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Well, it is not only turkey season up here, it is also fishing season. I figured I would go out and get a mess of brook trout to eat at one of my old holes. Fishing is just good for the Soul. God Bless.

To say it's been a rough week with the turkey hunting over here in my parts would be an understatement!
Turkey were non responsive to calls right from day one and would just not leave the hens to save their lives.
I literally could not get these turkeys to give up their roost either.
I spent a lot of time, spotting, stalking, going to where I thought they might end up, etc..
Then last night I caught them across the road and actually watched them roost from my driveway. My "hopes" were to get close enough and maybe they would fly down by the decoys and I could get a pop at one.
I set up about 60 yards from where I figured the tom's roosted. It was not long after getting against the tree they sounded off and I was not all that far from them.
I heard at least two fly down, but it sounded like they headed to the other side of the woods and the field in the back.
I sat tight until 5:30, then I got up and took a good look down the field edge and the flock was about 150 yards from me.
So I sat back down and just figured I had nothing better to do and I would wait and see if they made their way down to me.
About 20 min later, this guy broke off and came to check out my decoys.
He was all puffed out and I honestly thought he was the big tom. He got within about 20 yards of my decoys, puffed down, and it looked like he was not buying it.
I pulled up the gun and shot him at about 25 yards.
He is a funny turkey, has the tail of tom, and the body of a jake. The beard is 2", and he weighs in a little under 15lbs.
This is a very young turkey so the tail is very confusing to me. The 4 middle feathers of a jake's tail are longer than all the rest of the feathers, one easy way to identify a jake. But that is not the case here.
So it looks like my string of 20+lb turkeys is now broken! But after the week I have had with these turkeys, I will gladly take what God gives me and be happy with it!

Well, up here in the great state of Maine, they have "caved" and are letting crossbow hunters in on archery season. I actually started bow hunting about 18 years ago. I started doing it because it was in October up here, when it is nice and warm, and, we were also allowed to take a doe without a tag, so it was like having a free doe permit.
The state of Maine has doe permit lottery system for rifle season and doe permits are allocated by zones, some zones are much more populated with deer so one would obviously stand more of a chance to receive a doe permit. For example, there is one zone in Maine where they give out about 12,000 permits, in my zone, they give out 150.
So along with that, and the influence of this forum (there were quite a few bow hunters to talk to back then), I decided to start archery hunting.
It was not long after that and taking some deer and bear with my bow that we had the worst winter we ever had and it roughly killed almost half of our deer herd. With that, they took a lot of doe permits away, and they took does out of bow season all together, so I quit archery hunting. 
As of last year, they started allowing does to be taking during archery season again and it "sparked" my interest to get back out there. As I was reading the laws, I then noticed that they now counted crossbows as "equals" to regular bows and they were allowed all the same rules. As to be expected, this made a lot of archery hunters mad as we all now compound and crossbows really are not the same, especially when you have a bolt all knocked and waiting. And it would put more people in the woods during bow season which archery hunters really did not want.
At first I felt all of that, and as a "bow hunter", I was going to stick with the bow and not be a "sissy".
Then, I borrowed a bow from a friend, went out and shot it, and found out that I really suck at it now. My eyesight has a hard time lining up the peep sight, I seem to have a "should problem" in the hand I draw with, and obviously since i have not shot in awhile, I got tired easy. I also decided to find all this out a week before the season started.
Now, as God would have it, I had a friend who's wife got a moose permit. He bought a savage axis in 6.5 creedmore and wanted me to mount a scope on it and get it sighted in for him. He also had a crossbow that he had never really used and was more than willing to let me try it out.
With as bad as I was with a compound now, I thought, what would it hurt. I had already taken, deer, bear, grouse with a compound, I might as well try it.
I will admit, I was a little nervous at first, I know crossbows are not a toy and one can loose a finger or two awful fast if they do not pay attention. The first bolt I sent at 20 yards was little off so I made the proper adjustments on the scope and got a dead bulls eye at 20 yards. I then proceeded to hit almost dead center at 30, 40, 50, and 60 yards. I was definitely hooked at this point.
As I researched crossbows, it seemed any crossbow shooting at least 400fps was fully capable of taking a deer out to 100 yards. I was simply amazed.
So, I believe for this year, I just may purchase my own. Are there any crossbow hunters on here with experience they may be able to share? God Bless.

