- Oct 30, 2004
- 24,458
- 3,531
What is your load with the blr and 200 tsx?
Lever gun hunters?
- Thread starter Guy Miner
- Start date
- Thread starter
- #22
Guy Miner
Master Loader
- Apr 6, 2006
- 17,867
- 6,447
Dr. Mike - if I didn't state it before... I'm officially very, very jealous!
Great photos - and wow - the hunts... Nice...
Fine looking mtn grizz too. I'll bet he made a handsome rug! :grin:
Great photos - and wow - the hunts... Nice...
Fine looking mtn grizz too. I'll bet he made a handsome rug! :grin:
DrMike
Ballistician
- Nov 8, 2006
- 37,543
- 6,623
POP,
For the .358 with 200 grain TSX, I use WLR primers and 47 grains of IMR3031. It gives me a velocity that is touching 2500 fps. My hunting partner tells me it won't come home with me one of these days.
Guy,
Thanks for the kind words. I count myself blessed to live here. Surely, God has been good to me. When living in Texas and California, I never dreamt I would be able to hunt in such a place. Even after moving to Vancouver, it used to be a 14 hour drive in order to hunt this immediate area and on up the Alaska Highway. And now I live in the Serengeti of the north where I hunt grizzly, black bear, wolf, whitetail, mule deer, elk, moose, caribou, and a variety of varmints. I do regret that I haven't scanned in the pictures of any of the big black bears that I have taken. All those pictures were taken without benefit of a digital camera in years past. I have had a number of black bears that pushed seven feet. Certainly, there are bigger bears in Pennsylvania and on Vancouver Island, but a seven foot bear is still a big animal.
Interestingly enough, we hunted hard for three weeks before we found the grizzly. We had tracked several bears that had wandered about that spring but never saw the animals. We were close on several occasions.
One evening, coming into a valley we had not explored, a golden eagle swooped down and seemed almost to guide us in. Cresting a hill, there was a young grizzly standing in the road. I believe he has grown up, as we saw a bear with quite similar markings two weeks ago on the same road. Today, he is about a seven foot bear and very good looking.
We explored the valley and spotted this bear grazing on a mountainside 1500 yards away. It was getting toward dark, but we put a stalk on him and drew within about 140 yards. We situated behind a small hummock to watch the bear who was moving closer at a leisurely pace. At 140 yards, my hunting partner told me to shoot. When I said I wanted him to get closer, my partner told me to shoot or he was going to do so. He had no desire to let the bear get closer. His father has guided for 40 years, and both Gil and his father have a healthy respect for grizzlies, so he did not want the bear any closer. As I have stated, the first shot put the animal down, and I kept shooting until I was out of ammunition.
I usually make an effort to perform a necropsy on the animals I shoot. Pathological examination tells me quite a bit about bullet performance and yields other information on the state of the animal, etc. I knew that the .35 calibre bullets would do the job on big game, having shot a few head, but the damage to the bear by the 220 grain flat nose bullets was very impressive. I recovered only one bullet and two cores out of seven rounds fired in total.
As an aside, my hunting partner and good friend, Gil Davis, is native. We have returned to that particular valley on several occasions since then. Whenever the golden eagle guides us in, we see game. Whenever we miss him, we see nothing. Gil says the bird is his totem. Fascinating.
The buffalo were fun. A herd had escaped and were tearing down fences on several farms. Escaped buffalo are treated under the agriculture act for thirty days, after which they revert to the crown in British Columbia and become game animals. There is a limited entry hunt for bison each year, with a generous harvest. However, with the permission of the land owner and the owner of the buffalo, escaped bison can be hunted. We had permission from several farmers and the owner of the bison, and for good measure we notified the conservation service and went hunting.
In point of fact, three herds had escaped that spring and were causing destruction all up and down the Alaska Highway. The price of buffalo was depressed because of the mad cow scare at the border with the US, and so it wasn't worth the time or the cost for the buffalo ranchers to gather their herds.
In total, I know of around thirty animals harvested from the one herd alone that spring. Now, there is another free ranging herd in the area. That same day, my hunting partner, Gil, used a .376 Steyr to harvest a young bull. He wanted to see how it would work with a 260 grain AccuBond. It did a fine job.
For the .358 with 200 grain TSX, I use WLR primers and 47 grains of IMR3031. It gives me a velocity that is touching 2500 fps. My hunting partner tells me it won't come home with me one of these days.
Guy,
Thanks for the kind words. I count myself blessed to live here. Surely, God has been good to me. When living in Texas and California, I never dreamt I would be able to hunt in such a place. Even after moving to Vancouver, it used to be a 14 hour drive in order to hunt this immediate area and on up the Alaska Highway. And now I live in the Serengeti of the north where I hunt grizzly, black bear, wolf, whitetail, mule deer, elk, moose, caribou, and a variety of varmints. I do regret that I haven't scanned in the pictures of any of the big black bears that I have taken. All those pictures were taken without benefit of a digital camera in years past. I have had a number of black bears that pushed seven feet. Certainly, there are bigger bears in Pennsylvania and on Vancouver Island, but a seven foot bear is still a big animal.
