BOG Pod Death Grip- Rock Steady Like a Field Bench Rest

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There are so many rifle and crossbow tri-pod and bi-pods and mono-pods for many reasons. The BOG Pod Death grip was created to firmly hold and clamp your rifle, shotgun or crossbow at the ready and give you a rock steady rest when the moment of truth arrives.

I used it last year in Newfoundland on a Moose Hunt. The wind was whipping me at near zero temperatures gusting to 30 mph. I was rock steady for a 100 yard shot at a walking moose.

Truthfully, I likely would have missed or placed the shot wrongly without the BOG Death Grip.

If you go to my site search engine you can see my other articles on the BOG Death Grip. 

I will be taking the Death Grip to Texas for Trophy Whitetails just over a month from now! When the buck of my lifetime steps out it helps to steady that overwhelming adrenaline surge, I hope the BOG Death Grip will be there! 

In practice, for setting up my crossbow, I find it an essential tool to sight-in my broadheads out to 40 yards.

On high dollar hunts, especially,  it is an essential tool for shots of a lifetime!

I am a BOG Death Grip believer. 

Good Hunting!

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Flat Nose and Round Nose Bullets for Big Game

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Today’s bullet sales and profit seems to cater to where the bullet volume is. Specifically, sales cater to the long range crowd, shooting very low drag bullets and to the big game long range crowd. Long range in this case is beyond 200 yards which is a common sense limit for round nose ammo. Yes, I am one of those guys who likes to play with long range stuff but what about a hunter who owns rifles of odd calibers and/or those hunters who invariably do not hunt long range such as the deer hunters of my state of New Hampshire. These hunters often harvest deer in the woods at 40 to 60 yards on average with bullets that are of long range design.

And finally to those who believe, like  me, that a well placed round or flat nose or semi-spitzer bullet will drop game faster than a fully pointed spitzer would because more energy is delivered to the animal given that the range to the game animal needs to be relatively short, say 100 yards or less. Of course energy, frontal area of the bullet, and sectional density play a part.

The tug of a bullet entering game hide is, for all practical purposes, crushingly more powerful for a round or flat nose bullet than for a pencil pointed bullet which pokes a hole in the hide. In fact, you can often hear the slap (surface shock) of a flat or round nose which often instantly drops the game and highly recommended for dangerous game. I shot a red doe with a .375 dia flat nose bullet traveling at 1500 fps and she went 20 yards. Similar to the .375 Winchester or 38-55.. That speed is too slow for a spitzer to even open up and mushroom. Spitzers often need at least 1800fps to mushroom adequately. Semi- spitzers mushroom faster as they are more rounded.

Of course there are pro’s and con’s.

I have harvested deer with spitzers which mushroom ideally and have harvested with round and flat nose as well. Both work! My limited experience is that game seems to drop more often, on the spot, with round or flat nose than with spitzers give that it is short range. On long range I trust Nosler AccuBonds and E-Tips. Round nose and flat nose bullets are still out there. Hornady, Barnes, Speer and Sierra  makes them too.

My Texas buck in 2018 was taken with a muzzleloader and semi-spitzer tip and a flat hollow point design under the tip. He never took a step. Of course 150 grains of powder and a 300 grain bullet dropped him right there because of the huge energy delivered and frontal surface area.

My brother loves his 444 Marlin lever action with 240 grain flat points for New Hampshire thick stuff. Otherwise he likes his 300 win mag that does it all. I like the .375 Ruger for hunting everything because I handload. Of course, if it is a rifle, I love them all and of nearly every caliber.

Great campfire fodder!

© Copyright 2020

 

 

Muzzleloading Deer in New Hampshire is a Real Leg Up on Rifle Season

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I have always believed that if you hunt muzzleloader season in New Hampshire, then you have a leg up on the rifle season, and a best chance to get a shot at a big buck, or any deer for that  matter.

Deer that are shot at, don’t hang around, or at least in daylight hours.

That said; muzzleloading is your best chance at hunting game which has not been spooked. 

