Curious to know if this board has wing shooters, small game hunters, predator hunters and or big game hunters. What’s your passion and your favorite firearm. Best hunting stories are welcome. Debates on best calibers can potentially be more argumentative than politics. Not trying to sell y’all anything. I promise.

Hunted since I was about 7 so 22 years now. 

Wing shoot when I can which is very rarely.  Love duck hunting and used to be good at it but I went dove hunting (much easier) for the first time in 12ish years and really stunk it up. 

I shoot coons when I get a chance to get them off my deer feeders.  There’s a poor black family that lives down the road from our land that’s been a family friend.  He skins our deer for us from time to time and we split the meat.  He LOVES coon, said he would rather have coon for Thanksgiving than turkey.  Haven’t seen any this year though…. might have to set a trap.

I mostly hunt deer now.  Manage them 8pts or bigger and does only.  We have 300 acres and kill about 1 buck every 1.5 years.  My dad gets most of them…and some non management bucks that were “looking at me wrong”, “swear it was bigger”, “I needed the meat” (just couldn’t wait for a doe….).  He’s losing his touch a bit from the judgement and shooting aspect.  Still a better shot than most but this is back to back years that had a deer that required 3+ rounds.  We have an unusual amount of cull bucks on our land this year.

I’m just now starting to learn up on predator hunting.  We’ll likely start bating the yotes with deer remains this year.  Lots of them on our place.  LOTS of them on the neighbors land.  They are breeding with the dogs of our neighbors too.  We’ve killed them before but their numbers were low.  Sometimes it sounds like 100 of them are howling out there now. 

I shoot a 30-06 Rugger American.  Previously 25-06 Remington 700.  Both great guns.  Might be looking for a yote gun in the next year or so. 

I’ve only seen non shooter deer this year.  Yearling does, young spikes, and one 6 point that will be an 8 next year.  I have years where I see no bucks then years where I see almost all bucks.  In about 6 hunts I’ve seen 4 does and like 11 bucks.  Almost shot a wounded spike but it was getting late and he kept mixing in with 2 other spikes the same size, didn’t want to shoot the wrong one.

I grew up hunting the usual small game that was available, primarily because my dad was born on a rural ga farm in the early 40s. There were no deer around back then to speak of. He told me once that when he was a kid someone ran over a deer and people drove from miles away to see a whitetail in person.

I am a self taught deer hunter. The first five years were rough because I didn’t have a clue.
Our family has about 250 acres on the Abbeville Anderson county line but it’s kind chopped up and gerimandered so most of my setups are heavily pressured. And for that reason we can’t really establish the kind of cdm that we would like. Plus my son has a “if it’s brown it’s down” mentality until November.

Man, could not agree more on your caliber selections. That 30-06 is a sledgehammer. And if I could pick one caliber to use for all game it would be the 25-06. I own a 243 but it just doesn’t have the same punch. Harder to blood trail since you don’t always get a good exit wound.

The rut is on up my way. How about your area?

Rut started over a month ago for us in awendaw.  The first week of November is when we’ve killed about half our bucks historically.  We haven’t pressured too much bet we do have poacher problems at times.  You really need 1000+ acres or be in the middle of nowhere to manage properly. 

That’s crazy they were so rare back then, now you have to put an electric fence around a flower garden to keep them away. 

The only bad thing about the 2506 was finding ammo at times. 

We have a shit ton of turkeys too.  Its pretty common to have 25+ in a field.  Turkey season if fishing season so they don’t get much pressure.

I agree about the 1000 acres. We have a poacher problem as well. They will hunt out of my ladder stands and steal anything that’s not nailed down. Unfortunately it’s almost impossible to stop them completely.

I’m a 30-06 guy and I will argue with the .270 guys all day long. No comparison imho. When I hear somebody say, ” well I just like the 270 because it’s a flatter shooting gun”, I know immediately that they know ballistic charts but don’t understand how energy is released while going through big game. Besides, I hunt in the upstate big woods and most of my kills would be within bow range. I rarely have a shot beyond 100 yards. Any 270 guys out there wanna take the bait?

Yea I’ve never had an opportunity to shoot a deer beyond 150 and I doubt many in sc do.  Honestly I shoot 98% of them at 45 yards.  I dont practice long shoots but I would feel pretty confident to 350/400.  My performance at this distance will determine if I need a different gun for coyote. 

My reptile is a bit bold for shooting much further.  Love the Leopold but hate the reticle on it.

