What was your most difficult shot?

[steve white]

This could involve range, speed, surprise, danger, or even the difficulty seeing kudu in the thick spekboom brush of the eastern cape. You tell us what you had to deal with or overcome. Hopefully we can all learn something and up the skills in our hunting toolbox.

 

[Tundra Tiger]

Not Africa, and not a firearm...

In 2009 I went back to visit family in Kansas, over Christmas. I bought a NR archery deer tag. As luck would have it I picked up swine flu right before getting there. I was feverish and miserable the whole trip. Did that keep me from hunting? Nooooo.....

Long story short, on my last morning I was hiking out, after pulling my stand. I had seen a couple of does go into a tangle of plum thickets around several cottonwoods a half mile from my stand. The wind was in my favor so on the way out I angled towards the tangle, without knowing if they were still there.

They were. They started to come out as I approached, unawareof me. I dropped to my knees. I brought my bow up and drew, ready in case a shot was offered. I had to lean back to avoid brush between us. And that was when the stand-off started.

They spotted me but didn't spook. I didn't have a shot. They were as still as statues, staring holes in me. I managed to let off without spooking them but was still on my knees and still leaning back. They had me pinned down like that for over 10 minutes.

Eventually they turned to go back into the tangle. Ignoring the blinding pain in my knees and back, I drew and shot at the closest, dropping an arrow into her boiler room. She dropped in sight. The distance was right at 50 yards, and I still had a slight fever.

Not sure there was a lesson to learn from this other than sometimes it's better to be lucky, and persistence pays.

 

[Tgood1]

Absinthe. Definitely a shot of Absinthe

 

[R eight]

That’s a difficult question to answer….but I guess my last moose hunt. First two hunts in Alaska hadn’t produced a legal bull. So, I was on my third hunt chasing a moose in BC. I’d only seen a solitary bull winkle in a week. 3 days until the hunt was over we bumped a decent bull. He was running. Two shots at between 100 and 140 meters and he was down. At the first shot he showed no sign of being hit and I assumed a tree may have copped the bullet. Second shot he dropped. During the recovery we found 2 bullet wounds, both wounds would have been fatal.

I probably would’ve have taken the shot under normal circumstances. But I knew this was my last moose hunt.

I’d always been told that moose are easy to hunt and that the only hard part was the carry out. I was also told that I’d probably be shooting a stationary animal in close. But it wasn’t to be and I’m pretty happy about that.

Oh yeah….they were correct about the carry out.

Shots were taken off hand, after a short jog, with my R8 in 30/06.

 

[HankBuck]

This could involve range, speed, surprise, danger, or even the difficulty seeing kudu in the thick spekboom brush of the eastern cape. You tell us what you had to deal with or overcome. Hopefully we can all learn something and up the skills in our hunting toolbox.

@steve white - my most difficult shot involves ANY Animal I “really want” - nothing to do with distance, angle, time allowed to settle in and get the shot off….NO, it’s all about “How much do I WANT that animal”? And also, how much time do I have to think about it? If a GREAT buck or bull Elk just “steps out” - no time to get all ramped up…just “shoot” - I have no problems. However, if I see that big rack, walking thru trees, slowly coming in, barely presenting a shot or a poor angle and I MUST WAIT — that becomes a difficult shot. Seeing a “nice” whitetail Buck at 200 yrds - easy to stay calm, hold steady, squeeze…like shooting a ‘target’. But for a whitetail Buck “Bigger then anything I’ve ever taken” = WOW, heart starts pounding, desire to just-shoot-now before he gets away etc.. And that makes the shot difficult - For ME. I must concentrate, get cross hairs steady, don’t rush, and slowly “squeeze” that trigger. When I was younger, Buck fever caused me to miss 2 bucks and make a poor shot on a 3rd and they were just a spike & 5 pointer —- but they were the BEST bucks I’d ever seen at the time and I got excited. Now, I’m calmer at most shots and even with the bigger animals I can Hold-it-together and make a good shot, really took some discipline. However, if I ever see the next World Record Whitetail at 75 yrds — I wouldn’t bet my House that I’ll hit it !!

 

[BeeMaa]

Probably not what you had in mind...

Asking my girlfriend to marry me. The thoughts of rejection were crippling. 30 years of marriage later it turns out to be the best "shot" I ever took, even if it was tough at the time.

 

[grand veneur]

I think it was to shoot this deer. The story goes back more than 30 years in the north of the Mongolia. We spotted the Elk on a ridge at nightfall, very good stand in the moonlight but quite far away. There was not much time to approach it and I had to decide quickly whether to shoot or not. I did not have a rangefinder with me so I had to estimate the distance using the reticle of my scope and taking the size of the game into account. I estimated the distance to be 400 yards and, taking into account the external ballistics of a 19g TUG bullet from a 9,3x64 Brenneke cartridge, I aimed and shot about 20 inches over the shoulder of the deer. Hit and the deer rolled down the slope, but at first we did not know which side of the ridge because of to the dusk. We found it dead after a short time. Perfect shot placement in the heart area. I was very lucky, things could have turned out very differently.

