Saying "10 at a time" made me realize, I should have thought more about my hypothetical scenario this morning. If I give you ONE round a day for 50 days, and hang ONE jug at 1,000yrds each day, how many cold bore impacts will you make?
Let me get back to you on that!
I often joke with my buddies, "Cold bore" is made of of 2 Four Letter Words because it's really that bad...
Very true
Here's the downside, and it works out very nicely since you're saying 35 out of 50... In a standard distribution group (aka a round group), 68.2% on a 6x10" milk jug is 99.8% reliable on an 18"x30" target. We all like to think our misses are "JUST off of the edge," but when you put a big backer target behind your milk jug, the true group size shows up. Printed on paper, 35/50 on a milk jug is typically an 18" group. Group distribution is something I've seen often neglected by many/most of the new long range shooters out there. When 100% of your cold bore shots hit the milk jug, then 1000yrds on deer has absolutely no unethical component for you. Of course, you'll also be a world leading professional match competitor...
The backing last time shows 14" mostly horizontal spread. Hence my interest in better wind resistance.
I take newbies out as part of the classes I offer a few times a year, some of them the first time they've ever shot a rifle, and spot for them to "walk on" to targets at 1,000yrds. The Youtube Milk Jug deal is a game, at best. Your own life right now is a potential gutshot 30% of the time, and as you've said, that's stringing them together. You're picking your environmentals right now, so instead of going out and getting DOPE to know how your load responds to temperature changes, you're just not shooting. Maybe you won't hunt during cold weather either, we don't really have that luxury in the Midwest - our rifle seasons are too short to sit out, and often the coldest days are the best days. I shot my buck this year on the coldest day of the year, high of 22 raw,-5F windchill high... Sucked, thoroughly. I took the opportunity to shoot at a different location during my lunch breaks too - also sucked, thoroughly. But there have been years where I've hunted outside of Eagle, CO at the same temp as my home range in KS that week, but 4,500ft higher, and also outside of Maricopa, AZ, same elevation but 50F warmer than my home range in KS, all within 2wks... My go-to coyote load shifts around 4-6" at 600yrds with those changes, a difference in an ethical kill vs. a gutshot or a miss.
Here I have and advantage in longer season that allows hunting in anywhere from 80-20* weather. For the days when I don't have a confident DOPE, I can go out with a shorter range weapon in the woods instead.
Here are some examples of what we have to answer to improve cold bore percentages, because Kestrel/AB/Strelok/JBM/4DoF/etc won't always give you the perfect, real-world correction: What's the correction at 1123yrds vs. 982? What's the load do when your temp is 13F in the morning vs. 35F in the midday? What does the mirage do across that particular hunting field as that temperature swings up and back down? How does it respond at 2,100ft elev outside of Asheville vs. 400ft outside of Cincinnati (picking random OH and NC cities in which I've worked)? What's the elevation correction in a right to left 13mph wind? Left to right? These are some of the holes we have to plug to improve cold bore impact percentage.
I would not be out in OH with the .260 for deer unless I wanted to end up with a costly ticket. There I have an H&R ultra and a newly acquired 45-70 to use for 200-250yds max (though most shots are <100yds. No real need for temp and elevation considerations there. I do however keep a range tape for the 150yd plus shots that MIGHT be offered with those high arcing rounds.
And of course, you don't have to beg a milk jug to hold still for 5-10 sec while you range, read, correct, dial, hold, acquire picture, and break, plus another second and a half waiting for the bullet to arrive. I have taken all of my long shots on deer over water or under a feeder, where I know the deer will come in and stop, relaxed, head down, and stay put for a while, and I've used a spotter to read, run, and reread my enviromentals as I focus on position, acquisition, and reticle picture.
Read the next reply for the amount of control I have over the area I would be shooting in. I would not try it in an area I did not have at least some idea of what I was walking into. If it isn't the best it can be, I can always not fire. That is up until the hammer is released.
