Share your 2021 hunting season go to loads

I'll be toting the new to me Rem 760 .300 Savage. Due to a short supply of my usual Speer Hot Core, I'll be running the 150 Hornady SP seated to cannelure. 42 GR of IMR 4064 and a Fed 210 will propel it along right snappy in this strong action. I back that load down to 40 in the M99 as it slicks through the action smoother and that's how I like to shoot this rifle. It is mostly a range toy at this point, but it does see an occasional fair weather deer stand sit at closer ranges. Both loads in both rifles are quite accurate. Have never really benched either gun for groups, that's not their Huckleberry, but they're easily hitting a 3" dot at 100 yards which is plenty big medicine for where they'll see use.

The .280 Rem is up in the air. I need some cooler weather to make up a few test loads and see what shows promise. My standard bullet in this rifle is not available at any price, so I'm at the drawing board here. Think I'll work with the Speer 145BTSP, Nosler 150 Part. and Speer 160 BTSP, as that's what I have available. This rifle's role has now officially switched to sedentary positions with long range possibilities since the addition of the Rem 760 as my new "woods gun."

The wife will shoot in her .308 the same 44 gr IMR 4064, Speer Hot Core Mag tip (old stock) in PRVI brass, SB primer that she's been shooting for 11 or so years now. It's accurate and fills the freezer reliably. This will likely be the last year with the mag tips as her supply is nearly depleted. Just enough left to zero in and hunt with.

120 grains of 2f Goex black powder with a.58 caliber patched round ball in my John Browning Mountain Rifle for the shotgun/rifle season, and 110 grains of Goex 2f with a .58 caliber patched round ball in my Jaeger flint lock for the black powder season.

Muzzle loader season: 100 gr of FFg under a 58 caliber sabot with a .452 300 gr XTP.

Gun season: 30-cal 150 gr Core-Lok pushed at 2400 fps from a 30 RAR

In my 30-06 rifle I load a 165gr Sierra Game King bullet over 57.0gr H4350 with a CCI BR2 primer.
For practice I load a 168gr Sierra Match King bullet over the same powder charge with a CCI-200 primer.
In the 30-06 I've come to like a 165gr Nosler Partition over 58.0gr H4350 with a Winchester WLR primer.

In my 30-30 I load a 150gr Sierra Power Jacket bullet over 30.0gr H4198 powder.
A170gr Sierra FN bullet over 30.0gr IMR3031 powder.
A 165gr Missouri Bullets cast LFN bullet over 25.0gr IMR3031 powder.
All the 30-30 loads are made with a CCI-200 primer.

Load is the same as 2019 (missed 2020, cuz covid). MN woodland/brush, short-range. Fed TBT-180 over 40.7gr H-4895 for 2620fps. 180gr because it could nick a twig during the trip. 2626fps appears to be a node on my .308RAR.

I use the Ruger American because it's cheap and lightweight. Totally disposable rifle that's good enuf. The brush in Northern Minnesota can be like hand-to-hand combat, and a light/wet snowfall in a tree stand is no place for a wood stock and blued steel.

Edit: OP - I also have a .308 180 ELD-X over 43.6 CFE223 or 41.0 H-4895. Again, my RAR .308 favors 2620fps. "within a minute-of-deer", as my expert-nephew says.

The brush in Northern Minnesota can be like hand-to-hand combat, and a light/wet snowfall in a tree stand is no place for a wood stock and blued steel.
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Meh. Walnut matches the blood in the snow. Just need enough oil worked into the wood to be impervious to water, snow, and everything else. The brush scratches just add character.

Put the .280 loads over the bench this weekend. Holy S! This rifle really likes the 140 NP. I was mistaken in my original post, I thought they were 150s I had. 52gr of IMR 4350, Fed 210 and Peterson brass. Put my first 3 shots touching. Fired one more 5 shot group to be sure I wasn't dreaming and correct the zero. The group widened out a bit, but was still within a 1" square on the zeroing target. Fired a few more at 200, 300, and 400 yards more than acceptable accuracy. Pending performance on deer, I think I have THE load for this rifle. It's the best I've ever found in this gun.

