First, let me say that I have taught Hunter Education and shot placement on many animals. I have studied African Game shot placement with rifle as well. Wild boar seem to have their heart a bit lower and the shoulder/leg bone is a bit more forward than deer do. If you shoot just above the forward leg, you will have a heart shot but it is important to give yourself some additional room that will always kill your animal. Many experts agree to target the heart/lung area which is larger than just the heart. Further, that you want to damage both shoulders in the process if possible so that your boar has zero chance at a charge from a big ornery boar.

The lower picture shows a high heart/low lung hit in yellow. This is ideal. To do damage to both shoulders you need a bullet that can penetrate. Yes you can kill with smaller bores but if really close, it is comforting to have a big bullet.

See https://www.bing.com/images/search?q=Wild+Boar+Kill+Shots

Research in shooting “very large” Russian Boar is that a large caliber slug from a shotgun like a 12 guage or a 30 or 40 caliber such as the 30-06 Springfield, 300 Win Mag,  444 Marlin or 45/70 or a .375  does the trick and provides for the phrase used so often by Robert Ruark – USE ENOUGH GUN!  In addition it is wise to carry a big bore side arm if possible.  I am opting for my Ruger M77 African

with the .375 Ruger and 260 grain Nosler AccuBonds if I decide on a giant Russian Boar. On left. The AccuBond is a bonded lead bullet to the copper and will not come apart. Right is a monolithic solid used for Cape Buffalo and Elephant as a back up shot.

I have seen these boar fall dead in video and in others charge the hunter while wounded. Years ago my African PH said quite simply, “it is the dead ones that will kill you.”  Your guard is down and in close proximity there is no time to react. Give your boar some respect and a little time to die.

Head Shots and Neck Shots drop them fast if you can get your boar to stand still.

My Outfitter is a chef and likes head shots so it does not ruin meat and suggests that the 375 for a head shot is not necessary so will take my Ruger American Predator in 6.5 Creedmoor too as it is akin to the .270 Winchester and quite capable. Lots of lesser Wild Boar are killed with .243 Winchester but a giant bruiser Russian boar up close, well…you better be a good shot.

Bow and Arrow

Heart Lung shots with bow or crossbow are quite common and are big medicine on Russian Boar. My Outfitter has a crossbow that I will try out while there.  I may even take my own Bow on this trip.  Who knows!

All in all should make for some adrenaline moments to remember.

Good Hunting!

© 2016

Congratulations if you got your deer! For those of us still hunting, the deer have caught on to us. They have left their October/ early November feeding areas due to hunting pressure and are likely in southern NH living in unexpected places. So be extra careful! The bucks are still roaming and will roam for some time but mostly at night like this guy who looks like a young 2 1/2 buck with perhaps 6 points or even 8.

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These bucks will roam in their core area at mid-day as the rut, Phase I is at its peak. Phase II is early December for those does that have yet to be in estrous and mated. So don’t give up. All it takes is you being in the right place at the right time.

© 2016

I have been getting ready with my muzzleloader here in New Hampshire for quite a while. Opening day for Muzzleloader is October 29, 2016.  Season details can be found at http://www.wildlife.state.nh.us/hunting/deer.html along with a hunting video there.

I feel very optimistic and you should too if you hunt in the southern half of NH where the deer are plentiful… provided you have done your homework. No you just can’t walk in the woods and get one. Yes, if you do everything right and you shoot straight, it can happen.

First and foremost you should be shooting your Muzzleloader now, not just at the bench, but how you are going to use it in the woods.  I shoot standing and freehand at 50 yards or less or better yet…use a tree to stabilize my rifle. Using shooting sticks such as a monopod, bipod and tripod do work. I have a monopod with a telescoping v notch that I have used on occasion. I will be hunting with the TC Encore Pro- Hunter Rifle with Muzzleloader barrel as you could certainly guess from the numerous articles here at New Hampshire Rifleman Magazine.

Time to load? Loading black powder or a substitute in the muzzle and then your bullet (with or without a separating sabot) being sure that the bullet is fully seated atop and against the powder. Recall that it requires some technique. I have found some plastic sabots make it very hard to load and reload as the provide too much resistance in my particular rifle.  I use a bullet with a built in sabot base, and they shoot, and reload easily with good accuracy. You can purchase a speed loader tube to hold bullet, powder and primer for your back up shot.