So, I was going to Message Paul about a chronograph question, but thought I might get some more opinion on this subject and it is a good forum discussion.
   I have three rounds I need to get chronographed so I pulled out my chronograph last night and proceeded to read the directions on since I have not used it in 10 years. The chronograph in question is an Alpha shooters chrony. 
    Now it seems like I remember reading something years ago that "sunlight" can throw these things off a little since the chronograph reads the changes in light, as the bullet flies over it, to get the velocity.
    I took my middle son out an hour ago because he was highly interested in learning something about this. When we started with his 300 win mag the sun was primarily behind some clouds. the first two shots were pretty close together in velocity and not far off of the quickload prediction.
    When we went to shoot the 3rd shot, the sun came out in full force and all of a sudden the bullet was moving over 100fps faster. This happened with the 4 shot also, in fact it was 150fps faster than the first two.
    I then waited for the sun to back behind a cloud and we took another shot that did not fall from the first two shots.
  So my question is, is it better to chronograph on overcast days without the sun? do some people find it does not matter?

I also realize those extreme deviations in velocity could be my reloading, but there is a fat change of that!

Well, earlier this year I decided to get a caliber I have been wanting for a long time, the 338 Lapua magnum. Thought I might reload for it and try some "long" range shooting with it for fun. I could of definitely done this with my 7mm mag, or even 25-06, but the 338 lapua mag was an "itch" I had to scratch and we will leave it at that.

So, I didn't really want to break the bank on a rifle, so I decided to go with the Savage 110 Long Range Hunter. Also not wanting to spend more on a scope than I did the rifle, I decided to top it off with a Burris Signature HD 5-25x50 scope.

Once the rifle and scope were attained, it was time to get components together, which as you as you all know, is not the easiest thing to do right now. I ran powders on quickload and IMR 7828ssc seemed to be my best choice, followed by Vihatavouri N570. I set alerts on ammo seek and shootingbot.com and N570 became available first, so I ordered 3lbs.

The bullet I chose was the Berger 300gr Elite Hunter. I have used Berger bullets before and really like them, plus they were readily available. I also used Lapua brass and CCi Large rifle magnum primers.

I was going to wait till spring to test this out, but temps were in the 40's the other day, so I got my numbers off of quickload and got them loaded up to test.

I didn't measure all the groups, just the closest one, which was the 85.8 grains. This group came in at .762. All in all, that is not to bad for 20 test rounds.

I will play with this a little in the spring and see if I can tighten them up just for fun. When doing the initial test rounds, I had taken my measurement with my hornady AOL gauge, then remembered that I had a clip for this gun. So instead of starting 20 thousandths of the lands, I just measure the clip  and used that COAL in quickload. I would be interested to see if this tightens up right off the lands, who knows!

I also have room to keep loading hotter as I am 12,000psi from the supposed "max pressure" of the 338 lapua. And, if for some reason, this load does not tighten up any, I am good with .762.

338 by David LeTourneau, on Flickr
338 3 by David LeTourneau, on Flickr

338 2 by David LeTourneau, on Flickr

Well, it has been awhile since I did a range report on here, so I thought I would put this mornings on here.

When I first got into reloading, I had ordered a box of Hornady 162gr BTSP's to get started with my 7mm mag. When I shot factory ammo, this was the bullet I used and everything always died, so I thought I would stay with it.

Not long after they came, Paul told me there was a place selling .284 accubonds as factory seconds for 19.95 a box, so I ordered two. He helped get me started with the reloading process and I ended up with a little over a half inch group with the accubonds, so I stayed with those.

The other day I was looking at these hornady's and they were just burning a hole in my bench, so I thought I would develop a load and use them. Plus they are 38.00 a box for 100 and the noslers are around 52.00 for 50. Figured I would make up a good load and just do more shooting without breaking the bank. Plust Noslers are hard to find right now, although I did score 250 of them for 85.00 about a month ago!
The powder I chose was IMR 4350, which I use in almost all my rifles!

I ran my data through quickload, and here is how the test batches turned out.

