Long-range shooting has become extremely popular in the last few decades. More and more people continue to join the folds of precision rifle shooters, pushed forward by marketing campaigns from every rifle manufacturer out there. Long-range shooting has infiltrated many activities, but perhaps none as controversial as hunting. With so much activity in this practice, I figured it was a good idea to discuss building long-range hunting skills.
A good rifle like this Tikka T3 is important if you plan to shoot far
Every gun manufacturer out there seems to have at least one long-range model now. What used to require a huge investment in time and money, can now be purchased at your local Sportsman’s Warehouse. When I started out in precision rifle shooting, the only way you could get a suitable rifle was to build it. But today you can get pretty impressive results from common names like Ruger or Savage.
many modern rifles are both inexpensive and useful for long-range shooting, like this Mossberg Patriot
This lowering of the entry requirements has caused the general hunting public to run a train on the long-range shooting and hunting scene. And for those who wish to do it well, and as ethically as possible, it will still require some dedication the same as it always has.
The Why
If you hunt long enough, you will see animals go unrecovered. We have all seen someone either through negligence or no fault of their own make a poor shot, that ended up in loss of the target animal.
I used to think that most (surely not all) long-range hunters were better than the average hunter when it came to ensuring recovery of their animal. Mainly because the dedication and effort required to hunt like that typically resulted in some serious diligence and practice. Conversely, the numbers of non-long-range hunters who simply pulled out their daddies rifle once a year to plug a deer on the back end of their property might not be so diligent. And there are significantly more casual hunters than dedicated hunters out there.
I practice extensively with my Desert Tech SRS M2, and it pays off every year
As technology has allowed lower and lower costs to get into the long-range game, it seems more and more folks are following the trend. I don’t mean to disparage some of these people, but there is no doubt a number of them who buy into the marketing and thinking their purchase has made them ready. Essentially its the “now I’m a sniper” platitude.
Most of us want to hunt ethically. So in the interest of helping those who might be new to long-range hunting, I have gathered my thoughts to give you at least a starting point to building long-range hunting skill.
There is no substitute for practice, things like dry-fire and other activities are helpful. But when it comes to judging distances, wind trends and the other conditions necessary to be an effective long-range hunter, you need real world practice. I make no claim to be a particularly exceptional shooter, but this is how I have practiced and built a skillset that I think most would find useful.
I spend a lot of time in the mountains where I also hunt in the spring and fall. In order to hone my shooting skills I spend my time there both observing and engaging with the landscape. Every morning the wind comes down these canyons, and in the afternoons it goes back up.
adding a suppressor to your hunt also helps increase your odds, read about that here
On any given day I will practice by picking out random targets that closely mimic what I would see during a hunt. I pick out small targets, smaller than a deer’s kill zone for example, usually a small rock surrounded by dirt. And I pick them out in places where a deer might appear, and not always in an easy and comfortable position to engage. The range to these targets varies every time, depending on conditions and what I choose to practice on.
picking out targets across a long draw through this Kahles 318i
The whole idea is to present myself with a challenge every time, I evaluate each target as though it were an animal. I evaluate the range to the target, the angle at which I am shooting and the wind conditions between me and the target. Using the ballistic app on my phone, any other information I have as well as known data from previous engagements I come up with a firing solution. And after thinking long and hard about it, and making adjustments, I fire a single shot.
Making sure I followed all the best practices with breathing, trigger pull etc. I usually get a really good idea, based on my point of impact from that shot, whether I’d of gotten a deer, elk, or otherwise. Sometimes you miss by a little, other times you center punch the target. This practice also teaches you to shoot in such a way as to spot your own shots. Which is incredibly valuable if you are going to be any good. You must be able to spot a hit or miss to evaluate your tactics.
I would then move, hiking to a new location, and start over again. Following this practice over and over, creating realistic hunting scenarios is excellent for sharpening your skills. And the more you do it, the more common first round hits will come.
The Where
I would repeat the process wherever I might hunt. Whether that be at 9,000 feet high in the Rocky Mountains, or at 2300 feet in the parched desert badlands. Different density altitudes will greatly change the performance of your rifle, so if you are going from Oklahoma to Montana you will need to acclimate both yourself and the rifle to the change.
putting together a long-range rifle can be a fun experience, here is how I do it
I always like to get out and shoot a bit when I’m in new territory. Getting in more practice can only improve your odds of making a good shot. And changing up the variables of where you shoot will help you build a knowledge base of basic changes and how they affect you and your rifle.
The goal of these practices should be making that first shot as close to perfect as you can. After all, the first shot is worth all the rest. If you mess up the first shot, you may never get the second shot that would have been perfect.
this antelope fell to a well placed shot from 500+ yards from this 6mm ARC
Conclusion
Repeating the process outlined here, has helped me refine my shooting skills. Make sure that if you are not hitting where you intend to, understand why. If you don’t know why you are missing, you are just wasting ammo. Figure out why you missed, and how you could have corrected or anticipated it. Or if its even possible you could have anticipated it, which sometimes is the case. Thats why its called hunting. But don’t let your lack of effort and practice be the excuse for such a miss.
