now back in about about 1990-94 my cousin Howard who hunts with me on occasion, found a winchester feather weight bolt action in caliber 270 win for sale at some store in his home area (TAMPA) and purchased it, he was convinced it was a great rifle and it matched his needs, well...until he took it to the local range and shot a few groups.. the problem was it barely shot 3" groups at 100 yards off the bench out of the box, We cleaned the bore and re-bedded the action with an epoxy kit from brownells
http://garage.grumpysperformance.com/index.php?threads/bedding-a-rifle-action.1695/#post-4143
this BETTER ACTION BEDDING and BORE CLEANING, resulted in a MUCH more accurate rifle , it would now shoot 1" 100 yard groups off the bench at 100 yards with my favorite load for the 270 win, which was a 215 fed primer, a speer 150 grain bullet and 57 grains of H4831 seating the bullet out to the longest length that the magazine allowed
http://www.midsouthshooterssupply.c...50-Grain-Hot-Cor-Spitzer-Soft-Point-100-Count
http://www.handloads.com/loaddata/default.asp?Caliber=270 Winchester&Weight=All&type=Rifle
this resulted in both a fairly accurate rifle and a rifle that was several lbs lighter in weight than my 340 wby, which in HOWARDS mind was a huge advantage, along with the very reduced recoil and cheaper ammo, of course!
It was with this rifle and a Leopold 4x scope, that was also found a a good price at a local gun show, was the combo that Howard used on one of his first mule deer & elk combo hunts, now Howard also owns a 30/06 but he was determined to get his 270 win to take a deer that year.
we drove out the the same area near GRIZZLY creek that we hunted most years and found an area the previous year that had a long area on one slope that was free of any vegetation as it was an area where a old rock slide covered at least 1/4 mile of the canyon wall, the area was mostly open with clumps of aspen,SIMILAR TO THIS PICTURE,
but the area had more aspen and was quite a bit steeper grade
elk country generally requires you cover and glass a great deal of area, to locate your target, and unlike white tail deer, your chances of sitting in a tree stand in the correct time frame, at the correct place is far less likely.
simply because most elk range over many miles of range not hundreds of yards and they may take weeks, or months to travel back through one specific drainage or stand of timber.
use topo maps to locate potential natural choke points, logging road access and camp sites.
being in good physical condition is almost mandatory, most of us think we are but if your not familiar with hunting at 5000-10000 ft altitude you might be rather surprised at the difference, it makes.
bring a good set of binoculars and good comfortable boots with good grip tread soles.
have a decent pack, temps can change from below freezing to 70F in a days time, having a GPS helps
drink plenty of liquids and have a few aspirin, or aleve and excedrin etc. , youll need them
bringing a side arm is generally not mandatory, but you might prefer to pack out elk meat, once you have dropped one elk, , with a side arm vs a rifle as a 60-80 lb pack is plenty to manage while packing out of steep canyons
thus a good rifle shot could cover any game crossing the open area by positioning himself about 1/3rd of the way along one edge of the clear area while remaining in cover while sitting in the adjacent aspen. Howard sat there for 2 full days watching the area, (the first two days Frank sat near him, but on the third day Frank hunted else ware) Howard had spent each evening telling us about and relating the frustration of seeing all the mule deer does and cow elk he saw every day, too us, after returning too camp at dusk, but for the first two of three days he saw no really shoot-able mule deer.
on the third day at about 8 am he had just arrived at his favorite location a few minutes earlier as the walk in took over an hour, and really had not expected to see much as he had just got seated when a nice legal 4x4 buck started to cross the debris field at less than 180 yards below his location, he was so excited he said he barely got the cross hairs to steady when he squeezed off a shot....... now we had sighted the rifle in to hit 3.5" high at 100 yards and as a result the rifle was going to hit close to the point of aim out to at least 300 yards, but Howard felt he had to compensate for the high impact point he had at 100 yards that was set when he sighted in, so he held low, which is basically negating the whole concept, he should have held center chest behind the front leg. the deer acted as if it was untouched and sprinted back toward the area it came from, he got up and walked over too the area he thought the deer was when he shot, not expecting much , as he had mostly convinced himself he had missed, but found a substantial blood trail.... (the bullet impacted about 3" back and 1" " up from the lower edge of the chest passing just under the heart.) and following that blood trail into the trees, for about 70 yards into the conifers resulted in finding his very dead deer! (a mortal wound but hardly instantly deadly) the speer 150 grain, bullet had barely started to expand before it exited the far side of the deer.
there was not a thing wrong with the rifle or ammo, just the shot placement was a bit less than ideal.(experience would easily improve that over time)
yes a valuable lesson, too show that you can,t depend on appearances when you shoot a deer or elk they can be mortally hit and give little or no outward visual indication they are even hit, the bullet impact was about where the green dot is on the picture below. and yeah! thats why I generally suggest hunting with a partner because once the deers down moving and dressing it out and packing out the venison's a MULTI PERSON JOB IN THE COLORADO MOUNTAINS
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