Sounds like an excuse to buy a 50cal BMG now!!! As good excuse as any...
treefarmer,
I bet you guys had to shoot with "real" equipment (iron sights) back then. My eye sight isn't good enough to see that far with iron sights. Nowdays we cheat and use scopes and laser range finders, special ammo, etc... using technology to make up for some of our deficient skills.
It makes my wife feel much better to know somebody will check on the place once in a while when we are not there.
He called me last night as we agreed to go shoot at his range next Saturday afternoon. He seemed like a hard working family man.
We agreed to start at 400 yards and then move back as I become more confident. I don't have a 50 BMG and I don't think it's necessary. In past I've shot out to 800 yards with my .308 and out to 1,000 yards with my 300 WM. Normally I use my 308 is out to 600 yards and anything further than that is for the 300WM. I started to gather all my "long range" equipment last night and checked everything. I still have few hundred rounds of "target" ammo for both guns so I thnk I'm good to go.
Very cool! Post some pics of the targets!
Some of my best memories are from grove hunting...awesome places to have access to.
Growing up in highschool, a running buddies father was a caretaker and they lived in the grove.
Rabbits, Hogs, deer, dove, gators and frogs in the canals....we moved the old aluminum irrigation water pipes after school for "hunting rights". Still remember getting chased up the bank of one when momma gator took exception to us catching her babies. They started squelling and out the culvert she came!
Not enough time for a long post but a little update.
We've shot out at that range 3 times now. I shot my 308 and 300WM out to 600 yards without too much trouble but my groups are not what they were just few years ago. I am improving each time so that's encouraging. He shoots better groups than I do so it's pushing me to do better. I'm going to stretch out to 800 yards with my 300WM next time and if that goes okay I'll go back to 1,000 yards. I'm going to start reloading some target ammo soon as I don't have very much left so that's going to eat up a lot of my time out there.
We had a chance to hunt once early morning. He and I set up on one of the service roads and each shot a hog. My was a 120 lb. sow from 390 yards using the 300WM and his was 160 lb. sow from 410 yards using 308. Both were headshots. Two shots within 1 second apart and 2 hogs down.
Our wives and kids get along well so when we are there for few days they'll come visit us and have a meal together.
It's all turning out real nice.