Has high tech hunting pushed back the goal posts for hunters?
I can remember, not too long ago, when shooting a deer from a distance like 600yds or more would get you raked over the coals by the general hunting public. I remember telling my own Father about my aspirations of hitting targets at 1000 yards, and hearing his skepticism. I remember a well known gunsmith telling me that it was silly to twist a .223 Remington barrel for 75 grain bullets and higher. “Everything else peeters out past six or seven hundred yards” I told him. Again, came the refrain; “you cant shoot that far.”
Like Ralphie, in the famous Christmas Story, I felt like nobody understood my dream. Nobody could see what I saw in my mind. But there was a wave coming, and it was fueled by science, technology, and at least in my case, a quest for ballistic perfection.
Don’t get me wrong here, its not that I simply wanted to kill something from as far away as possible, that could be borderline recklessness. What I wanted was something more, I wanted to build a rifle or rifles that would make me unstoppable at hitting small targets at distances like half a mile or more. And to that end the ability, if needed, to take my game wherever it presented itself be it near or far. It’s easy now, to see my former folly. I had focused so hard on equipment, and failed to see my part as a marksman that is equally important. Thankfully, these Rocky Mountains are a great educator. In today’s hardware driven market, it is hard not to fall for the sales pitch of this rifle will make you a sniper. Many of the best manufactures sell more than just hardware, they sell you training to go with it. Dont be a fool thinking that your wallet will make up for your aspirations.
You can buy accuracy to a degree, but you cant buy skill.
A young buck being surveilled
There is so much more to making a good shot, than just the hardware. Skill is equally important, perhaps more so. “Its the Indian, not the arrow” many people say. You can put a good rifle in the hands of a skilled marksman, and he will deal deadly force against anything within range. But even the finest precision rifle in the unwashed hands of a novice may be useless beyond its point blank aiming radius.
I should move on from the generalizations and get down to real information we can use. The foundations of a good shot are anchored firmly on several things, I dont claim any kind of authority or prestige, so I’ll just throw em out there in the order I see em.
A properly trained marksman, who can yield at least MOA accuracy in expected conditions
Ammunition matched to the rifle providing at least MOA accuracy
MOA is a good start, but ideally you should strive for much better
If you cover those three basic pillars, you are well on your way. But all three of them have been around for at least half a century, so why has it taken so long to break these time cemented barriers that I mentioned above? I think part of it is human nature, and conservative thinking.
If you cover these bases, all it takes is a little pinch of science and a dash of high tech equipment to shatter the barriers that once congested both minds and ranges.
Now lets talk a little bit about hunting. As I outlined in my last piece, killing an animal, is about placing enough energy in the right spot. To me, that is what accuracy is all about, being able to hit my target exactly where I want to. The capacity to place a shot accurately should be the main determining factor in a hunter’s killing radius. If two hundred yards is as far as you can shoot accurately, then you would be imprudent to shoot beyond that.
Now we have come back to my original point, which was people looking down their noses at long range shooting, and long range hunting in particular. Shooting animals at long range distances is a taboo subject, mainly because people have either shot beyond their accuracy envelope, or watched someone else do it, and experienced poor results (wounded/unrecovered animals). Nobody likes seeing things like that happen, so most will shy away from questionable shots, which is a safe and conservative choice.
And so it was for the better part of the twentieth century, few dared to push the limits, mostly those in competition or LE/Mil circles. But to the average shooter, and particularly the hunter, the subject remained taboo and legend.
The advent of technology has brought a miriad of supplies to the industry, this has allowed everyone, even rednecks like me the ability to crash through the taboo with impressive impacts.
Some of these technological advances are worth pointing out, in no particular order:
Better bullets with higher Ballistic Coefficients allowing the bullets to cheat wind and resistance, keeping them on track further.
Better propellants, giving higher velocities, more stable and efficient burns.
Compact, accurate, and affordable laser rangefinders, allowing marksmen to extract the data they require to make proper predictions.
Precise and accurate telescopic sights, to adjust their shots according to data with exactness.
Reticles that allow precise measurements and wind holds.
New tools like the Kestrel are available to hunters can increase your odds of success
All of these tools, as well as others have not only become available to the average shooter, but they are affordable, and fit in a pocket. The science of shooting has also progressed greatly, even in the short time I have been following it. And again, it is all available right at your fingertips.
So it seems no small wonder then, that what once seemed nearly impossible, is now commonplace. Even as little as twenty years ago, who would shoot at something so far away that a guess could be off by hundreds of yards? And the target could barely be made out in your 3X9 scope? And even if you doped the wind right, and managed the correct holdover, your bullet may have run completely out of energy before it gets there.
These high tech gadgets have given us the tools to cross all those T’s and dot all the i’s. Now you hear about it at every end of the internet, on hunting forums and Facebook pages.