Not a hunter myself, would rather shoot them with a camera than a gun however I have no issue with the practice unless it’s endangered game for trophies like Elephants, big cats, etc.  I think it’s a great way to feed the family and I’d probably be more into it if I lived in a more rural area. 

I do love me some guns though.  I have a small collection of WWII type rifles, huntable weapons but not really the higher tech stuff you see these days with good optics on them.  My 1903 Springfields and Garands would do well, a lot of people use them with “Bubba” or Sporter stocks.  Have more Armor Piercing 30-06 M2 Ball than anything though, not really a hunting round….but it sure is fun elsewhere.

I would like to go Hog hunting sometime.  I always take my M1 Carbine into the woods with me.  Could just be walking the property lines to doing some photography, I’ll always sling it over the shoulder.  Small enough to pack around, big enough for the just in case defense/coyote/other pest problem.  For a while the .30 carbine rounds were a lot more plentiful and cheaper than .22 too when the whole ammo scare was going on.  Not sure if it’s gotten better yet, you couldn’t find .22 anywhere.

I’m glad to hear populations are doing better than ever…it sounds like good management practices outweigh the bad. I have done a little bit of hunting but am more along the lines of Clem.

Sorry to hear about poachers…in my area there are some real battles over hunting with dogs and some real nasty people who threaten others and don’t respect private property. At least that is what I hear from my friends who are avid. I wish they had a season for those types…where they were the hunted. Sounds bad but society would be better off without some folks.

Pines those are “dogers”.  Luckily dog driving is dying off in the Charleston area, or at least near me.  They usually treat dogs VERY poorly and frequently trespass while they are “retrieving their dog”.  Dad and I have sent several away with the warden.  Deer do quite well living in the swamps and golf courses that permeate loosely fit urban sprawl.  Actually there are tons of coons, deer, foxes, squirrels, and a large variety of bird life in my dads neighborhood. He feeds the deer in his back yard regularly, cant quite pet them yet.  As long as they have a little bedding space they are pretty comfortable living around people.  A golf course and houses with fertile plants is much better food than the thick pine forest that cover much of the state anyway.  The animals that get pressured out the most are probably just quail that need grass cover and larger shy predators (bobcat/cougar/panther/bears/wolves) to an extent.  Though I’ve seen a documentary, in Los Angeles I believe, that even showed that mountain lions would move pretty well through the suburbs. 
The poachers are quite disappointing at times.  One wrote “-10 point” on one of our stands several years ago to rub in out face that he killed a large buck.  If they just wanted meat I really wouldn’t mind much.  If anything we usually have too many deer on our land. 

Clem the M1 Garand is more than capable of taking deer. 

Buzzard I was kinda hoping you would say you didn’t find the deer so I use your username against you.  You don’t use buzzards to find them do ya?  XD

Oh it’s fully capable, but carrying it around vs something the weight of the 1903 or a newer production weapon with a composite stock and such is the deal breaker.  Not to mention optic mounting.  The Garand was the Cadillac of WWII, weight especially.

Always wanted a garland but you can’t have them all. I still want an m14 Springfield socom. Great weapons.

I’ve also had problems with cool hunters that are actually coon hunting but will also poach a deer from time to time.

4 does quickly through a shooting lane.  1 button buck and a 4 point.  The 4pt was on the side of the stand I climb down and he didn’t spook till I hit the ground and he was only 25 yards from me.  Great success.  Big wind gust tonight.

Ok, I’m an old bastard and am clueless as to how to post pics. Keep getting download failed.  But I’m trying from an iPhone. Any suggestions?

For whatever reason Southern Pigskin won’t let you post pictures in the thread in this section of the forum.  Better off uploading them to a hosting site and posting links.  At least from what i’ve found.

Had a yearling doe in the field for 15 minutes till it was time to leave.  Again got out the stand and shined the yearling, who was now joined by big mama, and they just stared at me at 25 yards.  Could have easily shot either.  At least I saw a mature deer, kinda getting tired of the yearlings/cowhorns. 

I love hunting when it’s cold and not fighting the mosquitoes that were swarming a few weeks ago.

Nie post Buzzard.

i grew up hunting but fon’t do much any more. Became an avid gun collector when I joined the border patrol. All og us did.

Bes rifles ever made in my opinion are the qak47 and sks. They are built like a tank, only Russian or Chinese though, thicker receivers and chrome bolt.Stick a 5 round clip in tghem and you have a deer rifle.