The elusive "Perfect Rifle"

I've spent many an hour pondering the merits of various rifles, their pros and cons, and the applications at which they might excel.  I jump around quite a bit:  one week I'm keenly interested in a hard-hitting 45-70 Marlin Guide Gun.  The next week I'm enchanted by the golden reputation of the pre-1964 Model 70 Winchester.  At other times I get a hankering for the clean lines and refined simplicity of a Ruger No. 1 single shot, chambered in any of a handful of exotic and interesting calibers (.303 British, 375 H&H, 9.3 x 74R). 

I don't have the budget to own each of the guns or calibers that I become infatuated with.  I don't really want to own them anyway.  If I bought them, I'd cease to daydream about them, and that's at least half the fun.  Anticipation itself is so often more pleasing than the object of anticipation. 

The ever-elusive "Perfect Rifle" must adhere to some rather strict parameters.  In no particular order, they are:

1. It must be chambered for an all-around caliber, versatile enough to hunt game up to moose or elk.
2. The caliber must be widely available.  Ammo that's available only online is a pain.
3. Recoil must be manageable.  The "Perfect Rifle" will be shot a lot.  Excessive recoil is a turn off and kills accuracy.
4. It must be a repeater.  Some repeaters are better than others.  I much prefer lever guns.
5. It must be short and light enough to carry well, but solid enough to help dampen recoil.
6. It must be functionally reliable.
7. It must be reasonably accurate (2 MOA or less).  That's enough for a hunting rifle. 

With these parameters in place, several candidates can be quickly discounted:

The beautiful, classy Ruger No. 1.  This rifle gets high marks for reliability, accuracy, and aesthetics, but it is limited in application.  Hunting dangerous game with a single shot is playing Russian roulette.  Getting charged by a large boar with only one cartridge in the chamber is not an appealing scenario.

Ruger No. 1.  Photo by Sturm, Ruger & Co., Inc.

All bolt-action rifles.  This will raise some eyebrows, as the bolt action is by far the most common type of hunting rifle used in the United States or anywhere else, and not without reason.  They are generally reliable, accurate firearms that can handle most any type of ammunition, unlike lever actions, which generally only handle flat or rounded bullets.  Bolt actions can handle spitzer-shaped (pointed) bullets, which are vastly more ballistically efficient and therefore have a much longer effective range.  My reason for discounting bolt-action rifles is 80% personal preference and 20% hard fact.  I plain don't like bolt action rifles.  They're common, they're utilitarian, they're....prosaic.  Boring.  Also, they aren't very quick on repeating shots.  Yes, you have several shots available in most bolt action rifles, but no, they do not come out very fast, no matter how much practice you've had. 

Remington 700 BDL.  Photo by Remington Arms Co.

Traditional lever-action rifles.  This breaks my heart.  Excluding the rifles that won the West, that have been America's go-to deer rifles for generations and have defended rural folks from man and beast for over a hundred years proves that I'm nothing if not objective in my criteria.   I've often stated that I hunt almost exclusively with a Marlin 336 carbine in .30-30 Winchester.  Why isn't the lever-action .30-30 not the elusive "Perfect Rifle"?  Let's break it down.  

1. Caliber widely available?  Yes.  .30-30 Winchester ammo is available anywhere ammunition is sold.
2. Recoil is manageable?  Yes.  It kicks much less than most other big game calibers out there.
3. Repeater?  Yes.  The lever action is also much faster on repeat shots than the bolt action.
4. Short and light?  Yes.  The Marlin and Winchester carbines are the best handling hunting rifles in existence.
5. Functionally reliable?  Yes.  The Marlin and Winchester designs are each over 100 years old.
6. Reasonably accurate?  Yes.  It is common for these guns to shoot 1.5-2 MOA.  Plenty good for hunting applications.