Which begs the question; Are we now living in a post short-range world? And is taking those long shots any more irresponsible with the help of today’s technology? I guess that depends on how you look at it. I have heard both sides of the argument for some time, and I have yet to find a compelling argument against this new anomaly as long as one does his due diligence. For starters, anybody can make a poor shot on an animal. If you hunt long enough, you will eventually make a bad shot, we’ve all seen it. Whether its caused by buck fever, lack of experience, weather conditions, equipment failure, or any one of a million other things that people can blame it on rightly or wrongfully. I’m not making an excuse for it, nor am I defending it, it just happens. I would go as far as to say that more animals are wounded and go unrecovered at close range, than at long range. Simply due to the numbers, the majority of hunters probably never shoot beyond 400 yards. Hitch that to their hit a paper plate at 100yds mindset, and you can count on some animals going unrecovered or lost.
We’ve seen people miss easy and simple shots, as well as make incredible and amazing shots. I’ve said it before, a good shot should be no surprise to a marksman, it should be expected after much practice and experience making same or similar shots in the same conditions and circumstances regardless of range.
We know what it takes to make a good shot, we outlined that above. Making a good shot is the same whether you are shooting 200 yards or 800 yards, the difference of course is the variables that come into play. For example, the wind at 200 yards is much less a factor than it is at 800 yards. What might only blow your bullet off course by an inch or so up close, may blow you completely off target at the further distance. Also, at 800 yards, one MOA is eight plus inches, which is why sub MOA is a much better goal.
As long as one considers all the additional variables and their consequence, they can be mitigated and overcome. Unless they cant be, what I mean by that is the further away your target the more downrange forces that simply cannot be anticipated unless you have forward observers or other assistance. And the further out the target, the more of these variables you have to worry about. Perhaps someday soon, technology will cover that as well.
Conditions will always dictate what you can and cant do, if it is a dead calm morning, you might be able to pull off something incredible. But if it is a switch wind breezy afternoon for example, it would be a wise choice to keep within your known envelope. A wise shooter, will always keep within his known realm of proficiency. But an even wiser shooter will recognize that his realm changes with atmosphere and weather. Keeping your finger in the air like a weak a politician, and paying close attention to what is happening around you, will go a long way towards letting you know when to shoot, or more importantly when not to shoot.
The ethics of long range hunting will be debated forever. There are those who think taking long shots will always be reckless, and there are those who are willing to take a long hard look at the data, make their calculations, and either take the shot, or choose another course of action.
Those who claim moral high ground, saying long range shots are unethical will always abound. But the truth is this; Not taking long range shots does not necessarily make you an ethical hunter, but staying inside your limits does. For some people, that limit may be four hundred yards, for others it might be twelve hundred yards. It is up to each individual to figure that out, and prove it to themselves repeatedly long before an animal falls in their crosshair.
I don’t hold anything against those who dislike long range shots, they are entitled to their opinion. But the irritating part of the debate comes when someone tells me (or anyone else) that you shouldn’t do that, simply because they cant do it. They love to make insults like; that’s not really hunting, or real hunters get closer. And it occasionally comes from people who hunt from a shoot house, with a Keurig and heater, overlooking senderos strewn with corn feeders on land so flat you cant see more than a hundred yards without jackin up the shoot house. Its really an ignorant position to take, particularly when you don’t know someone else’s skill-set or practices.
Just because a person can make a long shot, doesn’t mean they cant stalk into arrow range of an animal. There was a time where big bore muskets were used to shoot deer at what we today would consider archery range, should we go back in the name of purity? Would our ancestors look down their noses at our modern equipment thinking there is no challenge? It was the push for innovation that took us from those ancient smooth bores and stick bows to the rifle and/or bow you hunt with today.
Another problem with this way of thinking is that it is a never ending slippery slope. Long range hunting < spot and stalking < archery stalking < spear hunting < knife hunting < teeth and hands < etc. < etc. Where does it end? Are we so dedicated to our own ideal of hunting that we would deny another’s? Surely if a stalk into bow range is your thing, with wooden arrows and handmade broadheads, who am I to stop you? Despite having seen many wounded animals with arrows still in them, I wouldn’t argue that archery is unethical, nor would I want to keep people from doing it.
That leads me to my last point.
The worst thing that we hunters can do as a group, is to fracture off into different tribes pitted against each other. The anti hunting movement is growing wildly, everywhere you look there are people trying to take away our ability to hunt and fish the way we enjoy. We as a group need to stand together more than ever, for divided we will surely lose.
I used to be infuriated by the mass hordes of hunters that would flood my favorite hunting spots. It drove me nuts that they didn’t understand my plan, and walked right through my hunt. As years have passed, and age has toned my opinions, I have changed my attitude. Those hordes have just as much right to be there as I do, and I would rather it be other hunters interfering in my hunt than protesters.
Instead, I have evolved as a hunter. I now welcome these large groups of bush beaters, and like the predator that I am, I simply await the inevitable, like a hawk kiting in the sky. Instead of trying to beat them through the forest, and beat them to the stalk, I await the escaping game from a position where my skill allows me an advantage over the hordes. An advantage I intend to keep.
Technology and necessity have indeed pushed back the goal posts in todays hunt. I see nothing wrong with it, provided marksmen respect their prey enough to become swift and lethal, and stay within their known limits.