I am not quite sure what rifles will make it out this year, I said I want to use classics this season, but I like using that m18 mauser 6.5 prc so much.

for my ruger m77 ts 7x57 I still have some 140 Sierra pro hunters loaded, imr 4350 48.5 gr I believe.
want to load up some 175 partitions I've got to.

for the pre 64 m70 270win unless I get some primers and bullets it's factory 130 Winchester ammo.

Random 8 said:

Put the .280 loads over the bench this weekend. Holy S! This rifle really likes the 140 NP. I was mistaken in my original post, I thought they were 150s I had. 52gr of IMR 4350, Fed 210 and Peterson brass. Put my first 3 shots touching. Fired one more 5 shot group to be sure I wasn't dreaming and correct the zero. The group widened out a bit, but was still within a 1" square on the zeroing target. Fired a few more at 200, 300, and 400 yards more than acceptable accuracy. Pending performance on deer, I think I have THE load for this rifle. It's the best I've ever found in this gun.

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perfect deer load right there, I need to get a 280 been to long without one.

Using my 350 Legend AR I can get almost one hole shots with a Hornady 35 cal. 170gr pushed by 26.0 gr of H110, CCI small rifle primers.
Target from 100yds

ML deer will be a 58 round ball over a wad and 75 grains of Ole Eynesford 1.5F. Not as exciting a load as the above for ML, but ranges are about to 75 yards or a bit more and the Zoli Zouave I picked up last winter likes this load real well. With a 283 grain ball, I have little doubt it will make meat.

Elk will be a 165 grain partition over 49.5 grains of Varget in 30-06.

Will be trying out a cast load in my dedicated RAR beaver and muskrat gun. I was using factory FMJ 350 Legend, but I felt it was overkill (especially for skrats). A 180 grain cast bullet over 7 grains of unique is quite accurate and should be plenty good enough to punch through a beaver skull inside 50 yards while not blowing up the skrats.

For mule deer I like a 150gr Nosler BT for a Howa 1500 22" barrel in .308 Win. with 45 gr of Varget and a GM 150 primer, I get a average of 2875 fps with this load.

IF I get time to go hunting this year, it will depend on what I decide to use, and that will depend on where I hunt. But here’s my potential guns and loads for deer, hogs and bear.
308) 168gr Nosler Ballistic Tip over H335
30-30) 150gr Sierra RNSP over H335 or IMR3031
45-70) 405gr Missouri over IMR3031
50 Beowulf) 400gr Winchester Platinum Tip over AA1680
460 S&W) 300gr XTP Mag over H110
50 AE) 325gr Speer Bonded HP over H110
44 Mag) 240gr Keith over H110
375 H&H) 300gr Montana FNGC over IMR4064
460 S&W) 325gr Missouri Slammer over H110
500 S&W) 500gr XTP FP over H110
30-06) 180gr Winchester Silver Tips over IMR4064
375 H&H) factory 300gr PPU RNSP or Remington Premier 300gr Swift A-Frame
50AE) factory Speer 300gr Gold Dot Deep Curl
460 S&W) factory Jamison 260gr Prowler FP

7.62x39 HP Tula ammo

sarduy said:

7.62x39 HP Tula ammo

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Normal stuff or the good stuff like 8m3 hehe

Two loads for 30-30-: Tried and true load - Sierra 170gr fn with 33gr of 3031. Experimenting this year with 160ftx and 33.8gr of vintage Rx11.
30-06 will be 178eldx and 47.4gr of 4064.
300wm, will be 200eldx and 76.5gr of H1000.

My deer load is 48.0 gr H4198, 300gr Hornady HPFN, Fed 210, in federal brass with a decent crimp for my 45-70 Marlin 1895 GBL. If it works anything like the factory ammo I've been using, it'll do great!

Haven't decided on pig load yet, but it's leaning towards N140/165 interlock or IMR 8208XBR/150 interlock in my .308.

Coyote load has been 24.0gr TAC/75bthp out of my 20" AR for a while, I've been thinking about moving to 8208XBR instead of TAC, but haven't done it yet.

I don't reload shotgun, so my duck and pheasant load is Rio Blue Steel 20ga 3" either #4's or #5's.