Hornady 162gr BTSP by David LeTourneau, on Flickr

Targets two and five have almost the same vertical spread at 1.151. However, I will take target two, 59.2gr's, and tweak it a little a see if we just can't come in under an inch.
I will go down .1gr's (59.1), then down .1gr's from that (59), then up .1grs (59.3, then up .1gr's from that (59.4) and see where those land me. News at 11:00!

So, I am sure everyone has been feeling the crunch for reloading supplies. I was lucky to score 8lbs if IMR 4350 a couple weeks ago at "regular" price from a big retailer.

Last week I got an alert from ammoseek that someone had CCI 250 large rifle mag primers in stock (at regular price), so I got those ordered. I received them today, but I did not recognize the packaging!!

The box was all white with 250 O.E.M. on it. So I was not sure what to think about that, so I gave CCI a holler to find out if these were "legit". Come to find out, they are indeed 250 large rifle magnum primers but they are what they sell to the ammo companies. Probably why they have "not for resale" on them.

Technically, this is not supposed to happen and CCI was pretty interested to find out about them. Seems like someone somewhere has a little "side gig" going!!

primers by David LeTourneau, on Flickr

So, back in Late December I purchased my 14 and 16 year old their own rifles. Not long after that I ordered some optics for those rifles. I decided on Burris Fullfield II's 4.5x14 to put on both rifles.

I had the scopes mounted in January and have just been waiting for the snow to go to try out some test loads. Well, today was the day to do some shooting. I was hoping to get both rifles done, one being my younger sons weatherby vanguard chambered in 30-06 and my other sons Browning AB III chambered in 300 win mag.

I decided to take my youngers sons rifle out first and test out the 30-06 test loads. Now, I did not know if these rifles had been boresighted, so I set up at 25 yards, took out the bolt, lined the bore up with the bullseye, and "tried" to get the crosshairs lined up with the bullseye.

I knew I was in trouble as it was going to take about 70-80 clicks to get those cross hairs on. I maxed out the elevation and decided to try a shot anyways. the crosshairs were probably a good 4  inches over the target at 25 yards, with the elevation maxed out.

I put a shot down range, and I just barely got the top of the target. My best guess would be that I needed at least 50 to 55 more clicks to get on the bulleye.

So feeling a little discouraged, I went in and got the other gun and went through the same routine, this went off without a hitch and was able to do all 5 test batches.

Once everything was put away, I decided to get a hold of burris and let them know of my current situation. It seems to me that the scope may be defective, I have never had another scope do that before and this scope was way off!!

I went through their process and got a message back telling me to use their burris signature rings, as all rifles "can be different". I did not like that reply and I called the number to customer service and the guy had my case up as I was talking to him. He also was selling the burris signature rings telling me that some mounts just don't work with some scopes.

I have used burris rings before, I do like them, BUT, I have already purchased the warren rings and they are mounted on my rifle. I have never had a scope "not work" with a set of rings.

I Personally think that the amount the scope is off is a little excessive. I cannot even get on paper at 25 yards.

Has anyone else ever had something similar happen to them?

My middle son turns 16 next month, which means he is old enough to hunt by himself next year! So, it was time to get him his own rifle and get him set up!
Now I have not bought a rifle in 7 years, so I was not sure what was out there. I thought about a savage axis scoped package, which was cheap, but then I ran across this Browning A-bolt 3 which really caught my eye.

I was looking for something in .308 caliber, initially thinking .308 or 30-06. When I saw this A-bolt-3 chambered in 300 win mag, I thought what the heck, he uses my 375 H&H for his bear gun, so recoil would not be a problem.

I bought it online then went and picked it up at the dealers house the next day, which was a 20 min ride!! I was very impressed with this guy and I will be buying again.

once I had the gun, I shopped for a scope and ended up getting this Burris Fullfield II 4.5x14x40. I had no idea Nikon stopped making scopes, and I was not paying for a Leupold, so this Burris was it. Plus I have owned a Fullfield II years ago and liked it.

