First animal taken with my .375 H&H

[Albert GRANT]

I'm going to start this out with my reasons for taking this buck, before I get crap for the size of it. First is I live in Maine, and in an area where you can hunt all 30ish days of the season and only see one deer. Next is that I have both boys hunting this year, with the youngest for the first time. Also my wife was just last night worrying about the moose meat running out over the winter. Last I wanted to be able to recover the bullet from the new load I'm using with peregrine bullets and this guy just stood head on looking at me like a dummy. Took much coming together to pass up on.

So now the interesting part. I used my .375 H&H with a reduced load of about 2000 fps. Bullet was the peregrine plainsmaster in 230gr. The range I hit the deer at the speed had dropped to somewhere between 1600-1900fps, which is the lower range of expected expansion. The bullet did still expand, not a huge mushroom, but obviously enough to get the job done. As stated it was head on- going through the neck, chest cavity, guts and hind quarter, resting under the skin at the tail end for over 3ft of penetration at this reduced speed! I even found the brass tip in the stomach, which means that pushed through for 2ft of penetration. Accuracy was the same as the match bullets and had identical point of impact. Pretty sure these will be the only bullets I shoot out of this gun- reduced or full house load

 

[Clayton]

You hunt, shoot, and reload as good as you are at Horse Trading! Congrats Albert.

 

[375 Ruger Fan]

Cool! The venison should be tender from that youngster.

 

[Ridgewalker]

Performance looks perfect to me! Congratulations on your first game taken with your 375 H&H!

 

[PHOENIX PHIL]

I smell venison brats on the grill!

 

[peras]

Congratulations on blooding the .375

 

[BRICKBURN]

Damn, you had to do some searching to find that bullet tip.
Not every shot will be at a Booner.
Congrats on your bullet testing.

 

[Albert GRANT]

Actually got really lucky. Bullet split the stomach and made a huge mess, I was just pulling some of it out and noticed something shiny- turned out to be the tip

 

[BRICKBURN]

Incredible. What a mess. You wanted to recover the bullet so you paid for it

 

[siml]

Great on your first 375 kill and impressive bullet preformance. Not always about size.

 

[Art Lambart II]

You can't eat horns, well done on the bullet testing.

 

[petrusg]

Congrats, for a reduced load that Peregrine seemed to preform just fine! When you come back to Africa you should load them up a bit for a buffalo and then you'll be amazed by the performance!

 

[Albert GRANT]

Congrats, for a reduced load that Peregrine seemed to preform just fine! When you come back to Africa you should load them up a bit for a buffalo and then you'll be amazed by the performance!

I don't know if I can afford buffalo but it is def my plan to load them hot and bring it. Reduced loads were just to get used to the gun and mostly to not blow up these whitetails!

 

[BRICKBURN]

I don't know if I can afford buffalo but it is def my plan to load them hot and bring it. Reduced loads were just to get used to the gun and mostly to not blow up these whitetails!

Broadside shots and neck shots are the only way to really pull that one off.

Loaning my 375 to a friend for his Moose hunt next week. Somehow he feels more confident than carrying the 270 in thick brush.

 

[Albert GRANT]

Broadside shots and neck shots are the only way to really pull that one off.

Loaning my 375 to a friend for his Moose hunt next week. Somehow he feels more confident than carrying the 270 in thick brush.

Actually even though it went end to end and split the stomach in the process, the damage wasn't that bad with this load. There is only about a 2in area around the bullet path in the hind quarter that is messed up. When I used a 7 mag I pretty much knew both shoulders were going to be junk. Had I shot this broadside, I'm betting there would have been less damage than that

 

[BRICKBURN]

At home I always shoot behind the shoulders with everything. Couple idea a damaged and all the meat is edible.
You can blow up meat with any caliber if you shoot them badly

 

[Albert GRANT]

At home I always shoot behind the shoulders with everything. Couple idea a damaged and all the meat is edible.
You can blow up meat with any caliber if you shoot them badly

I agree. However all my shots with the 7 mag were behind the shoulder, always a complete pass-through and the ribs all the way up through both shoulders would be black blood clots- very little meat salvaged out of most front quarters. If I put this .375 load through the shoulders, I'm sure both would still be junk, however put it behind them and I'm guessing most of the meat would be ok. Now if I loaded these things hot to 3000 fps I'm sure it would be as bad if not worse than the 7mag.

 

[BRICKBURN]

I'll have to test the theory this year and we can compare notes. Although we use different bullets

 

[gizmo]

You can't eat horns, well done on the bullet testing.

Yip I've boiled the hell outta those things and still can get them palatable.

 

[Clayton]

Yip I've boiled the hell outta those things and still can get them palatable.

You're making glue instead of gravy!