WY Antelope hunt later this month: .270 Win: 130 Nosler BT, 62.1 H4831, FED 210 primer: 3167 out of my Nosler M48's 24" tube

Western KS Whitetails: .270 Win: 130 Nosler Accubond, 62.3 H4831, FED 210 primer: 3176 out of my Nosler M48's 24" tube

Eastern KS Whitetails: .350 Rem Mag: 200 Hornady Interlock, 62.3 IMR4320, FED 210: 2825 out of my M7s 20" barrel. Last year I'll use this, just burning up IMR4320 as I'm sitting on 11Lbs of TAC.

IF my rebarreled Rem M7 comes back in time and IF the Manners stock gets done and IF my smith can get it bedded:

Eastern KS Whitetails: .260 Rem, 120 Nosler BT, ?? grains of H4350, FED 210 at about 2930 from my 20" barrel.

Coyotes (calling): .223: 55 Nosler BT (3 different loads for two AR15s, one Rem M7, and one Rem M700)

First time hunting with ammunition I reloaded. Pretty stoked about it.

.243 Winchester
Barnes 80 grain TTSX seated 0.100" off the lands
42.2 grains IMR4350
Winchester brass
Winchester LR primers
Don't have chronograph numbers. GRT calculates muzzle velocity of 3076 fps. 0.8 MOA

bluejay75 said:

I know most of you won’t change a thing about your winning race car mid season….

I was wondering what loads you plan on starting with. Most of the time I will be carrying one of the loads below.

I’m going with three:

44 Magnum Rifle- 3rd Season
Starline Brass
23.5 H110
MP Molds Plain Base Solid 434 Hammer powder coated clear sized to .432 crimped in the crimp groove and collet crimped. 277 grains. I commissioned and spec’d out this mold. If you see one available buy it!
CCI LPMP
1 inch to 1.5 inches @ 100 depending on how clean the barrel is and which rifle is shooting it.
1700 FPS 10SD from 18.5 inch barrel.

308 Winchester- 1st Season Load
Lapua or LC LR Brass
43.6 Varget
178 ELDX
2.820 COAL
FED 210 Primer
Lee Collet crimped-light
.3-.4 inches reliably. Never thrown a shot more than an inch out of main group with this load across 5 different rifles.
2620 FPS 2-3 SD 10-12 ES from 20 inch barrels.

6.5 Creedmoor- 1st Season on the barrel-1st Season Load
Lapua SRP Brass
46.4 Superformance
147 ELDM
2.825 COAL
CCI 41 Primer
RCBS taper crimp-light
.6-.7 inches reliably.
2712 FPS 7-8 SD 18-24 ES from 24 inch barrel.

What are you running in the rifles you will most likely carry to hunt with this season. JB.

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Let me know how that 6.5 eld-m works if you down something with it.

New for me this year is an m77 Hawkeye in 264 mag. Im toting 120 barnes ttsx over 61 grains of 7828ssc. I have a provisional load of 140 partitions over 58 of 7828. Its provisional because i just got my hands on some ramshot magnum and i havent tried it out yet.

Been using 38.5 gr H414 with a 100gr Sierra Pro Hunter and a Remington LRM primer. I loaded a bunch a few years ago and this has been my go to. Might be better but I don't know what it is.
For my 30-06 I've been shooting a reduced load of 45gr of H4895 and a 125gr Sierra Pro Hunter and a standard CCI LR primer. I haven't killed anything with it, but it shoots really nice. I doubt a deer 100 yards out will know the difference.
Still haven't gotten dies for the BM450 so if I take that it'll be off the shelf Hornady Black.

-Jeff

I will probably use my M18 Mauser in 6.5 CM most of the time, but I might get wild and use another gun.

My Rem 700 243 likes a 90gr Nosler AB over 43gr of R-17.
Bergara B14 6.5 CM gets 129gr Nosler ABLR with 40gr of H4350. It is mild but matches my BDC out to 500 yards
The Mauser M18 will get a 130gr NAB over 42gr of H4350
My go to gun, when all else fails, is a Savage 10 300WSM with 165gr AB and 64gr of IMR-4350. It is awesome.
The Ruger GP100 gets used when it is up close and personal. It likes 180gr XTP and 12gr of AA#9, but I'm working on a H110 load.
M77/50 Ruger muzzle loader shoots a 300 XTP with 90gr of FF really well.