I was able to order the bullets, brass, and dies, and have powder and primers already on hand!! My son asked to be a part of the reloading process and that made my day. we will start the test rounds up this winter, and test them in the spring.
All in all, I got one happy boy!! God Bless.

ab3 2 by David LeTourneau, on Flickr

ab3 3 by David LeTourneau, on Flickr

ab3 1 by David LeTourneau, on Flickr

garett scope 2 by David LeTourneau, on Flickr

garett scope 1 by David LeTourneau, on Flickr

has anyone ever used Prvi Partizan Brass? If so, what do you think of it? God Bless.

would anyone on here happen to have 50-100 300 winchester magnum brass they would be willing to part with? God Bless.

So it has been a long haul for my middle son this hunting season. He drew a doe permit and I wanted to get him out as much as I could so he could fill it.
Pretty much, this has been after school on Thursday's and Friday's, on my days off. The first week it was just Thursday, which was not bad because we did not hit the time change yet, so we had 2.5 hours.
After the time change, we only had about an hour and a half on each night, which is tough.
The first night out we saw two does on posted property. The second time out we didn't see anything. The third time out he got a hard shot at a buck that was over 200 yards away and almost back to us. The fourth time out we saw 3 deer, one was this big girl. He got a shot but there was a ton of fog and again right around 200 yards, no dice.
The 5th time out, he got a chance to redeem himself at this big girl again. We first saw her over 300 yards away. we managed to creep in and cut off 100 yards on the shot. We set up the steady styx and the rest is history.
This doe weighed in at 165lbs dressed, pretty impressive. I did not think she weighed that much but I knew she was heavy.
The gun in question was my Remington 700 XCR RMEF 7mm mag loaded up with 160gr Nosler Accubonds.
I have one happy kid now and some more meat for the freezer....God is good.

garett deer by David LeTourneau, on Flickr

garett deer 2 by David LeTourneau, on Flickr

Well, bear season kicked off here in Maine at the end of August. Here we are allowed to take one with rifle and one by trapping. I managed to use my rifle tag a couple weeks ago a small black bear. It has been a funny season, I started off with 5 bear then when the natural food became more available, they all but disappeared. I did have one young one coming and had hopes of my youngest son getting his first bear, but it did not work out. So I ended up shooting it later on.

Right about the end of baiting season, I got pictures of this big boy and I immediately got out my snare and set it up the first opportunity I had. When I went in the next morning, this is what I had.

Long story short, this bear weighed in at 400lbs dressed!! It is an absolute monster. I really did not know what I had until we tried to put it on the truck!! I literally could not be happier, it is a bear of a lifetime.

Wanted to share with you guys since you seemed to like the bear pictures when I used to post. I also want Paul Hoskins to get a look at this monster as I am sure he has seen them just as big!! God Bless.

400lb 5 by David LeTourneau, on Flickr

400lb 3 crop by David LeTourneau, on Flickr

400lb 2 by David LeTourneau, on Flickr

400lb 1 by David LeTourneau, on Flickr

So, this last Saturday was youth turkey day in Maine. I only have two kids that can participate in this day now, and for my middle boy, it is his last turkey hunt as a youth.
Now, luckily, I have a neighbor down the road with land that holds turkeys. There really is not a huge population of turkey here in Presque Isle, but there is a flock on my road.

I was able to find out where they roosted the night before because they crossed the road about 200 yards from my house that night at the exact time I went to pick my middle kid up from tennis.

We were up at O'dark thirty and in the blind as soon as possible. I was able to bring in a jake for my youngest boy that morning. Then in the afternoon, I played cat and mouse with a nice tom for about 45 minutes before he finally came in for a shot and my middle son closed the deal.

My youngest's jake weighed in at 15lbs and my middle boy's tom weighed in at 20lbs with an 8" beard, almost identical to his bird last year!!

Both boys were happy, and so was dad! God bless.

