Too much gun!!

[Norbrat]

Some folks would argue that you can never have too much gun.

But last weekend I certainly was overgunned for the job.

We were invited to have a go at feral goats about 500 kms (300 miles) north of home.

Saturday morning saw us climbing over a couple of ridges near Silverton, just out of Broken Hill. Mad Max fans would recognise this country as this is where MM2 & 3 were filmed.

We came across a group of 4 goats in a gully, and were able to get to within about 80 metres (90 yds) before the lead nanny bleated a warning.

I had my Brno ZH304, a combination gun with a 7x57 rimmed over a 12g shotgun barrel. As I considered I really only had one shot, I waited for Anthony to take the first shot with his new Tikka T3 in .223.

Well, he missed, so I lined up the lead nanny over the open sights and hit her hard in the shoulder. She took two steps and collapsed. I waited for Anthony to finish the job by shooting the other 3 goats, who were now milling around not sure what to do now that the lead nanny was down.

I saw Anthony fumbling with his rifle (he had double fed the next round) so I reloaded and took a second shot at a smaller goat. This one also hit it in the shoulder, but didn't penetrated the body as the goat turned just as I fired. The glancing shot broke the shoulder of the goat, so it was now trying to get away on three legs.

Anthony finally sorted out the problems with his Tikka and shot the last 2 goats, as well as giving the coup de grace to the second one I had hit.

So why was I overgunned? Well, the big nanny I had shot first showed a classic boiler room shot, with the bullet exiting just behind the far shoulder, with plenty of lung tissue and a huge blood trail on the ground behind.

But even though the bullet went nowhere near the gut, the hydraulic shock blew up and tore the gut completely, ruining the carcass for meat. All we could salvage were her hind legs.

Next time I'll take my scoped Tikka .222 and head shoot the goats.

The 7mm Mauser with 139gn bullets is just too much if you want to shoot goats for meat. But perfect if you just culling these feral pests and leaving the carcasses for the scavengers.

[versifier]

What weight bullets were you using? I agree that it might have been a bit too much gun, but my thought is with a light bullet or a cast bullet load it might be a lot more appropriate. No reason you can't head shoot them with the 7mm, either. I don't imagine you would put a scope on thet rig, but a head shot at even 150yds shouldn't be a problem if you have decent sights.

[257 ROB]

If you reload you can make some low velocity rounds with heavy bullets and they won't do as much damage.

[Norbrat]

The ammo is SBP 139 gn soft point doing about 2600 fps.

I bought a batch of this Czechoslovakian made ammo not long after I bought the gun as 7x57 rimmed ammo or brass is not that easy to find here in Oz. The SBP ammo can't be reloaded as it is twin flashhole, but I have since been able to get about 200 rounds of various Norma and RWS ammo so that's plenty for reloading.

The gun is basically made for European forest hunting, where you may come across a boar or a deer (so you can use the 7x57) or a hare or rabbit (for the 12g). It's less suited for our goat hunting conditions, where you can come across mobs of goats so a faster reloading rifle would be better.

The last time I hunted goats we were able to drive almost up to them, and they had just had a drink so couldn't run. It was fairly easy to walk up and shoot them from behind, and the 7x57 certainly put them down quickly. Quite a few shots even put down two goats at once, but we were shooting for extermination, not meat.

You gotta appreciate goats in Oz are considered a feral pest and do a lot of environmental damage with their foraging, and as we have no large predators in the areas the goats live, they breed prolifically.

Anyway, I was invited on this trip at pretty short notice, and I hadn't hunted in this particular area before, so didn't really know what to expect. I took the Brno as much for the shotgun/rifle flexibility as any other reason. And Anthony was the one who is/was really keen, so I figured if I get one shot in, he should be able to take the rest with his bolt action.

I do have a Leupold 2-7x33 scope for it on QD mounts, but hadn't sighted it in with this ammunition, and I didn't have time to go to the range to do so. I know the gun will shoot any of the ammo I have for it into "minute of pie plate" using the express open sights out to 150 metres, so I was confident I could body shoot a goat without the scope mounted.

I have loaded some mild cast bullet loads for this gun (160 gns @ 1800 fps) and it was interesting to see that at 100 metres, these grouped 4" high and 2" to the left of 160 gn jacketed factory ammo!

I used this cast load to have fun trying to hit silhouette targets out to 200m; funny how I could hit more rams @ 200 than pigs @100

I'm sure that cast load would be plenty to head shoot goats, even through their thick frontal skull plates, but I would definitely need to have the scope fitted to do that. My eyes are too old to shoot such a small group over express sights!

[versifier]

I have loaded some mild cast bullet loads for this gun (160 gns @ 1800 fps) and it was interesting to see that at 100 metres, these grouped 4" high and 2" to the left of 160 gn jacketed factory ammo!

In this case, the much slower cast load spends a longer time in the barrel, so it exits when the recoil impulse is farther along (the muzzle has risen more), so it prints higher. The same effect is often seen in handguns when switching to heavier bullets. FWIW, I have seen 18-24" vertical differences testing cast rifle loads with the sights set for jacketed loads at 100yds. Yours stayed on the paper!

Aside from the classic situations above, it is also not unusual to see greatly varying points of impact when switching bullets, even of the same weight with roughly the same MV: slightly different lengths of bearing surface, different friction coefficients for varying alloys of jackets or cast bullets (and lubes), different barrel harmonics. All can be contributing factors to POI shift. Usually the POI won't move much with similar bullets, but I have seen several occasions when it has shifted more than 6" just changing brands.

[Norbrat]

Yep, and shooting off a benchrest can make quite a difference to shooting from the shoulder, let alone the barrel harmonics of having a 12g barrel soldered underneath the rifle barrel!

[versifier]

I can relate to that. I like combination guns. I used to have a Sav24V .30-30 over 20ga. I have to say that it was the most accurate .30cal barrel I have ever owned, and I've owned several dozen. (I always have to think about that gun before I free float any other rifle.) Jacketed bullets from 110-150gr, .5MOA or better depending on the load all the way out to 250yds. I put a peep sight on it for the longer daylight shots. I usually shot 110gr RNSP in it, and Sierra 125FNHP's, but it was just as accurate with 150GK's, too. I didn't do a lot of casting then, but it did shoot Lee 117 "soupcans" right around MOA and I was very impressed with their performance on large canines. I had no problem pushing linotype bullets well over 2300fps.

It was a great farm gun, day or night, woodchucks or raccoons in the garden, dogs or coyotes in the sheep, foxes or fishers at the ducks - many, many dozens of varmints over the twenty years I had it. I ordered it after a particularly frustrating day in the woods. Out in the morning with the dog and shotgun after birds, we jumped three deer, didn't see a single partridge. I left the dog at home and went back out that afternoon with the rifle after the deer, flushed six partridges, only deer sign I saw was tracks. I ordered the gun next day and hunted with it for the next four years. It was amazing. Every time I carried it in the woods during those four years I saw absolutely nothing except squirrels and tweety birds. No game. Not once. Nothing. I had a very forgiving dog, that was the only good part. I never hunted with it after that, eventually it got sold to a friend who just had to have it to defend his garden.

[Norbrat]

I ordered the gun next day and hunted with it for the next four years. It was amazing. Every time I carried it in the woods during those four years I saw absolutely nothing except squirrels and tweety birds. No game. Not once. Nothing.

Oh, well, it must have been jinxed!

Still, a nice day out talking a gun for a walk is often ruined by actually shooting something. Then the fun becomes WORK Skinning, gutting, carrying out, butchering, etc, etc. Just think of all the effort that gun saved you from.

[versifier]

There is that....