Just had to share

User00003

Well-Known Member
Sorry, but I just HAD to share this one! I was reading up on Bergers and the effects at various ranges on a particular US forum, trying to educate myself a bit more on this specific manufacturer of bullets.

One forum poster, followed by a shocking number of respondents, argued that the European way of stalking was quite unethical, and literally unfair to the deer!!! It was argued that because we stalk in so close, using camoflage, etc. the deer have no chance! The message was that to be an ethical and 'fair' hunter, you should be taking shots from at least 350 yds, ideally more, so that the deer had a decent 'chance' :rolleyes::doh::lol::lol::lol::lol:

..need I say more!
 
Did they mention launching a rocket in the air and not shooting till 2 seconds after it went bang to give the deer a chance to run away????? :eek:

Personally I always stalk up close, hold the rifle over my shoulder looking through the scope using a mirror whilst shooting backwards using a .177 springer. I think that gives the deer a fair chance,:D
 
Not unsurprisingly, the differences in shooting styles/ethics/etc are fairly disparate on either side of the pond. However, I don't know how someone could rationally argue that improving the probability of being able to humanely dispatch an animal (via stalking in close) is unethical. I don't know how they do it on the particular US forum you mention, but any time I have been stalking in Canada (where I grew up) long range shots were to be avoided at all costs.
 
Idiots abound. He is probably confusing the issue of "fair chase" with ethics. For example, the use of camo, high seats, suppressed weapons allowing multiple shots at the same herd/group of deer would seem to lack a certain amount of "sport" for many US hunters. Here florescent orange is mandatory in may states, suppressors for hunting are verboten, and hunting from stands is generally considered poor form unless using a bow... and even then many hunters give it the thumbs down. But the style and purpose of hunting is different in both countries and that fool doesn't understand it. The fact that he insists that shooting deer under 350 yards is unethical proves he's an arm chair hunter. ~Muir
 
Ha ha ha...I thought we might hear from you guys (YukonT and Muir). I know very well not all US based hunters believe in long range shooting, and the people who were making these comments are probably in a very small minority indeed...I just thought the comments were unbelievably funny...to give deer a 'better chance' by not shooting at them from up close! really, we all know that you are giving them a good chance BY stalking in close, because the chances of spooking the deer are HUGE in comparison to missing a long range shot with modern technology....

Please, no one take offense to this.
 
No offense taken, PKL. In any sport you're going to get your fair share of idiots that are largely unrepresentative of the rest of the sports' community. Sadly, the advent of the internet has made their audience much larger.
 
Likewise, no offense taken. I mostly hunt with iron sighted rifles, handguns, and muzzle loaders so getting close is required. I also do quite a bit of varmint shooting out to 400+ yards, shooting at beer-bottle sized prairiedogs with 22 Hornet, .222 and .223. I can certainly kill a mule deer at the same distances with a suitable high-powered rifle but choose not to. I have learned that (here, at least) if you're glassing a deer at 400 yards there are probably two within 100 yards you've not yet seen.

Besides.... I'm getting old. I don't like to take shots farther than I care to walk!:old:~Muir
 
I am so old and decrepit these days I dare not shoot anything too far away :) because by the time it takes me to walk that far it could have gone off :D not run off, started to rot :rolleyes:
Like I say, I don't Stalk any more ;) I Creep :D
 
That's why there's a difference, in the states it's known as Deer Hunting and here we call it Stalking, they see their prey at long distance and shoot whereas we stalk to safe and certain distances, hopefully.
 
That's why there's a difference, in the states it's known as Deer Hunting and here we call it Stalking, they see their prey at long distance and shoot whereas we stalk to safe and certain distances, hopefully.

I don't think this is quite fair as it is a very general statement. There is no question that long range hunting techniques appear most highly developed in the USA where they seem to be practised more often than here in the UK. It is likely that there are many driving factors behind this - some social, some related to technology like accurate rangefinders and some down to the simple fact that they have more land to shoot over than us.

However, it seems a little unreasonable to assume that long range hunting is not a skill in itself or that it is necessarily unsporting as a general method of hunting deer. Having the confidence to make a one shot kill at many hundreds of yards in real world conditions, and every real sportsman will be confident of a clean kill no matter how he hunts, is certainly an achievement in my view and I'm not at all sure that I could ever do it. Also although we imagine that stalking into a deer is a much more advanced stalking or fieldcraft skill than setting up at 1,000 yards and shooting it from there it also occurs to me that selecting a location from which to take a 1,000 yard shot requires a lot of knowledge of the lie of the land and the movement of the deer. Yes, this knowledge is different to that required to get within 50 yards of a sika in a forest but that doesn't make it any less of an achievement when this knowledge along with shooting skills come together to achieve a clean kill.

