Hi all

I was doing a little research last night and here are the numbers and my conclusion. I was looking at a sight www.aldeer.com and one of the pages is a trophy room and one of the options is to look at the last 25 deer submitted. I figure that 25 deer at random in the state is at least a semi reasonable population. Remember that whitetail deer in Alabama are not terribly large bodied either. 150 lb deer would be big.

The first look at the numbers is grouped by yardage taken. The second look at the data is by equipment.

Yards Equipment
20 30-30
20 bow
20 30-06
25 223
35 223
40 270
50 Rifle
50 308
50 rifle
50 30-06
50 0.243
50 rifle
50 30-30
50 rifle
60 12 ga
65 30-06
75 30-06
75 35 rem
80 30-06
90 270
100 308
100 7mm rem
115 270
125 7mm-08
200 30-06

Yards Equipment
25 223
35 223
50 243
90 270
115 270
40 270
50 308
100 308
60 12 ga
200 30-06
75 30-06
80 30-06
65 30-06
50 30-06
20 30-06
20 30-30
50 30-30
75 35 rem
100 7mm rem
125 7mm-08
20 bow
50 rifle
50 rifle
50 rifle
50 rifle

Altho the SD is pretty high, the average distance for the 25 deer is only 66 yards. Not only that but the max distance is only 200 yards. The yardage which divides the data is 50 yards.

The conclusion then is that in Alabama the distances are normally miniscule.

What would be the optimum cartridge for this combination of range and size?

For me, the only deer that I have killed was been with a .243. I have bought a .260 remington and plan to use 120 gr. NBT's if and when I get a chance to go this year.

This falls under the heading of matching the equipment to the task at hand. I personally think that a hot 300 would be terribly out of place as far as velocity needed and terminal effect of the bullets at such a high velocity.

This does go to show how popular the 30-06 is, even tho (in my most humble opinion) that it is still "too much" gun for the task at hand. I am of the firm belief that it is not so much what you shoot with but rather where you apply the bullet that is important. If a 30-06 is that which floats your boat then all is well and good there too.

Jim B.

I think a .270 or 25-06 is about perfect because it will handle anything near or far. I think 150 lbs is more average and not "big". I've seen several killed that went over 210 lbs. A friend of mine has killed close to 200 with a marlin 336 in .35 rem. He has had to pass on some long shots that would have been easy with a .270.

Hi Jim,
I've taken 50-60 deer in Alabama, from 15 yards with a bow to 200 yards with a 7mm, from a 60# doe to a #200 buck. 13 of them with a 6.5x55, your .260 will do just fine!!

Heres a link to some photos of the deer we took last year.
http://groups.msn.com/20012002HuntingSeasoninAlabama/shoebox.msnw?Page=5&pgmarket=en-us

While I have never deer hunted in Alabama, I have hunted feral hogs in southwest Alabama. I saw deer everyday while still hunting the swamps for hogs. The longest shot I would have had on a deer would have been under 75 yards. A 30-30 or 35 Remington would have worked very well as would a good slug gun. And for whatever it is worth. I believe deer are easy to hunt compared to feral hogs. Those darn things are constantly on the move and where see or hear them one day, more than likely they won't be there the next. I did manage to get two of them in 5 days of hunting the swamps. The 308 shooting the 165 Sierra HPBT GameKing @ 2750 fps worked very well. Both of them went down in their tracks.

Shoot Safe, Shoot Straight.........RiverRat

I hunted Alabama for 8 years, killing as many as 17 deer in one season. I hunted on a 6000 acre club. I killed deer from 11yds to 250yds, mostly with a .270 or 7mm Rem Mag. I can say the 30-06 was the least popular caliber, with the .270 no 1, followed by the 7mm Rem mag, then the .300 win mag, the 30-06 was at the bottom trailing the 8x57, and .308.