The archery season and muzzleloader season is a huge leg up on hunting deer that have not been spooked or shot at all year. But the most important part is that if you want to hunt bucks, there is no better time to call one in or rattle one in than during muzzleloader season because the first does will come into estrus and drive the bucks crazy and they WILL make mistakes. It has been my experience that if you hunt from the ground or even in a tree, you need to be ultra clean and scentless. On the ground you must walk into or quarter into the wind. Tree stand hunting is great when you know unspooked deer movement patterns and active trails or you are going to call or rattle. Remember when calling, less is more. Scouting should be high on your list in prep for the hunt. Use a compass and map. Have a drag rope or wheel carrier, license, knife, pen for filling out your tag, flashlight, first aid kit, water, a snack, and TP (I use orange or camo toilet paper if nature calls), a phone… and let someone know where you are hunting.

Be Safe and Practice, Practice, Practice.

Shoot Straight, Shoot Often.

Good Hunting!

© 2016

In preparation for Deer Season I sometimes bear hunt in northern New Hampshire. A few weeks ago I placed a Moultrie Trail Cam and got these videos. It has been a three years since I used this camera and forgot to set the time and date correctly. This was taken September week 1 of 2016. Here setting the cameras I am carrying the Ruger American Predator Rifle in 6.5 Creedmoor with a Leupold VX-6 3-18x44mm. Great bear medicine and great anything medicine for deer, bear, and moose. At 6.6 pounds the Ruger American Predator carries like a feather and shoots like a target rifle with the the finest Leupold Scope!

as you can see this coyote looks healthy and right behind a doe with a single young fawn in the next video. No mice for this yote, it wants venison!

Both look very healthy and already eating acorns and unaware of the danger that lurkes behind.

I was hoping to get a bear to step into the camera. The next video you can hear a huff sound and that may be my bear but was reluctant to step into the camera lens.

I was very pleased to capture these short videos for my NH Rifleman Readers. I hope there is more to come. I found an old primary scrape nearby as it has the remnants of ground that has been scraped and beat-up though covered with leaves and the overhanging spruce branches all knarled from his antlers. I will set up the camera on it later in October perhaps.

© All Rights Reserved

I am all alone but in reality I am really not alone at  all. I am with myself, hunting for deer with my trusty 58 Caliber muzzle loader, on opening day of the  New Hampshire Muzzle Loader deer season many years back perhaps in my mid 30’s. I hunted alone (with myself) often because I like hunting solo. Me, the woods, and the deer!

My soul senses a joy, like a kid opening his first Christmas present, as I ease into the pitch black forest. It is 4:30 AM, I can hear my breathing strong and clear through my nose. My mind momentarily conjures up a predator with teeth standing before me as I approach. A vestige of my childhood fear of the dark.  I forge ahead through that air space with narry a scratch.  Take that!  You toothless imagination. Be gone!  I chuckle to myself.

The fall oak leaves beneath my feet crunch with each step.  I slow down my pace. It is dark. The woods are still… Every step seems to shout as I attempt to become one with the forest rhythm. The air has the pungent smell of oak acorns and leaves, Douglas fir and dew soaked moss covered earth. A sweet but pungent oak flavor with a twist of fir and earth! Thank God for noses to smell, I think. It was so delicious that I could eat it if only it were edible.  Daylight arrives by each passing minute as I work my way toward where, just a week ago, I saw good deer sign of tracks, rubs and scrapes. Finally the leaves on the trees are visible with yellow and orange and deep red colors. The yellow comes from beech trees and orange and red from sugar maples.

As shafts of light arrive, the yellow leaves in front of me fall but just one at a time, a leaf falls hear and a leaf falls there. At my side is my knife, a “Buck” knife, with a Bowie style blade that is keenly sharp. The sheath and handle have been camo’d and are invisible against my camo clothes (I wore an orange camo vest and orange camo hat).  Around my neck is a buck grunt-call and a small pair of rattling antlers. As I approach the area I saw good deer sign. Shooting light finally arrived. The wind was nearly still.  I could not figure which way it was blowing, but I was as clean as I could possibly be with newly washed clothes. And I showered with scent free soap a dash of baking soda under my arms. Seeing a scrape on the ground,  I stood in an area that allowed my observation of two directions and began to grunt softly with the call sparingly…

Suddenly, a deer appeared as it hopped in front of me, a doe at 30 yards. My adrenaline kicked  in like starting ether to a gasoline starved lawnmower.  Heart hammering; I raised my muzzle loader and she was now facing me directly. In one movement she turned, hopped once and walked away occasionally looking at me over her back and I eased the  muzzle loader down. A buck with a rack is what I am after. She was a beautiful sight as she melted away. I took out the grunt call and tried to create a “tending grunt” call with several soft calls as if another buck was walking with her. Then tickled the tines of my small antlers. Minutes passed.