      

So, what gives?  In a word, ballistics.  As great as the venerable .30-30 Winchester is, it is limited as an all-around rifle cartridge.  I hunt in brushy areas and never seriously challenge the range of the .30-30, but if I hunted, say, elk in Colorado or mule deer in Montana, I'd choose something else.  A scoped .30-30 has an effective maximum range of around 225 yards.  After that, you're holding over a game animal's back to account for bullet drop, and the bullet is seriously running out of steam when it reaches the target.  The lack of range issue would rule out the .30-30 for a Montana hunt as well, but so would the presence of grizzly bears.   For all its many virtues, the .30-30 is not ideal grizzly defense.

Stainless Marlin 336 .30-30.  Photo by Marlin Firearms Co.

So what is the elusive "Perfect Rifle"?  I've eliminated the vast majority of rifles commonly bought and used by hunters and shooters in this country, and around the world for that matter.  However, there is one rifle out there, made by one company, that fits all my strict requirements better than any other candidate.  Honestly, I was very surprised to come to this conclusion.  Well, what is it?

Drum roll please.....

The Browning BLR in .30-06 Springfield.

Huh?

Browning's lever-action rifle is an instrinsically different design from the traditional Marlins or Winchesters.  The most important departure is in how the cartridges are stored in the magazine.  In traditional lever-action rifles, the extra shells stack up end-to-end in the magazine tube under the barrel.  Because the tip of one cartridge is touching the primer of the next, only flat or rounded bullets can be used.  Spitzer (pointed) bullets might set off the primer of the cartridge it rests upon, resulting in a big bang and a greasy spot on the ground where the rifleman was standing.  In the BLR, the bullets stack up on each others' sides, like in a bolt action's magazine.  This allows the BLR to be chambered for cartridges that shoot pointed bullets, like the .30-06 Springfield.  To be fair, the BLR action is very complex and some would say over-engineered.  However, most BLR owners report that this is a remarkably well made, reliable rifle.

Browning BLR.  Photos by the Browning Arms Co.

The BLR combines the fast follow-up shots of a lever action (the BLR action is actually faster and smoother than the Marlin or Winchester) with the true versatility of the .30-06 Springfield cartridge.  The range and power of the .30-06 far exceeds that of my beloved .30-30, making this a truly all-around rifle.  Your Colorado elk hunt?  The .30-06 has likely taken more elk than any other cartridge.  Your Montana mule deer hunt, and potential grizzly encounter?  Load up the universally available 180 grain Remington Core-Lokt ammunition and you can reach out for that buck at 300 yards, and if needs be, shoot the same bullet through both shoulders of the biggest grizzly out there.  In the BLR, quick repeat shots are available if necessary.  The .30-06 is the unrivalled king of versatility. 

180 grain .30-06 ammo.  Photo by Remington Arms Co.

Well, it's been fun.  I've found the elusive "Perfect Rifle".....or have I?  This has been a decision made on paper.  When it comes to rifles, ladies and gents, decisions just cannot be made on paper.  There are subtleties and intangibles that are hard to quantify.  I think my criteria for choosing a great all-around rifle are sound, but there's no perfect gun out there.  Shoot much, experience much, get to know several different types of firearms.  Intimately know the application you intend for the rifle.  Then you can make a decision for yourself.  A man is denied many choices in life, but I fervently insist that he chooses his own gun.  At the end of the day, this article was just talk.  Fun talk.  Entertainment.  What it leaves out is the subjective element, the human element.  The 'feel' of a particular rifle in your hands.  The way it comes to your shoulder.  The pride it may inspire in you.  Certain guns can impart a bit of childhood magic- don't discount that.  It can be just as important as ballistics tables.  I still remember the day my dad bought me my first BB gun- a Red Ryder, and I remember every dent and scrape that it accumulated over the next few years.  Those memories are sacred.  Maybe that Red Ryder is actually my elusive "Perfect Rifle" after all. 

Just keep huntin.

Rifles for hog hunting

The question of what artillery to use for hunting feral hogs is a lively, beautiful debate that has given me many happy hours of reflection.  The simple answer is this:  anything will work. 

That being said, the simple answer is woefully inadequate to address an issue as fraught with subtleties as this one is.  Many thousands of feral hogs have been dispatched with the lowly .22 rifle or pistol, but is it a great idea to rely on that level of firepower?  Hell no.

