mcb
Member
At the top of this post is supposed to be a nice picture of me with my 450 Bushmaster and a trophy whitetail buck. 
That did not go as planned. I spent the last three days hunting the first three days of Tennessee modern gun season. The weather was great, the company excellent and the hunting good but ultimately I did not take a deer. I had several opportunities but only on small bucks we want to let grow or immature does and the freezer already has a nice doe my nephew took during youth weekend, so Ultimately I did not take a deer. None the less I had an excellent weekend hunting and spending time off the grip and relaxing with family and friends.
Despite not take a deer it was still three days of great hunting. Opening morning I shot a raccoon with the old 450 Bushmaster. Probably not worth much mention other than I recovered the bullet. I hit the raccoon at about 15 yards and it went in the back just below the diaphragm and, not to be too graphic, but everything came out the front. That I did not expect that. The results looked more like I had shot it with a high velocity varmint HP bullet than a slow and heavy 450 bullet. Despite the shot 15 minute after first shooting light I still saw several deer that morning but nothing worth taking. When I got down to inspect my handy work I found that the bullet had left a very visible furrow in the forest floor. A quick brushing away of the leaves and I could easily trace the 2.5-3 feet of the bullets passage through the ground. At the end of the furrow, with a little digging with a stick I found the Barnes TSX 275 gr bullet. I was impressed.
I weighed it at home and it had 100% weight retention. Given the damage done to the raccoon I am pretty sure the bullet had expanded most of the way while still in the raccoon and yet did not loose any mass going through nearly 3 feet of forest floor. All in all I was very impressed with the bullets performance. It did likewise on an armadillo I crossed later that day walking to my afternoon deer stand. Just wish I could see the results on that big 10 pt I have been seeing in the game-camera pics.
The last morning was really windy and so I got down from the deer stand and stalked most of the morning. I had been working a thick edge between the brush on the top edge of the ravine and the more open woods in the ravine and had just sat down behind a big hickory to glass the other side of the ravine and this little spike buck walked up on me. I was wearing a blaze orange baseball cap and a blaze orange camo jacket. He totally could not figure out what I was and kept coming. I very slowly pulled out my phone and was able to use physical buttons to activate the camera and snapped a few still images. Gloves would not let me use screen functions but I used my nose to trigger the video mode. At the point where he finally spooks away I paced off about 15 feet from where I was sitting.
The worst days hunting are still better than a good day in the office.
That did not go as planned. I spent the last three days hunting the first three days of Tennessee modern gun season. The weather was great, the company excellent and the hunting good but ultimately I did not take a deer. I had several opportunities but only on small bucks we want to let grow or immature does and the freezer already has a nice doe my nephew took during youth weekend, so Ultimately I did not take a deer. None the less I had an excellent weekend hunting and spending time off the grip and relaxing with family and friends.
Despite not take a deer it was still three days of great hunting. Opening morning I shot a raccoon with the old 450 Bushmaster. Probably not worth much mention other than I recovered the bullet. I hit the raccoon at about 15 yards and it went in the back just below the diaphragm and, not to be too graphic, but everything came out the front. That I did not expect that. The results looked more like I had shot it with a high velocity varmint HP bullet than a slow and heavy 450 bullet. Despite the shot 15 minute after first shooting light I still saw several deer that morning but nothing worth taking. When I got down to inspect my handy work I found that the bullet had left a very visible furrow in the forest floor. A quick brushing away of the leaves and I could easily trace the 2.5-3 feet of the bullets passage through the ground. At the end of the furrow, with a little digging with a stick I found the Barnes TSX 275 gr bullet. I was impressed.
I weighed it at home and it had 100% weight retention. Given the damage done to the raccoon I am pretty sure the bullet had expanded most of the way while still in the raccoon and yet did not loose any mass going through nearly 3 feet of forest floor. All in all I was very impressed with the bullets performance. It did likewise on an armadillo I crossed later that day walking to my afternoon deer stand. Just wish I could see the results on that big 10 pt I have been seeing in the game-camera pics.
The last morning was really windy and so I got down from the deer stand and stalked most of the morning. I had been working a thick edge between the brush on the top edge of the ravine and the more open woods in the ravine and had just sat down behind a big hickory to glass the other side of the ravine and this little spike buck walked up on me. I was wearing a blaze orange baseball cap and a blaze orange camo jacket. He totally could not figure out what I was and kept coming. I very slowly pulled out my phone and was able to use physical buttons to activate the camera and snapped a few still images. Gloves would not let me use screen functions but I used my nose to trigger the video mode. At the point where he finally spooks away I paced off about 15 feet from where I was sitting.
The worst days hunting are still better than a good day in the office.
Last edited:
