GUNS AND AMMUNITION. 



213 



PROVING A .30-30. 



JOHN HAST1B. 



I returned October 4, '97, from a trip 

 through the Yellowstone National Park 

 to Cottonwood creek. From there driving 

 Northwest we camped the second day on 

 the South fork of Horse creek, high up in 

 the mountains. The scenery is grand, the 

 atmosphere delightful, richly laden with 

 the odor of the pines. The first day out, 

 while on my way to camp, the quick wink, 

 only, of a pair of gray ears caught my eye. 

 It took several seconds to make out, and 

 then not very clearly, the outlines of a deer's 

 face and ears turned directly toward me 

 while the whole body, lying down, was be- 

 hind a log. I had never fired the .30-30 

 rifle I carried that afternoon and had little 

 faith in it. A single movement of the mus- 

 cles of the deer followed my shot. I found 

 a dead doe behind that log and saw that the 

 bullet had struck the face, entered the cen- 

 ter of the neck and for several inches had 

 ground the bone and flesh like a sausage 

 mill. 



The following day my partner secured a 

 young elk with a .40-60. Then we moved to 

 a new camp on the North fork of Horse 

 creek. The first morning out and near 

 camp we surprised a small band of elk. I 

 succeeded in wounding one, terribly shat- 

 tering a shoulder. We trailed this elk and 

 finally killed it. I hung up 2 more* deer 

 and one antelope at this camp. One deer 

 was killed standing at long range, the bul- 

 let scooping a big chunk out of the back 

 of his neck. The bullet entered the neck 

 of the other near the head and came out 

 through the opposite cheek. The antelope 

 was standing about 250 yards distant on a 

 flat at the bottom of a long sloping hill. 

 The bullet struck him square in the should- 

 ers, a little back of the center, leaving a hole 

 about an inch and a quarter in diameter. 

 I was not satisfied arid moved my camp 

 farther North where I found plenty of snow 

 and elk sign. 



On the second morning I saw the tips 

 of a set of elk horns coming my way, and as 

 the bunch passed where I stood, I laid out 2, 

 at a medium range, without 20 feet of each 

 other. One fell on his back with his feet 

 in the air and had evidently died without a 

 struggle. The other lying on his side had 

 slid a few feet down the hill. Both were 

 large bulls and had died almost instantly. 

 After getting in my 2 elk, I left for Roy's 

 ranch, on the Beaver, as the weather was 

 then too stormy for me, 200 miles North of 

 home, but meeting some ranchmen friends, 

 they urged me to try it again. I had but 2 

 more chances to test the little gun, one was 

 cutting and shattering the front leg bone 

 of a large calf elk close to the body, so the 

 leg only hung by the skin. The other was 

 killing a grown elk dead with a shot well 

 back behind the shoulder, at a distance of 

 about 500 yards. The others of the party 



were not idle and in 5 days we pulled into 

 Roy's ranch again. I have now so much 

 faith in the .30-30 smokeless that I have sold 

 my old reliable .45-90 and 3 other rifles and 

 will put all my trust in the little gun. 



It seems by this report that you killed 

 on this trip 9 head of big game and that 

 your friend killed some. What could you 

 do with so much? Of course, you would 

 not sell it and it is not right to kill such 

 noble animals to give away. 



MEDIUM LOADS FOR THE .30-30. 



That the .30-30 is the best deer gun is 

 no longer open to argument. It does chew 

 the venison up a good deal with a soft- 

 pointed bullet and fresh powder; but the 

 offset to that, which far outweighs the ob- 

 jection, is that is prevents the venison from 

 getting away wounded and bleeding. The 

 next best cartridge is, in my opinion, the 

 •45"70j and the little " dynamite " load un- 

 doubtedly downs a deer more promptly 

 than the big bullet. I have killed 6 deer 

 with a Winchester .30-30, and not one of 

 them moved over 10 steps. Two dropped 

 as if struck by lightning, and one of these, 

 strange to say, with a paunch shot. My 

 gun is a Winchester, take down, 24 inch 

 half octagon barrel, half magazine, shot 

 gun butt, with Lyman sights. 



I have had no trouble getting the light 

 squirrel or rabbit load to work. I use the 

 Ideal 30812 bullet of 95 grains with Du 

 Pont's No. 1 smokeless rifle powder. This 

 makes an accurate and effective load, about 

 equal in power to the old .32 rim. As the 

 bullet is sharp pointed I make no attempt 

 to work the load through the magazine. 

 The model '94 Winchester can be conven- 

 iently used as a single shot. 



But I have not yet struck the right com- 

 bination for a full, low pressure load, which 

 should be about the equivalent of the old 

 .32-40. This is especially desirable for 

 turkeys, as the full load smashes them, and 

 the miniature load has not quite power 

 enough. Any combination I have so far 

 tried leads intolerably. J. S. B., in Oc- 

 tober Recreation, says a type metal bullet 

 and Oriental powder are all right. What 

 powder is that? He refers Jo it as not 

 among the black powders. Let me ask: 



1. What would be the weight of a type 

 metal bullet of. the same size as a 168 grain 

 lead bullet? 



2. Is there any low pressure powder suf- 

 ficiently clean to shoot the .30-30 metal 

 cased bullet without lubrication? 



3. Can any reader give his experience 

 with King's semi-smokeless powder in a 

 .30-30? 



I have found nothing will clean the .30-30 

 except a good stiff wire brush. I do not 

 know whether the fouling is from the tin 

 coating of the bullet cases or is a residuum 