But there is more.

In Line Muzzleloading rifles are easy to purchase, very cost effective, and super accurate.

But don’t wait till the last minute to get your muzzleloader gear.

In the week prior to the season which begins in my Zone M  on October 31, everybody is out shopping and finding few bullets they liked, powder that was out of stock. And they are sometimes mad that there was none left! Who is to blame for that!

WORD TO THE WISE

Be  super ready now, shoot your muzzleloader and get all your gear now while it is in stock! 

Stay clean, scout ahead, keep your hunt clothes away from odors that cling, and watch that wind.

Luck is where preparation meets opportunity!

Good Hunting!

 

My Labrador Retriever Puppy for Hunting and Family

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There are many outdoor friendships we have and my best hunting friend is my dog. We have had several dogs over the years. Our newest is a female Labrador Retriever we named Bella.

Bella is going to be my hunting dog (ducks for sure) and family dog for my wife and I. We got her from an purebred breeder at the age of 10 weeks old. She is now just over 12 weeks and growing like a weed on “Miracle Grow”. She chews on everything and especially likes my leather shoes. She is heavy into the investigative phase sticking her nose into everything and eating what I can’t get out of her mouth when outside. All that said, she is very loving and loves to have her belly rubbed. She is growing so fast in fact that i must increase my education and her training now! Accordingly I have a few dog hunting books now and ordered DVD’s and some dog training supplies which I will discuss later. The most important thing is to love  Bella and get me up to speed in the training department. More to come…

Good Hunting!

© 2020

Campfire Peach Cobbler in a Dutch Oven on Labor Day Weekend

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I wrote an article a while back about having Peach Cobbler while Trophy Hunting Whitetails in Texas. See below.

Campfire Peach Cobbler in a Cast Iron Dutch Oven

You know, I enjoyed that dessert so much using a camp fire cast iron Dutch oven that I bought my own and used it yesterday Labor Day Sunday! I did not use charcoal briquettes, I used wood coals from the campfire that had just cooked a bunch of lobsters. See image below.

Open the lid and here is the Peach Cobbler! It was OMG delicious and with a  dollop

of vanilla Ice Cream was sooo good!

It was a Labor Day Special Dessert! Not a crumb or peach was left. Note that I had purchased aluminum tray inserts for the oven. Easy cleanup!

Good Camping!

© Copyright 2020 All Rights Reserved.

 

The .375 Ruger Makes Me Smile; Talking with Larry Weishuhn…

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In 2018, my readers knew I was hunting Texas at Wildlife Systems, Rocky Creek with Larry Weishuhn (Mr. Whitetail). Larry invariably had a friendly smile and soft Texas drawl. Photo below Larry’s buck antlers for rattling made my NH antlers look small!

I mentioned to Larry that I left my Ruger M77 Hawkeye Africa rifle in .375 Ruger home. Larry pipes right up, “shot a number of deer with my .375 Ruger, you should have brought it”!  Love that cartridge! Me too, “I’m thinkin” Now (November 2020)  I am taking the .375 Ruger back for a Trophy Deer Hunt to Texas — lots of land to self distance!

I recently sent an email to Larry:

Hi Larry,

You and I have championed the 375 Ruger for years certainly for me since 2012/2013. I have written dozens of articles on the .375 Ruger as part of my Ruger M77 Hawkeye African Rifle.

Here are just a few of my articles. I shot hand loaded 260g Nosler AB’s at 600 yards prone “High Power Practice” full power and my groups were 3 ½ inches at 600 yds and 3/8th inch 3 shot at 100 yards. As a handloader “the .375 Ruger makes me smile”. Sounds like the title of a new article!!

https://www.nhrifleman.com/hand-loading-the-375-ruger-for-deer-bear-moose-and-cape-buffalo/

https://www.nhrifleman.com/the-375-ruger-cartridge-a-handloaders-dream-cartridge/

https://www.nhrifleman.com/reloading-the-375-ruger-changed-me-by-ed-hale/

https://www.nhrifleman.com/best-deer-bear-moose-bison-cartridge-for-handloaders-with-375-ruger-in-a-ruger-m77-hawkeye/

https://www.nhrifleman.com/the-375-ruger-enough-cartridge-and-accurate/

https://www.nhrifleman.com/ruger-375-buffs-cant-get-enough/

 

Robert Ruark always said; USE ENOUGH GUN and the .375 Ruger does that splendidly.  I am taking my .375 Ruger to Rocky Creek in November.