The technic used is surely familiar to some of you. It comes from a time when rangefinders were not yet readily available. The problem is to know the size of the game well. It only works, regardless of the magnification, with European scopes. I had a reticle Nr.1 in my scope.

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[Hunter-Habib]

My third & final man eating Royal Bengal tiger, April 1989. I shot him from a department speed boat with my iron sighted 7x57mm Mauser E.J Churchill Gun Makers Model Deluxe. Broadside lung shot with Winchester Super X 175Gr soft point from 75-80 yards. He succumbed to his wound an entire day later.

I still don’t know how I made that shot. The man eater had seen us and gotten alerted. He was just about to turn and make off into the thickets, when I saw his exposed broadside and made a desperate shot at his shoulder.

 

[Rare Breed]

This could involve range, speed, surprise, danger, or even the difficulty seeing kudu in the thick spekboom brush of the eastern cape. You tell us what you had to deal with or overcome. Hopefully we can all learn something and up the skills in our hunting toolbox.

For me it was last year shooting my 400 J at the distance I had practiced on my farm at 300 yards. I had to trust my holdover and trust my practice. I never would have taken a shot at that distance with that caliber unless I had done the practice work knowing exactly what that gun would do at that distance. My point is I never thought I would have this distant shot in Africa with this caliber but I did. On all my previous PG hunt lower calibers taken.

 

[Rare Breed]

404 Jeffery not 400 J

 

[fourfive8]

Most difficult shot? Is that the shot you knew you shouldn’t have taken but got lucky on? Or the shot you knew you shouldn’t have taken, did anyway and muffed it?

6x6 bull elk 90 yards- also my largest elk. A long time ago. 54 cal Kit Carson Hawken replica round ball BP cap lock, open sights. Gun I built using H&H barrel and Dewey lock and trigger. Elk quartering toward standing. Shot placement had to be perfect at seam between neck and shoulder. Prone, rifle rested on low branch of small tree. One shot no second chance. Reflecting back… some chance of failure and lost cripple so shouldn’t have taken shot…. hindsight is always 20:20. Fired, huge smoke screen in still air, bull crashed through brush heading laterally to the right. Tracked digging hoof tracks (no blood) 100 yards to find bull dead, piled head long into a tree.

Coyote running full speed angling away, 270 Win M70, 130 grain normal deer load. Lead a few body lengths at 490 yards, squeeze trigger watch coyote roll/flop to stop in cloud of dust. Did it twice, nearly identical specifics and with a witness both times a couple years apart. Difficult… I guess! But the reality is nearly 100 % luck dependent.

 

[Ontario Hunter]

In Africa on my second safari I made a couple of very long shots (370 and 440 yards) with my PH's 270 WSM wearing a tactical scope worth as much as a good used truck. But that was the equipment. I didn't think either shot was particularly difficult. I once tracked a bull moose into a big alder thicket and shot him asleep in his bed at less than twenty yards just before dark. An incredible stealthy stalk but Helen Keller could have made that shot.

Perhaps the most challenging was not one but three shots. Two years ago I was hunting pheasants in Montana in temps hovering just above zero F and with a steady wind out of the northwest. Too cold for little French Brittany "Puppy" so I left her in the Jimmy and just hunted my black Lab Ellie. We pushed up a few birds but they were jumpy and no shots. After about an hour and a half I had to call it a day. That wind was taking a toll on my face and hands. Not worth it. On days like that a wrenched knee or broken ankle could be fatal. Most of the time I was in cell range but by the time help could come out from town I'd be done for. Time to quit. I was walking the road back to the vehicle and Ellie was trotting along in front fifteen yards or so. The road curved around a brushy ditch and I could barely make out Ellie around the corner locked up on point. I had plenty of time to catch up to her and get ready. Any late season bird that holds that well is probably a hen (not legal). But no! Up jumps three roosters, all squawking. The first shot was quartering away in thick willows. I saw him flutter down and pulled to the one on my left going straight away in the open and crushed it. Third bird was in the wind by then and too far for a shot. Ellie couldn't see the first one drop so she charged off after the second. I pulled the lined buckskin glove from my right hand to reach into my vest pocket for a shell to reload. Just then two more roosters jumped up from the same spot. I dropped the glove and shell and nailed one that fell just off the road to my left. Ellie picked up the first bird and ran to the second. She alternated picking up and dropping them, trying to bring both in at once. I walked to her and helped resolve the dilemma. Put one bird in the vest and let her parade around proudly with the other for a few minutes. We couldn't find the first rooster. He was obviously crippled and too much scent in the area. Went to the Jimmy down the road a half mile, warmed up, had a snack, then let both dogs out and we went back for that rooster. Had to find it! After a half hour or so Puppy finally ran it down and pinned it against a big cottonwood trunk until Ellie could catch up and make the retrieve. That is my only pheasant triple in a lifetime of hunting. Very difficult to achieve because 1) it requires an empty bag [three rooster daily limit]; 2) it requires finding three roosters in the same spot and in those lean years that was a very rare occurrence (during the previous three years of hunting six weeks each season I had filled my daily limit just once); 3) it requires shooting a gun that can actually fire three shots (most aficionados MUST hunt with O/U because shooting uplands with an auto or pump shotgun is ... well ... just plain trashy); and it requires skill shooting moving targets that are hard to knock down and fly erratically, especially in the wind. Oh, and I almost forgot ... it requires a good dog. Add to that the handicap of being more than half frozen, nearly worn out, bundled up in more layers than the Michelin Man, and fighting a brisk wind. That was a very special day.