Gavin turkey 2021 2 by David LeTourneau, on Flickr

Gavin turkey 2021 1 by David LeTourneau, on Flickr

garett turkey 2 by David LeTourneau, on Flickr

garett turkey 3 by David LeTourneau, on Flickr

You never know what you will see out your living room window!
I have to work 4- midnight tonight, so I try to sleep in later on these mornings. I made it till 8:00 and had to get up. I went into the kitchen and got some coffee going, then went to the living room window to take a look in the back field as I always do.
Noticed a deer nipping on a spruce tree about 150 yards away. Pulled out the binos and noticed it actually had horns.
I loaded up the gun and took one more good look since my scope is 10x. Yep, he had horns. Put the cross hairs on him and a doe came out and stood right in front of him. Waited for her to move and let the 7mm mag ring.
After the shot, the little fellow headed into the woods. I did not have a good feeling while walking down to look.
Got within 10 yards and saw a nice blood trail and he was lying right off the field a couple yards in the woods.
This spike horn weighed in at a whopping 124lbs and I am grateful.
Not to bad for just getting coffee ready!😉

Set my bait up at the end of my field this year just like the last 5 years. This year I put a sensor on it so I did not have to keep looking out my living room window.
   Got home early from work on the first day of the season and was just finishing up lunch when my sensor went off. Looked out the window and low and behold this bear was piddling around the blind I had set up for the boys.
   I have shot my last couple bear with my 375 H&H but happen to have the 7mm mag in the corner just in case a window shot presented itself.
    I put the 7mm mag on the rest and got out a bullet and loaded it in the rifle. The bullet was a 160gr nosler accubond backed by IMR 4350. This was a load Gitano helped me with when I first started reloading.
   I put the crosshairs right on top of left shoulder and the bullet went in the left ear and came out the left eye socket dropping her right there. Not what I intended, but I will take it.
   I ate the heart that night!

Headed out with my middle son today to try and fill his doe tag. We got up on some deer first 10 minutes out. One was standing at about 170 yards. I got him on the steady stix and was taking aim when I decided to make them higher. He was not impressed as He said I took his cross hairs off the deer. It then disapeared.

We got back in the truck and swung the edge of that field and spied them about 230 yards away. One was lying down and could only see the heads of the other ones. We went for broke on the one lying down. The bullet hit about 3ft to the left and they ran off. We went down to make sure but no sign.

we got  back in the truck and situated ourselves to watch the field. The weather was bitterly cold, about 16 degrees with the wind chill around 0. We sat for about 20 minutes when a lone doe came out around 150 yards broadside and just stood there. I got him on the stix and got the hammer back and he took aim.

After the shot, the deer jumped forward and then almost landed on its front end. He had broken the right shoulder. The deer kept going forward then started straight away from has, falling to the ground further and further with each step until it was down.

I had one happy boy who started crying and saying, "I got it dad, I got it"! Gun in question was the 25-06 with a 115gr berger VLD.

Thats two deer down, one more boy to go!;) Also now 2 bear and 2 deer in the freezer this year. God bless.
garett first deer 2017 3 by David LeTourneau, on Flickr
garett first deer 2017 1 by David LeTourneau, on Flickr
garett first deer 2017 2 by David LeTourneau, on Flickr

quick question for ya Paul, it seems I remember you doing some experimenting with this bullet in one of your rifles, seeing penetration through wood? Am I recalling right, or did I dream it?:D
Way back when I loaded some of these for my 25-06 in 85gr to use for coyotes. That never happened as wanted to keep furs without big holes in them and got a .223.

I seem to recall people using regular Nosler ballistic tips for whitetails, would you use these bullets for whitetails?

anyone with experience with this bullet, please chime in. God Bless.

So today is Maine's youth deer day. In the zone I live in, kids under 15 and under are allowed to shoot either a buck or a doe today. We got up this morning, took our time getting out, and were set by 6:40 to watch a field my neighbor has taken his deer in for the last 8 years. We spent and hour there and the boys were complaining about getting cold, so we cut into the woods and made our way back to the truck.
about a half mile from my house there is a field road that I had taken with the four wheeler about a month ago and decided it was worth a drive. long story short, right where we were going to turn around, a deer came up over the hill.

Pointed it out to my oldest son and instructed him to get out but stand behind the door. I got out and got to his side, gave him a bullet, he loaded up and took aim. She never moved a muscle and dropped right where she was standing. it was about a 120 yard shot and he had to free hand it. Gun in questions was a 7mm mag shooting 160gr accubonds.

I was one happy dad with one happy kid. Getting ready to head out with my middle boy to finish the day out. God Bless.

Gages first deer nov 2017 by David LeTourneau, on Flickr
Gages first deer nov 2017 2 by David LeTourneau, on Flickr
Gages first deer nov 2017 3 by David LeTourneau, on Flickr