Now for a lot of us our view of long range hunting is somewhat coloured by rather unpleasant youtube videos that appear to show people shooting animals at long range where the "achievement" is the range rather than the stalk and the clean kill. However, I imagine some aspects of our stalking here in the UK might not look so good if all we knew about it came from youtube. Of course I can't say that for every clean youtube kill there aren't 10 wounded deer running around but what I can say is that it seems unlikely that we in the UK are the only hunters to have high moral, sporting and animal welfare standards. It also seems likely that here in the UK we have the same proportion of "hunters" with a rather lower set of personal standards as are found in the USA.

When I have the skills to be confident in achieving clean, one shot kills on deer at 1,000 yards after selecting a suitable location to set up my rifle etc. then I will be in a position to decide if this method of hunting is fair, reasonable and sporting. Until then it will have to remain something about which I know so little that I really am not in a position to comment on the method in general. Of course, like others, I have some pretty strong and negative views on some of the long range hunting videos as seen on youtube but considering a specific event wrong does not mean that I can generalise and say that all long range hunting is wrong and that it is some form of America affectation which will never be found among stalkers here in the UK.
 
Of course, it could simply have been a tongue in cheek remark from some sardonic wit. :doh:
 
Hmm so where does he view stand on creeping into place or in a cammo tree stand with bow hunting then :doh:dont get too near you might hit them :lol::lol:
As some one has already pointed out idiots abound :D where ever you go in the world.
 
I don't think this is quite fair as it is a very general statement. There is no question that long range hunting techniques appear most highly developed in the USA where they seem to be practised more often than here in the UK. It is likely that there are many driving factors behind this - some social, some related to technology like accurate rangefinders and some down to the simple fact that they have more land to shoot over than us.

However, it seems a little unreasonable to assume that long range hunting is not a skill in itself or that it is necessarily unsporting as a general method of hunting deer. Having the confidence to make a one shot kill at many hundreds of yards in real world conditions, and every real sportsman will be confident of a clean kill no matter how he hunts, is certainly an achievement in my view and I'm not at all sure that I could ever do it. Also although we imagine that stalking into a deer is a much more advanced stalking or fieldcraft skill than setting up at 1,000 yards and shooting it from there it also occurs to me that selecting a location from which to take a 1,000 yard shot requires a lot of knowledge of the lie of the land and the movement of the deer. Yes, this knowledge is different to that required to get within 50 yards of a sika in a forest but that doesn't make it any less of an achievement when this knowledge along with shooting skills come together to achieve a clean kill.

Now for a lot of us our view of long range hunting is somewhat coloured by rather unpleasant youtube videos that appear to show people shooting animals at long range where the "achievement" is the range rather than the stalk and the clean kill. However, I imagine some aspects of our stalking here in the UK might not look so good if all we knew about it came from youtube. Of course I can't say that for every clean youtube kill there aren't 10 wounded deer running around but what I can say is that it seems unlikely that we in the UK are the only hunters to have high moral, sporting and animal welfare standards. It also seems likely that here in the UK we have the same proportion of "hunters" with a rather lower set of personal standards as are found in the USA.

When I have the skills to be confident in achieving clean, one shot kills on deer at 1,000 yards after selecting a suitable location to set up my rifle etc. then I will be in a position to decide if this method of hunting is fair, reasonable and sporting. Until then it will have to remain something about which I know so little that I really am not in a position to comment on the method in general. Of course, like others, I have some pretty strong and negative views on some of the long range hunting videos as seen on youtube but considering a specific event wrong does not mean that I can generalise and say that all long range hunting is wrong and that it is some form of America affectation which will never be found among stalkers here in the UK.

Well put. I have taken my share of deer at long range (sub 400 yards) but now prefer to hunt by more "primitive" methods. A 1000 yard shot is a very specific shot that few could achieve without having a concise knowledge of the land, the weather, and the cartridge... and the skills to put them together. I have never tried deer at such ranges but there was a time in my misspent youth when I attempted 600 -800 yard shots at prairiedogs with the Holy Grail being a 1000 yard kill. I never did it and eventually sold off the barrel burner I was using in the attempt. I enjoy the fair-chase aspect of deer hunting which is why I don't use scent blockers, lures, feed stations, camo, stands or blinds.


As to the notion that deer are shot at "long range" her in the US. My goodness. I could put you on an island on the Big Horn river where your visibility is about 15 yards, tops. There you must be quiet, quick to the shoulder, and smooth on the trigger. Much the way I envision stalking in the UK.~Muir
 
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