AND LARRY E-MAILS BACK

Ed,
THANK YOU SIR… Great articles!
Perfect choice for Rocky Creek! In my opinion!

I’ve taken elephant, hippo, several African and Australian buffalo, African lion, and plains game on down to blue duiker; in Europe
roe deer, fallow, red stag, mouflon, ibex; in North America a near 11 foot brown bear down to whitetails.. Still my one most favorite round with which to hunt the world. Have shot it out to 700 yards.

I do like your new title!

All the BEST,
Larry

*********

 Larry notes that he uses factory Hornady Ammo for all his hunts.

I on the other hand have almost never hunted game with a factory load of  any caliber and derive great satisfaction from hand-loading my own rounds customized to each rifle. 

Each to his own, right. Larry is a good friend and a world class sportsman!

You can find Larry on Facebook https://www.facebook.com/larryweishuhnoutdoors/

Happy Birthday Larry!

Perhaps I got that reloading bug from Jim Carmichael of “Outdoor Life” Fame. I recall that Jim had a 458 slug taken from a bull elephant that he harvested and said that it was in such great shape that he could hand-load it again. Jim was a great shot and at the time reloaded for his bench rest competition, as I recall. Being of an engineering mindset hand loading is a great hobby!

Just yesterday I loaded up some more .375 Ruger rounds with SR 4759 (now out of manufacture) with an additional grain of powder with Speer’s 235 grain Hot Core Bullet made famous by Vernon Speer. Molten lead poured hot with the copper jacket is near enough to bonded in my book. I achieved around 2200 fps, my secret deer load goal and shot a 3 shot one inch group at 100 yards. Why 2200 fps? Because, I believed that out to 150 yards I would still get decent mushrooming and delivered energy with this reduced load in a semi-spitzer and still have hit that big buck with the .375 diameter “Hammer of Thor”!  Yet the recoil was just a bit less than a full power 30-06 shooting 180 grain ammo. 

It is interesting to note for the technical folks out there that in 2005 Chuck Hawkes, the owner/managing editor of Guns & Shooting Online  first published his formula called Killing Power Score or KPS where the frontal bullet area (.1104 for the .375 vs .0745 for a .308) was instrumental in the calculation along with BC and bullet speed. The .375 has more frontal area and thus if you can control speed and BC you can customize your so called “Hammer”. 

Below is a big bull moose with a smaller rack that I whacked with a 300 grain Nosler AB with a load of RL-15, the bull dropped in 2 steps at the shot. The wind was blowing up to 30 mph and the thermometer was in the teens. With Wind Chill being well below zero I was happy to have this bull in my Leupold VX-6 crosshairs.

800 pound Newfoundland Moose October 2019

First reduced load harvest was fat Red Deer with Hornady’s now defunct 220 grain FP traveling around 1500 fps. At 30 yards I got full penetration and the deer fell dead with a heart shot.

Below is my New Hampshire bull taken with the .375 Ruger and 260 grain heads. My partner followed up with his .308 Winchester. 

Below is an 800 pound Bison, a one shot kill with the .375 Ruger and 260 g Nosler AB. The bull was moving fast at 100 yards but felt confident at the shot. He fell dead as a door-nail entering a rear rib and up thru the heart and lungs, broke the far shoulder and kept going. We were lucky as all get-out to have a skidder nearby to load in the truck.

The .375 Ruger, Larry and I agree is one cartridge for the World!

Good Hunting!

© 2020