Interestingly enough, we hunted hard for three weeks before we found the grizzly. We had tracked several bears that had wandered about that spring but never saw the animals. We were close on several occasions.
One evening, coming into a valley we had not explored, a golden eagle swooped down and seemed almost to guide us in. Cresting a hill, there was a young grizzly standing in the road. I believe he has grown up, as we saw a bear with quite similar markings two weeks ago on the same road. Today, he is about a seven foot bear and very good looking.
We explored the valley and spotted this bear grazing on a mountainside 1500 yards away. It was getting toward dark, but we put a stalk on him and drew within about 140 yards. We situated behind a small hummock to watch the bear who was moving closer at a leisurely pace. At 140 yards, my hunting partner told me to shoot. When I said I wanted him to get closer, my partner told me to shoot or he was going to do so. He had no desire to let the bear get closer. His father has guided for 40 years, and both Gil and his father have a healthy respect for grizzlies, so he did not want the bear any closer. As I have stated, the first shot put the animal down, and I kept shooting until I was out of ammunition.
I usually make an effort to perform a necropsy on the animals I shoot. Pathological examination tells me quite a bit about bullet performance and yields other information on the state of the animal, etc. I knew that the .35 calibre bullets would do the job on big game, having shot a few head, but the damage to the bear by the 220 grain flat nose bullets was very impressive. I recovered only one bullet and two cores out of seven rounds fired in total.
As an aside, my hunting partner and good friend, Gil Davis, is native. We have returned to that particular valley on several occasions since then. Whenever the golden eagle guides us in, we see game. Whenever we miss him, we see nothing. Gil says the bird is his totem. Fascinating.
The buffalo were fun. A herd had escaped and were tearing down fences on several farms. Escaped buffalo are treated under the agriculture act for thirty days, after which they revert to the crown in British Columbia and become game animals. There is a limited entry hunt for bison each year, with a generous harvest. However, with the permission of the land owner and the owner of the buffalo, escaped bison can be hunted. We had permission from several farmers and the owner of the bison, and for good measure we notified the conservation service and went hunting.
In point of fact, three herds had escaped that spring and were causing destruction all up and down the Alaska Highway. The price of buffalo was depressed because of the mad cow scare at the border with the US, and so it wasn't worth the time or the cost for the buffalo ranchers to gather their herds.
In total, I know of around thirty animals harvested from the one herd alone that spring. Now, there is another free ranging herd in the area. That same day, my hunting partner, Gil, used a .376 Steyr to harvest a young bull. He wanted to see how it would work with a 260 grain AccuBond. It did a fine job.
bullet
Handloader
- Dec 26, 2007
- 4,975
- 18
Very nice DrMike, I really appreciate you posting the pictures and that is so cool doing it with your Lever rifle. Man, makes us all want hunting season to come around.
bullet
Handloader
- Dec 26, 2007
- 4,975
- 18
Very nice DrMike, I really appreciate you posting the pictures and that is so cool and shooting those with your Lever rifle. Man, makes us all want hunting season to come around.
nomosendero
Handloader
- Apr 13, 2006
- 536
- 1
Sorry Dr Mike, you said what it was to start with & I looked at the photo too fast, nice Griz. !!!
- Oct 30, 2004
- 24,458
- 3,531
Thanx Mike!
G
Guest
Guest
Kinda jealous of that .358. Nice rifle! I caved in a bought another lever last month, couldn't resist the new marlin lever. Can't complain in the accuracy department either. This is my new 308 MX. Surprisingly it shoots 1" groups at 100 yards with hornady ammo.
:grin: [/img]
- Oct 30, 2004
- 24,458
- 3,531
I came real close to getting a Marlin 308. If hornady would offer these bullets as loading components then maybe.......
- Oct 30, 2004
- 24,458
- 3,531
So I got this instead....
BLR 358 win Not bad huh? Arrived today
BLR 358 win Not bad huh? Arrived today
- Nov 4, 2004
- 25,602
- 9,772
Dr. Mike,
Very nice trophies, congratulations on every single one of them.
Those 35 calibers are thumpers. :wink:
JD338
Very nice trophies, congratulations on every single one of them.
Those 35 calibers are thumpers. :wink:
JD338
DrMike
Ballistician
- Nov 8, 2006
- 37,543
- 6,623
All the lever guns are fun. I haven't found any that weren't fun to shoot. I just came in from the range. We hosted a dental practise at the range all day. There were some nice lever guns of older persuasion present. They are just plain fun and far more deadly than some of the experts would lead one to believe. However, the 35 calibres are favourites for me.
G
Guest
Guest
POP, you must have a really nice wife or one that's completely oblivious to how many guns you have. Which is it and what's the secret? Nice looking rifle, tell us how it shoots! Totally with you on reloading components for the 308 mx. :?:
- Oct 30, 2004
- 24,458
- 3,531
Nope not oblivious at all. She just appreciates me. 
