utm fk

EDITORIAL
February 2020 G&A 13
The .308 Winchester is still a winner.
DEER HUNTER
AS A YOUNG MAN, I met disappoint after watching the
1978 war drama “The Deer Hunter,” starring Robert De
Niro, Christopher Walken and John Savage. I enthusiastically
picked up a copy on VHS after mining through a discount
bin of used video tapes. I flipped over the box to read the
summary and was impressed by the picture of De Niro carrying
a Remington 700 BDL —
a left-hand model mind you.
Filled with intrigue, I thought
I had spent my hard-earned
dollars on an Academy
Award-winning film about an
epic whitetail adventure. Oh,
how wrong was I.
I’m often distracted from
the tried-and-true while
testing new introductions
such as rifles chambered
in 6.5 Creedmoor and
.300 PRC, but I’ve found
my way back to the .308
Winchester. It’s a versatile
cartridge whose case has
been used as the parent
for the .243 Winchester, 7mm-08 Remington, .260 Rem.,
6.5 Creedmoor and .338 Federal, among others. After
35 years of shooting, my conclusion is if you could only
own rifles in one caliber, a strong argument can be
made for the .308 given modern bullet technology.
I’m on a lifelong quest to try and take a deer in
all 50 states, a Grand Slam I invented for myself.
As I continued this pursuit in Kansas last fall, I was
reminded why I love the .308.
Last year, I hunted a lot with a selection of new
Savage rifles, including a 110 Lightweight Storm
topped with a Bushnell Nitro 3-12x44mm. The
stainless action and adjustable stock are impervious
to weather, affordable and as versatile as the .308. In
Kansas, I hiked across a cut, slushy corn field to my
stand at the corner and toughed out a bone-chilling
drop in temperature for three days. One morning,
before the sun crested the trees, I saw
antlers begin to creep out. I
didn’t trust my eyes and pulled
up a pair of binos to accurately
ERIC R. POOLE
@GUNSANDAMMOMAG
identify the buck. I started counting to myself, one, two,
four, six, eight … until I couldn’t believe I was still trying
to count his points. He was a shooter. I thought to myself,
You’re wasting time! He is not going to stand there forever!
With his head turned away, I quickly picked up the Savage,
zoomed up to 6X and shot a 165-grain Barnes TSX (loaded
by Federal Premium) into
his shoulder — or so I
thought. It sounded like a
good thwack, but he turned
and dove behind a tall pine
tree. In that same moment,
a group of deer took off
up and over a hill into the
trees. I imagined my buck
was among them. Seeds
of doubt around my shot
grew. Did I get him?
Minutes later, I was
horrified to only find a small
drop of blood where he’d
been hit. For more than
an hour, the outfitter and I
hiked and retraced each set
of tracks until we couldn’t. Deciding to take a break and
leave to fetch another searcher, we caught a whiff of the
buck’s scent and saw him piled up in a thorn bush just
under a pine tree. He had been just a few feet from
where was shot. Relief and excitement ensued.
He was a non-typical eight with a drop tine and a
total of 16 measurable points — plus trash. It’s the
most character I’ve ever found in a deer, especially
one taken by a single shot. This hunt serves to remind
me that the .308
Winchester is
still a capable
cartridge, especially
now with
improved bullet
technology. The
adventure contained
all of the
FEDERAL PREMIUM BARNES 165-GR. TSX, 20 CT.: $30
drama I had hoped to watch in
“The Deer Hunter,” one worthy
of an award.