356/358 Winchester?

FOTIS · May 11, 2005

Does anyone have one? What game have you used it on? What was performance like? What accuracy/velocity did you get and from what loads? Thanx

RogueRiver · May 15, 2005

I have taken elk, bear, Blacktail and mule deer with my whelen. I have not had anything go more then ten feet after being hit. I would actually like to find a savage 99 in 358. I have hunted with a wide range of calibers and I have not found any caliber except med. magnums that will put game down faster. The nice thing about the 35's is they don't recoil bad, they shoot heavy bullets that penetrate good and with their med velocity don't do to much meat damage as compared to some of the super fast magnums. In fact year before last I had to put down a friends deer that he hit a little low and back with a 7 mag. one 200 grn 35 and it was finished. I use 200 grn rem cl rn for deer and 250 partions for the big stuff. if you are in open country I would try the 225 BT for deer. That is what I used to take a mule deer and the Ballistic tips do open up when they hit bone. I live in western Oregon and most of my shots are under a 100 yds. I hope this helps.

JD338 · May 15, 2005

Pop,

I have a M700 Classic is 35 Whelen that I have used for WT Deer and Blk Bear here in MI.
The first two seasons I used the 200 gr CL factory load and killed 4 deer, 3 of the 4 in their tracks. The 4th one made it back into the cedar swamp about 30 yds with a double lung shot. I recovered one bullet under the hide after I hit the buck in the neck (head on 75 yds away) down through the shoulder.
I switched over to the 225 gr PT and killed 13 more bucks and a 250 lb Blk Bear. 12 of the 13 deer and the bear dropped in their tracks. The deer wer ehigh lung shots behind the shoulder and the bear was a shoulder shot.
I always had a nice exit hole and very little meat destruction. The two that I had to blood trail left consideral blood trails for about 30 yds each.
I realize that the 35 Whelen is slightly bigger than the 358 Win but they are realitivly close in performance.
I feel that I have enough experience with the 35 Whelen to state that 35 cal bullets put WT deer down fast. Any blood trailing will be short and sweet.

Hope this helps you out.

Best REgards,

JD338