like elk, or mtn goat, 'bou on the tundra, I get it. I would like for HUNTERS to limit their shots on game to their skill level, all I'm saying. 

[kevshell]

Funny but but also serious. After I shot my elk this year I sent a photo to a few friends saying I shot it at 500 yards and by the time I got there the wolves cleaned it up. Wolves and bears are everywhere where I hunt. There were 2 grizzly encounters with 2 other groups the week I hunted. The grizz was attempting to claim the kill. You could make a kill (or wound an animal) at long range but lose it to mother nature. It doesn't take long.

BTW - I shot mine at 200 yards and this is not an elk skeleton.

[bigbrowndog]

Kev, that looks like some grand country!!

Trapr

[potatojudge]

Without long range hunting, why would we need 1/3 MOA hunting rifles, 18x + hunting scopes with drop reticles and drop turrets, high end bipods, new high b.c. bullets and the new cartridges designed around them?

We wouldn't, but then that stuff wouldn't be viable for companies to develop and we'd all be shooting game under 300 yards with a 30-06 using a 4x steel tube Weaver scope.

Nothing about hunting is fair to the game. We have laws, then we have rules each of us makes up to feel however we want to feel about how we take the game, but given modern equipment and the dirth of man eating tigers we're just making up challenges on moving targets.

Last point is why do we own hunting guns? If the end goal is preservation of our freedoms via the 2A, then hunting is about generating marksmen with some experience in taking live targets at whatever range their equipment allows in uncontrolled conditions. When our kids have to fight, do you want their shooting experience to be 150 yards with a 30-30 or 600 yards with a 300 PRC shooting across a canyon?

For entertainment purposes, there is obviously a market for long range hunting shows and like any product there are detractors. Change the channel.

[bula]

Nicely put. 

[Big Bore]

Aug 8, 2022 10:34:03 GMT -5 potatojudge said:

Without long range hunting, why would we need 1/3 MOA hunting rifles, 18x + hunting scopes with drop reticles and drop turrets, high end bipods, new high b.c. bullets and the new cartridges designed around them?

We wouldn't, but then that stuff wouldn't be viable for companies to develop and we'd all be shooting game under 300 yards with a 30-06 using a 4x steel tube Weaver scope.

Nothing about hunting is fair to the game. We have laws, then we have rules each of us makes up to feel however we want to feel about how we take the game, but given modern equipment and the dirth of man eating tigers we're just making up challenges on moving targets.

Last point is why do we own hunting guns? If the end goal is preservation of our freedoms via the 2A, then hunting is about generating marksmen with some experience in taking live targets at whatever range their equipment allows in uncontrolled conditions. When our kids have to fight, do you want their shooting experience to be 150 yards with a 30-30 or 600 yards with a 300 PRC shooting across a canyon?

For entertainment purposes, there is obviously a market for long range hunting shows and like any product there are detractors. Change the channel.

Agree completely.  Stop throwing stones.  Mistakes and wounded animals can and certainly do happen at handgun ranges as well.  Does anyone here have a perfect, blemish free, hunting resume?? Long range shooting isn't for me, but I sure as heck root for those chasing it.  Last thing we need right now is law abiding 2A activists telling other law abiding 2A activists they are wrong...

[bigbore5]

I'll take a varmint as far away as I can hit them. But for many years all my big game have been less than 50yds. Most less than 50 FEET!

That's from years of developing skills. I enjoy long range target shooting. But that's not hunting.