A good read on the roll of the spotter in Long Range Hunting

http://www.longrangehunting.com/articles/spotter.php

I'm not a proponent of long range hunting, though I do enjoy long the challenge of long range shooting as a sport. I guess I've just seen to many animals wounded and not recovered over 45 years of hunting by folks shooting way past their ability to say it's sporting to shoot animals at super long ranges.

This type of shooting really requires some special equipment and training to be effective. I've seen lots of hunters just buy a rifle in a long range caliber and start shooting at animals at the 600 to 1200 yard ranges with terrible results. I've watched them knock down or seemingly miss an elk or deer and when it got up and ran away or just ran they just left rather than check to see if they made a killing hit or if the animal was wounded.

I know this happens within regular ranges too, but it seems to happen with the folks shooting at longer ranges more.

I've got a friend whom harvests game far past my comfortable range and he's a precision long range shot and has the equipment and ability to go along with his hunting skills.

He's never lost a game animal out to 800 yards to this point. 800 yards is about the limit of his shooting. He uses both a 300 Remington Ultra-mag that has been blue-printed and has a premium 28 inch barrel with a muzzle brake added. He's using Leupold ballistic plex reticles that have been muessauged by Leupold for the exact loads he uses.

His other long range rifle is a 7mm STW that has had the same treatment. Rangefinders, spotting scopes and bipods follow along and are used extensively. I can't tell you how much this young fella has invested, but it's a major piece of cash for his hunting hobby.

Shooting at game within reasonable ranges seems much more sporting to me. Spot and stalk folks like the challange of getting into reasonable shooting ranges of game rather than making the "long range shooting" the sport of hunting.

As far as the spotter goes, the article is right on. Anytime someone shoots at ranges in excess of 800 yards having that other pair of experienced eyes is a really good idea. Rifles capable of those ranges usually don't let you watch your hits thru the scope and those other eyes with a good scope or binocs can be a real help.

Bob, I agree with you about shooting past your ability whether that is 100 yards or 800 yards, but that is about a persons ethics more than about the type of hunting he or she does. Yes it does take a lot of investment in the proper equipment to be a good ethical long range hunter VS. a long range lead slinger the 2 or not the same.I once pasted up a shot at a beautiful 6X6 Bull Elk (the best that I have ever seen while hunting) because I knew that I could not make the shot.Was it at long range no it was 100 yards or a little less. The reason that I could not make the shot is because I was too winded and could not keep him in the scope because of my heavy breathing. As I posted in the other thread on shooting uphill or downhill at various angles there is a lot to know yet it is not insurmountable. For many hunting situations A simple balistics card with your drops in 25 yard increments will work fine yet for other situations I use a pocket computor to inable me to imput the exact conditions for the shot at the moment. I remember when I got heavy into handgun hunting in the 70s many people looked down on that type of hunting, but now handgun hunting is fairly well accepted.
If I can't shot with a high degree of certanty of making a killing shot, then I see no reson to shoot. There is a proper way to hunt at long range and if one is not willing to do it properly then I suggest that they are no different than any other type of slob hunter at any range.

I think you've hit the nail on the head about hunter ethics and long range game shooting.

Some of the hype for long range shooting goes right to several of the gun makers doors. I'm a Remington fan, but when they developed both the STW in 7mm by necking down the 8mm Rem mag to 284 and the development of the Ultra-mags they advertised laser like shooting at long ranges with these guns.

I personally know several folks that bought into that argument and ended up finding out that even a 180 grain bullet at almost 3400 fps did drop and had it's limitations.

I wouldn't call some of the folks that bought into that argument slob hunters either, just really uninformed and suceptable to the same type of advertising that sells corvettes to 50 year guys trying to relive their youth. Ok where did I put the toupee?

Uninformed is a bad combination as well, I agree. With the help of web sites such as this one hopefuly we can educate those that or not informed and they can make an intelligent well informed decision on the type of hunting that they or comfortable with and proficient in, whether that is rifle, handgun, bow and arrow, Long or short or intermediate range hunting.. I post groups on here at various times inorder to show what is possible, to give those that might be interested a look at the possibilities and to realize that the limits are often ourselves and only because we do not know the possibilities..