Feral hogs have the potential to be truly dangerous game.  They aren't deer, or coyote, or coons.  They sometimes charge, and they sometimes have 6" tusks that are great for disembowling other mammals.  God gave the mature male hogs extremely thick skin on their shoulders, which they supplement with sap by rubbing on pine trees and by rolling in wet clay.  When the males fight, they try to cut into each other's shoulders with their tusks, so building up this shoulder shield is in their best interest.  Sometimes, bow hunters' broadheads are bent and broken by this ultra-tough 'shield', and many smaller caliber bullets fail to fully penetrate to the vitals.  A .22 might just bounce off. 

Then there's the problem of swine anatomy.  Hogs' vitals are not situated like a deer's are.  The heart/lung area in a pig is hidden by its massive shoulder area, not behind the front elbow like your cuddly whitetail deer's is.  You have to shoot through the abovementioned shield to get to the boiler room.  There is a shortcut, however.

Pigs are one of the very few animals in which a neck shot is perhaps the most reasonable placement.  A pig's spinal column is located in the middle part of its neck when viewed from the side.  A solid neck shot is generally an instant kill, as is a shot behind the ear.  However, even if the hog is down and unmoving, an insurance shot into the head is always smart.  You don't want your prize boar waking up while you're posing beside it for victory photos.

To guns.

The Marlin Firearms Company, recently acquired by Remington Arms Company, Inc., produces top-quality, American-made firearms of various kinds, but they specialize in lever-action rifles and carbines.  Of these, the Marlin 336 is the flagship model.  It has been in constant production since 1948, and is made of walnut and steel.  Most are chambered for .30-30 Winchester, which in gunspeak is the "jack-of-all-trades" caliber.  This cartridge has been harvesting game since 1895.  It's a near-perfect blend of power, speed, range, and moderate recoil.  It's pretty good for most any game animal in North America, sans the great bears, and it works pretty well for hogs.  If you get a solid head or neck shot, any hog out there is bacon.  Some of the big boars may soak up a round or two if you hit the shoulder shield, especially if you're outside the effective range of this cartridge (say 175-200 yards).  A gut shot with any cartridge is effectively torturing the poor beast and will not result in a quick kill.

To calibers. Most American hunters own and use .30 caliber hunting rifles: your .30-30 Winchester, .308 Winchester and the ubiquitous .30-06 Springfield being chief among these. Each of these has killed a mountain of feral hogs, and in the hands of a patient, deliberate shooter, they can be very adequate indeed. However, wild hog hunting can often be a messy enterprise, and deliberate shots are not always readily available, as in the case of a charge.

Once you get above .30 caliber, the average Joe hunter is a little less familiar. The main reason for this is that the quintessential American big game animal is the whitetailed deer, and always has been. The above cartridges are best suited for targets in the general weight range of a whitetailed deer, or a human being for that matter ( the .308 Win and .30-06 were each originally designed as military cartridges). Clearly though, feral pigs are not in the same class as whitetail deer when it comes to toughness and degree of difficulty to bring down. Larger calibers that may be a little heavy for deer can really come into their own against hogs.

Oh, doctor.

Many folks use the 45-70 Government cartridge (pictured above) for hogs, often shot out of a Marlin lever action rifle. I've never used this caliber, but I've read and heard enough to have faith in it. Flinging 300-500 grains of lead at relatively slow velocity is a recipe for massive penetration, regardless of thick hide and tough shoulder bones. The 45-70 is often used as protection in grizzly country; even the largest feral swine should present no particular problem. If you must go bigger than the .30 caliber class of cartridges, a short, handy Marlin lever-action Guide Gun in 45-70 Gov't might be a great choice for busting hogs.

Most of my hog hunting has been with the .30-30 levergun, and I highly recommend it.  I am intrigued by other cartridges, calibers and rifle platforms as well.  I'd love a nice Winchester Model 70 in .30-06, or a Marlin Guide Gun in 45-70, or a Ruger No. 1 in 375 H & H.  I haven't had a chance to hunt with these guns, but the road is long and the hogs are many. 

