Here's a report on my annual whitetail hunt in North Dakota. It�s strictly a meat hunt, as trophy racks are not common in the farming area where we hunt, so I had two antlerless tags to fill. We generally hunt from ground blinds in a small woodlot along a coulee, through which run many deer trails created as they transit from one field or shelter belt to another. Clear shooting lanes are no longer than 60 yards, and typical shots are much shorter.

I use my �Junior Scout� for these hunts: a blued, synthetic-stocked Remington Model Seven in .260 Rem with a Burris Scout Scope on a Ching Ring mount and a Galco Safari Ching Sling and butt cuff ammo carrier. I also have 10 rounds in a Galco belt carrier. I load the magazine from the butt cuff (and unload to it for transport or at the end of the day) while keeping the belt carrier in reserve.

I use handloads of 125-grain Nosler Partitions backed by 43 grains of IMR 4350 for about 2700 fps. This combination shoots into �� at 50 yards and prints 1� high at that distance for an approximate 200 yard zero.

The first afternoon in the woodlot resulted in sightings of a dozen deer, but few shootable deer, and no clear shots on them. On Saturday we were back in the woodlot in the afternoon. Experience over the years has told us that the most active time is from 2:30pm to the end of the day. As on the previous afternoon, only small deer or distant sightings through the brush occurred until about half an hour before sunset as the light was dimming.

A group of three deer emerged from a tangle of brush to my left, following a trail that crossed in front of me about 15 yards out: one larger doe and two smaller antlerless deer with the larger doe in the lead. As they passed behind a clump of trees I raised my rifle and aimed at where they would emerge.

As the larger doe walked clear of the trees I put the crosshairs just above her elbow joint and fired. She ran towards me and passed a couple of yards to my right, finally plowing into the leaf litter nose first a few yards behind me. As this was happening, the two smaller deer ran off to my right toward my hunting partner in another blind, and I heard him shoot.

Amazingly, the two small deer ran back my way. One angled away from me, while the other paused in about the same spot where I�d shot the larger doe. Since I�d bolt-flicked I was ready and decided that since the pickings seemed slim this year (a lot of corn was still in the fields due to a wet fall) I�d go ahead and fill my second tag. I shot the second deer, and it trotted straight away for a few yards, then turned facing to my right and stopped.

As I bolt-flicked again I could see that it had a gash in its belly with a portion of its small intestine hanging out, so I quickly put in a finisher. It ran straight away again and fell a couple of yards from the other small deer that my hunting partner had shot. My first shot had hit low and shattered the sternum, which resulted in the gash. This deer turned out to be a button buck, while the other smaller deer taken by my friend was a doe.

So in less than 10 seconds and with four shots the two of us had dropped all three deer in the group and I had filled my two tags. Estimated weights of my two deer were about 120 and 80 pounds. I field dressed them as dusk fell and we hauled them out after shooting time was over. Back at the farm we hung them in the barn to cool overnight, and I spent all of Sunday skinning, butchering, and wrapping the meat for the freezer while the others were out trying to fill their tags. We hard freeze the meat right there and bring it home in a cooler with us as checked luggage on the plane.

The net result was four backstraps, two sets of tenderloins, and the rest of the estimated 50 pounds of meat will be turned into sausage and burger by a local butcher here at home.

How did you like the performance of the 125 gr partitions? Wounds... penetration etc...

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