jacads

yes black bear. We live in Michigan although I have hunted all my bear in Minnesota. As far as Africa goes just plains animals and some baboons.

jacads

I have 2 .243 one is a savage youth left hand I got for him and the other is a ruger M77 compact that is right handed. Now I love the ruger but again it is right handed. and while they are excellent deer guns I wanted to get him something that 10-15 years for now would be more versatile. Where I live in Michigan it is shotgun only so I did get him a Mossberg super bantam in 20 gauge. We also hunted a youth hunt in Ohio so I mainly got it for him for these two areas.

Jack Ryan

There's a good reason you have to look around for reduced loads, shortened stocks and what ever else to make an adult size center fire rifle "reasonable" for a 12 year old child. Think about it.

stalkingbear

If you haven't bought him anything yet, I have some suggestions. I've trained shooters for years, so when my daughter was ready for her 1st year of actually carrying the rifle, I let her use a pet 7mm08 I'd had for years. To make a long story short, she got 2 clean 1 shot kills her very 1st year with it! She's claimed that little 7mm08 ever since! By the way, she was the ripe old age of 11 at that time. I consider the 7mm08 to be arguably THE best all-round whitetail cartridge EVER designed of all time! Very mild recoil, extremely accurate, easy to reload for, not load picky at all in every rifle I've ever seen shot or shot personally, pretty flat trajectory, and it kills all out of proportion & well beyond what it's modest paper ballistics would suggest! It's THE perfect diameter bullet for deer hunting, being big enough to definitely do the job EVERY time, have enough weight to go as deep as needed or depending on bullet choice, but yet don't even have over 2/3 the felt recoil of the mild recoiling .308, and you can even choose elk loads as long as you stay within reasonable range, and for sure it'll do the job further out than a youth has any business shooting!

stalkingbear

If you can afford it, and can find them, the Browning A-Bolt 2 was on sale for 503$ for Composite Stalkers at budsgunshop , and if you're on a strict budget, the Ruger American in 7mm08 will shoot VERY much better than you would expect for that price, and even keep up with rifles costing hundreds of dollars more! I'd put a Nikon Monarch 5 on it with 5x zoom power adjustment range 3x-15x-40mm will let him bust up deer still hunting with it turned down all the way on 3x(the way ALL MY scopes are when hunting), but yet will zoom all the way up to 15x for a shot at extended range, predators, varmints, load development, or zeroing. If the budget won't allow that, a Nikon Prostaff 3x-9x-40mm s less than 150$, and sometimes on sale as low as 100$.

jacads

I have a new right handed 7mm-08 savage camo with a stainless barrel I got on clearance at cabelas never have shot it but when I bought a box of shells a little sticker shock at how much those rounds are. I had another person tell me to get him a 7mm-08 honestly I never would have bought that caliber except $250 on clearance was a steal. As soon as the weather warms up I will take him out and let him shoot and see what he thinks. The only two calibers he has taken deer with are a .243 and .223. We never got a shot in Ohio.

jacads

Do you think composite is better than wood?

stalkingbear

It depends. Which is more important to YOU? Composite stocks will never warp, don't have to worry about scratching them, won't split out or crack, and temp/humidity/elevation/weather will never make a composite warp. Now walnut stocks are SOOOOO much prettier than composite stocks, have a rich warm feel, and is generally preferable if you KNOW you're never going to hunt in seriously nasty weather. Having said that, at my age & disability, I figure i'm never going to be in bad weather to begin with, and I go plumb discombudglated over extremely fancy walnut, and I make SURE my wood stocks are sealed many times over what's needed on outside, inside (inletted area), I glass a aluminum block in when I glass bed them so thet cannot warp. Do YOU want something to just grab at any time, and stand up to extreme punishment, or do you want to have more pride in ownership with a stock with dazzling figure, but will scratch up during use

stalkingbear

The main difference between the "budget" factory stocks, and more expensive stocks, is the el cheapo models are simply injection molded plastic, whereas the best and lightweight or precision versions are hand laid layers of fiberglass, carbon fiber, or other material, and the best 1s have full length aluminum bedding blocks glassed in. There's a HUGE difference between those "levels" or quality if you will!

Phern

Without the least bit of doubt....30-06.