Springfield 1903 .30-06

In August, my family took the Colorado hunter education class so we could do some small game hunting this year. We've done that, and had some luck at dove and teal. However, during the class, my wife said she liked the idea of hunting elk. Quite a goal for folks who have never hunted, but it sounded good to me. But, I decided that if we were going to give that a go, we'd best get some other experience first. Did some checking, found that there were still doe pronghorn tags available for some good units in South East Colorado. So, I've picked up two pronghorn tags and hope to go hunting next week.

I was going to try to use my father-in-law's Springfield 1903 .30-06. His rifle is absolutely a beautiful vintage piece. We're not sure what year his rifle is -- he bought it used in 1940 at a pawn shop and the scope mount covers up the serial number so I can't check the age myself (it's a custom mount, so I'm reluctant to mess with it). However, it's probably a 100 year rifle or so. It's got a 1940 vintage scope -- probably 4x by 40mm. We took it up to Parshall on Saturday to zero it. Well, rather, I should say "try" to zero it. I loved shooting it -- recoil was perfect and the action is absolutley smooth. Unfortunately,  I couldn't pull a good enough group even at 25yards to even try adjusting the scope. Which is a serious bummer. First of all, it's a pretty tough hit to my confidence when I'm going on my first big game hunt. Second, I was really liking the idea of using

My wife is always practical and after taking a nap Saturday,she woke up and said -- "Well, you've got to get a new rifle." We've already put a lot of effort into making my trip next week to the areas work and she didn't want me to waste the effort. So, we popped over to Sportsman's Warehouse (love and hate that place -- spend entirely too much money on great stuff every time I go). I figured we'd get a Remington .30-06 combo (rifle + scope) which are running about $400 right now. Unfortunately, I didn't like the scope (eye-relief was very narrow and the optics just didn't have good contrast) and she didn't like the action (decidedly not smooth). I love my wife. She is just.. well, perfect. We went home with a new Tikka T3 Lite with a Nikon Buckmaster 4-9x 40mm. I'm sure this rifle is going to kick quite hard, but it's sub-MOA accurate, the Nikon optics are great, and it's going to be very easy to carry.

So, sometime between now and next week, I've got to get that zero'd. It's going to be a bummer if I find out that it was the shooter afterall (but, then, at least I'd know). More on that later.

Camping in Hugo Colorado

August and September have been intensely busy -- and I lost my battery charger in Las Vegas so I couldn't take any good pictures. Which is why I haven't writen and new posts in several weeks! But, I've got lots of great stories to share and will be posting them and more over the next several weeks.One of the big things going on is we've decided to start hunting.

For the 2011/12 season, one of the things I really want to do is some pronghorn hunting. I've never hunted big game and so this is quite an undertaking, but its been fun. In early September, I decided to go scout the unit I planned on hunting in this year. This is in South Eastern Colorado. For those of you who've never been out there, it's a cross between open grassland and, well, mostly desert. So, you'll understand my surprise when I get half way down there and drive into a murky fog bank that lasted till noon the next day.

Which was fine. Had a nice evening camping in the fog under some trees in the Hugo State Wild Life Area. Got up the next morning and saw all sorts of wild life. Also got a dove (more on that in a later post). But, I think the fog spooked the pronghorn. Only saw a single small group until the afternoon.