Fifty three years ago, my new bride (hell...my only bride!), gave me a Sako Forester in .308 for our first Christmas. What a gift, blued steel and dark walnut...I knew I'd won the girl of my dreams....
I have literally lost count of the ground squirrels (with M1 Carbine 110 gr bullets), badgers (Speer 130 gr HPs), skunks (4 of them with 150 gr cast bullets), woodchucks-lost count (125 gr Sierra's IIRC), mule and whitetail deer (way over 50 now as the old gun is my loaner..usually with 150 Sierra's or Hornady's), and 3 elk (Speer 180 Mag Tips IIRC).
I glass bedded the old beast early on & it's still good for ~ 1MOA out to 300 yds off a rest. It has generally been scoped with a Leupold 2-7x in their version of "Sako" mounts, of one sort or another. I hunted Colorado, Idaho, Washington and Texas, back when I had legs, lungs and eyes, with it set to 4x...but coming east, I now use 2.5 for the broader field of view.
Over the years, it's done it all for me, as well as my sons, and a half dozen close friends. Over a round of Single Batch Woodford in a recent deer camp, the laughing lot of malcontents were fantasizing about my demise...and arguing who'd be in "THE WILL", for that old Sako. Truth be told, I'm still accepting suggestions, taking only those that include a BIG bottle of Single Batch Woodford as serious recommendations but hoping to pick a winner with a bottle of "Pappy".
So...one rifle...
to do it all...from now until the Fat Lady Sings...it'd have to be that .308 Sako....And below; here's the Sako & here's our summertime ramblin' rig with the Tetons in the background. The trailer is an R-pod, weighs 3200 lbs fully loaded, and tows with a Jeep Grand Cherokee with their 5.7 hemi doing the work. Mileage is ~ 14 mpg. We do a 5 week tour every summer.
YMMv but
you'd be wrong...Rod