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Last year, Indiana added a pistol caliber rifle to firearms season. My son and I both got new rifles for this year. I got a Marlin 1894, and he got a handi rifle, both .44 mags. We tried and liked the new hornady leverevolution .44 mags, and used them. Here are some pics of the first 3 days of season.
My sons first doe. 130# field dressed.
My "brain fanny burp" buck. Long story, but I thought he was bigger.
Me with my 1st doe and my son's buck. We both shot them at the same time.
My second doe taken 3d day of season. The LE ammo was great. We took 6 deer in 3 days.
Dave, the deer are so thick in our county, I still have 1 doe tag left, but don't know if I am going to try to kill another one or not. We saw so many deer on the property we hunt, that when we loaded the last 1 in the truck, 20 stood off at a distance and waved goodbye!
Maddog, congratulations to you and your son! You guys are definitely doing your part to thin the Hoosier deer population, but your getting all the non-Hoosiers jealous. Ain't it great to finally get to use a real rifle now. This is my second season hunting with the 1894c and it hasn't let me down. This was also the first year of deer hunting for my 13 y.o. son and he had success with the same rifle. Now there's a tug o' war going on. Say, what's the recoil like on that 44mag handi-rifle. I'm just trying to decide my options for son and his sister who will probably deer hunt next year.
nemhed, recoil is not bad at all. I started my boy at 11 with a 20 ga. slug gun. He got used to it. Probably killed 25 deer with the single shot tracker II 20 ga. The .44 is a pussycat compared to that. Also, you can get .357 mag in it I believe. Good little rifles, cept some of them need a little tweeking.
Looks like you had a classic hunt for the delicious corn-fed Whitetail Deer. I am very pleased to see that Indiana is permitting levergun hunting this year. Your 44 Mags are certainly plenty of gun. I really like the Marlin 1894. It is a fast handling compact little carbine with some serious punch. What with my weakness for the old cartridges, I'd be tempted to try some of the old classics like the 44-40 and the 38-40.
Kirk: An old geezer who loves the smell of freshly turned earth, old cedar rail fences, wood smoke, a crackling fireplace on a snowy evening, pristine wilderness lakes, the scent of
cedars and a magnificent Whitetail buck framed in the semi-buckhorn sights of a 120-year old Winchester. Blog: https://www.kirkdurston.com/
maddog wrote:Kirk, another year goes by, and the boys here in Hoosierland figure out how much fun the rifle is, and ya won't be able to give a shotgun sluggun away
maddog
Oh, I dunno. As much as I hate Slug guns, I don't think I'll be getting rid of my Rifle Sighted Slug Barrel for my M500 any time soon.
There ARE some times a 1oz hunk of lead is useful... just not white-tail hunting.
C2N14... because life is not energetic enough. מנא, מנא, תקל, ופרסין Daniel 5:25-28... Got 7.62?
Not Depressed enough yet? Go read National Geographic, July 1976 Gott und Gewehr mit uns!
Gobblerforge wrote:Oh, if only Ohio DNR would please wake up to this. Then Ohio lever gunners wouldn't have to go out of state to legally hunt with these arms.
Gobbler
What it takes is a concerted effort by ballistics wonks to constantly and continually flood the DNR wit reqests for it with data showing quite conclusively that pistol calibers out of rifles are ballisticly equivelent to Slug guns in almost every respect.
Also point out that they are more effective, accurate and easier for youth to handle/shoot/practice with than a .410/.28
Push the "hunting heritage" angle, along with the "cheaper ammo = more practice = safer hunters" angle.
And keep pushing.
It took indiana about 3 years of concerted effort... and the worst of it was trying to shout down the FUDDS who hate the word "rifle"... while using hypervelocity sabot slugs out of scoped rifled "shotguns".
C2N14... because life is not energetic enough. מנא, מנא, תקל, ופרסין Daniel 5:25-28... Got 7.62?
Not Depressed enough yet? Go read National Geographic, July 1976 Gott und Gewehr mit uns!
!
Say, what's the recoil like on that 44mag handi-rifle. I'm just trying to decide my options for son and his sister who will probably deer hunt next year.