I've learned most of what I know about firearms from Guns and Shooting Online, in my mind the best firearms website out there.  See www.chuckhawks.com for more info.

Just keep huntin.

Sunday hunt, 06/05/2012. One bullet, two hogs.

Another river bottom hunt, this time with Little Joe along.  Again, we were able to get very close to several hogs in the incredibly thick brush (under 10 yards), and again, we were stymied by the wall of vegetation.  There was just no shot to be had.  There were times when I could see flitters of movement, a patch of hide here, an ear twitch there, and I wondered if a heavy brush-busting spear would not be a better option than the scoped .30-30 carbine I carried.  I'm serious.

 

One particularly intense moment came when we jumped a group of pigs on a small bluff overlooking the river.  The crashing noise they made through the undergrowth sounded like we were chasing bull bison through the brush, not 100 pound pigs.  We followed with haste, bending low to avoid branches and plowing through matted briars, and eventually we came to the lip of the bluff, with Old Man River flowing placidly ten feet beneath us.  We'd passed up the hogs.  Working back to our starting point, we determined that they must have stopped their retreat in an especially hellish thicket and let us pass by, within 10 yards of their overgrown fortress.  Approaching cautiously to test that theory, we picked up their musky, sweet smell.  They were in there.  Adrenalin flowed and a myriad of thoughts raced through my mind ("This will make a kickass blog entry!"), and then....we lost them.  As we approached to within five yards, still unable to see pig but able to hear them, smell them, hell, we could almost taste them, but.....no shot.  I'm not the kind of hunter that blazes away into the brush at unseen animals.  That's irresponsible, especially if you have a hunting partner along, and wounding a wild pig of any size in close quarters is asking for trouble.  Well.  They rushed out the backside of the Hell Thicket, a merry chase ensued, but, alas, no shot presented itself.  So, heads hung in defeat, Little Joe and I left the river bottom and went fishing on a shallow lake about a half mile from the river. 

As we stared at the motionless bobber in the tepid, tea-colored water, I thought I'd wander down the path a little ways for some target practice.  Since I hadn't been able to shoot at a pig, I felt the need to pop a few lily pads.  Not wanting to scare off Little Joe's fishing prospects, I moseyed off a couple hundred yards.  Turning a bend in the road, I saw a shape flitting around on the path ahead.  I went to a knee and brought up the scope.  Pig.  It didn't see me, but it was rooting around on the shoulder of the path and was moving around quite a bit.  As I was carrying a Marlin .30-30 carbine with a 16.5" barrel with a fixed 2 power Weaver scope, it was no slam-dunk of a shot.  I waited for a neck shot, held my breath and squeezed off.  Bang/flop.  The pig dropped as if hit by lightning and didn't twitch a muscle.  Yelling for Little Joe, who dropped his fishing rod and arrived promptly, we approached the downed pig slowly.  It's the "dead" ones that jump up and bite your face off.  We counted 90 paces from where I shot to the downed pig.  Not bad shooting, if I may say so myself!

If you squint, you can see two dead hogs.

This porker had been hit three inches behind the ear with a 170 grain Remington Core-Lokt bullet and was down for good.  The real treat of the deal, though, was the smaller hog lying dead not three feet from him!  The slug had passed through the first pig's spinal column and exited, striking another, unseen porker just above the left eye.  Two dead pigs, one bullet spent!

Little Joe.

Neither pig was very big- one was about 50 pounds, the other about 30.  Perfect eating size.  Unfortunately, we had no cooler with us and no ice, and we were several miles from the nearest highway.  As it was around 97 degrees in the shade, the prospects of salvaging the meat was slim at best.  Our loss would be the boon of the alligators, the catfish, and perhaps even other hungry hogs.  I hate wasting resources at any time, especially in the outdoors, and here was a couple dozen pounds of prime pork that would go to waste.  It bothers me still, and next time I will be better prepared to properly harvest the meat.  Lesson learned.

Another lesson to take from today's experience:  pass throughs.  Be always, always, always aware of what is behind your target. 

All in all, a great hunt and a wonderful day with Little Joe. 

Just keep huntin.