Woah! What was that to my right? An eight point buck was walking fast and straight at me at 25 yards. My heart was now fully soaked in adrenaline hammering as if to leave my chest. I swung the muzzle loader up and cocked the hammer. The shot angle was wrong but for this fighting mad buck to get to me, he had to walk around a thick sapling in his path. Never breaking stride he cleared that sapling at 20 yards and gave me a forward angled shoulder to shoot at. Ka Boom! I shot and the deer jumped left.  The belch of muzzle loader smoke hid the buck from sight. So I got on my knees and looked below the smoke. I was having no luck seeing the buck. Ok!  “Stay put”, I thought,  and mark the spot in my mind  where the deer was when I shot. Soon the smoke dissipated and I walked to the spot where I thought I shot. The nearest tree behind the buck was 4 feet away and covered in rich red blood at its base.

I reloaded, but knew that the buck could not have gotten far. Adrenaline was coursing through my veins. It was just an amazing feeling to be alive. The blood trail was enormous and 30 yards away lay the buck facing away from me. The exit wound was on the far side of the buck just forward of the rear ham. The bullet having skewered the buck from shoulder to its exit hole, about the size of a silver dollar.

I took the cap off the muzzle loader and reached for my deer tag. I gutted the deer, not having any rubber gloves, I proceeded to get messy up to my elbows. The bullet having pierced the gut left the acrid smell of the open gut wafted over me.  I began to get light headed. It was brief, but between the adrenaline and the acrid gut I turned and vomited momentarily. Wiping my face on my sleeve, I turned to the 8 point buck laying before me remembering he wanted a fight and said. Gotcha! Didn’t I !

I found a small branch and attached my drag rope to pull the buck out of the woods. I talked to my buck each time I got exhausted pulling and told him how fine a buck he was!  I would always remember this hunt. Today I share it with you! Memories are fantastic aren’t they! We can  relive them over and over! Good Hunting! © 2015

According to the many short articles I have read on the .243 Winchester suggest that because the .243 is easier on felt recoil that the shooter will have more confidence, enhanced accuracy etc. I agree with that! Light Caliber Shot Placement on deer with the .243 Winchester should always be “ideally” the double lung shot and broadside or slightly quartering away as with all calibers. A large magnum caliber needs lots more of perfect practice to make long range kill shots in the field conditions as the recoil must be dealt with. That said, if competent with a larger caliber, use it! More delivered energy and a larger caliber allows more latitude on shot placement as in a head on frontal shot taken with a large caliber capable of deep penetration but can result in more meat damage too.

A doctor bowhunter once shared the medical term for double lung hit is a bilateral pneumo-thorax. The lungs cannot inflate and carry oxygen because air enters the bullet holes as the air is attempted to inflate the lungs. Accordingly, the animal loses consciousness and dies a fast painless death. Recovery of this animal is often less than 50 yards from where the deer was shot. Of course you can shoot them surgically in the heart with a much smaller invisible target the size of a fist and shoot low and miss and a few more inches hit the shoulder bone. Or you can shoot for the larger oval of the lungs. When I hunted Africa, all my kills were one shot with rifle and bow and arrow and I shot them all in the same place. The Lungs!  If the bullet or broadhead does its job of either mushrooming or slicing wound channels then death is moments away. My most spectacular double lung hit on a Pennsylvania 6 point buck was with my bow, and the deer ran 60 yards and expired after being hit with a 4 blade Muzzy broadhead at 20 yards. The arrow was painted bright red from tip to knock. Of course the deer ran those 60 yards in less than one minute. Watching your bullet hit deer after the shot is critical if it takes off. Just like in bowhunting, if you are in a tree stand, take out your compass and take a bearing on where you shot and where you last saw your game. A fast broadside kill makes for better venison and less damaged meat. © 2015