PS: Lost the fancy black buckskin glove. It should have been right there at my feet with the loaded shell. A wood nymph must have stole it. Wish she'd hung around for a more intimate visit. Sigh! The cap is a Salvation Army Store special. Lost my safari cap a few days earlier. Have no idea who or what TD&H is.

 

[ftrovato]

In Africa on my second safari I made a couple of very long shots (370 and 440 yards) with my PH's 270 WSM wearing a tactical scope worth as much as a good used truck. But that was the equipment. I didn't think either shot was particularly difficult. I once tracked a bull moose into a big alder thicket and shot him asleep in his bed at less than twenty yards just before dark. An incredible stealthy stalk but Helen Keller could have made that shot.

Perhaps the most challenging was not one but three shots. Three years ago I was hunting pheasants in Montana in temps hovering just above zero F and with a steady wind out of the northwest. Too cold for little French Brittany "Puppy" so I left her in the Jimmy and just hunted my black Lab Ellie. We pushed up a few birds but they were jumpy and no shots. After about an hour and a half I had to call it a day. That wind was taking a toll on my face and hands. Not worth it. On days like that a wrenched knee or broken ankle could be fatal. Most of the time I was in cell range but by the time help could come out from town I'd be done for. Time to quit. I was walking the road back to the vehicle and Ellie was trotting along in front fifteen yards or so. The road curved around a brushy ditch and I could barely make out Ellie around the corner locked up on point. I had plenty of time to catch up to her and get ready. Any late season bird that holds that well is probably a hen (not legal). But no! Up jumps three roosters, all squawking. The first shot was quartering away in thick willows. I saw him flutter down and pulled to the one on my left going straight away in the open and crushed it. Third bird was in the wind by then and too far for a shot. Ellie couldn't see the first one drop so she charged off after the second. I pulled the lined buckskin glove from my right hand to reach into my vest pocket for a shell to reload. Just then two more roosters jumped up from the same spot. I dropped the glove and shell and nailed one that fell just off the road to my left. Ellie picked up the first bird and ran to the second. She alternated picking up and dropping them, trying to bring both in at once. I walked to her and helped resolve the dilemma. Put one bird in the vest and let her parade around proudly with the other for a few minutes. We couldn't find the first rooster. He was obviously crippled and too much scent in the area. Went to the Jimmy down the road a half mile, warmed up, had a snack, then let both dogs out and we went back for that rooster. Had to find it! After a half hour or so Puppy finally ran it down and pinned it against a big cottonwood trunk until Ellie could catch up and make the retrieve. That is my only pheasant triple in a lifetime of hunting. Very difficult to achieve because 1) it requires an empty bag [three rooster daily limit]; 2) it requires finding three roosters in the same spot and in those lean years that was a very rare occurrence (during the previous three years of hunting six weeks each season I had filled my daily limit just once); 3) it requires shooting a gun that can actually fire three shots (most aficionados MUST hunt with O/U because shooting uolands with an auto or pump shotgun is ... well ... just plain trashy); and it requires skill shooting moving targets that are hard to knock down and fly erratically, especially in the wind. Oh, and I almost forgot ... it requires a good dog. Add to that the handicap of being more than half frozen, nearly worn out, and fighting the wind. That was a very special day.
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PS: Lost the fancy black buckskin glove. It should have been right there at my feet with the loaded shell. A wood nymph must have stole it. Wish she'd hung around for a more intimate visit. Sigh! The cap is a Salvation Army Store special. Lost my safari cap a few days earlier. Have no idea who or what TD&H is.

Something about pheasant hunting that creates the best of times!