Searching for the perfect deer gun? It could be a shotgun

I was thrilled about straight-walled rifles becoming legal during the regular Ohio gun season. Since then, I have been searching for the ultimate deer rifle.

However, I have not found it nor did I ever expect to be shooting slugs again.

A lot has changed, such as the amount of hunting I am able to do and way I hunt when I can go. Through it all, a shotgun still made sense. Plus, the guns have become more specialized, so I can get what I need from one.

Another realization concerned reloading shotshells and slugs. Like taking up fly-fishing and enjoying the fly-tying as much as the fishing, you do not plan for such things to happen.

A gun nut I know may have fostered my shotgun decision without even trying.

MORE FIREARMS COVERAGE FROM OUTDOOR NEWS:

A little shotgun maintenance will improve your accuracy this hunting season

Interested in using shooting sticks this hunting season? You’ve got options

Speed, weight, and design: Identifying the best modern bullets for hunting whitetails

I asked him a few years ago – knowing his background with rifles – what caliber he hunts with. “I hunt with my 1100,” he said. The surprise on my face prompted him to go on. “I have yet to find anything that puts a deer down like my 1100. Why should I change?”

Another potential reason may have been a video put out by a firearms manufacturer, comparing its .400 Legend with the company’s rifled-barrel 20-gauge. The results showed nearly identical wound channels in ballistic gel at 200 yards, both had energy dumps in the first 8 inches, ideal results for what you want from a deer cartridge.

The .400 Legend showed slightly more channel trauma and total penetration (by about three inches), but otherwise, the ballistic gel-blocks showed little difference out to 200 yards. The accuracy from the .400 Legend was as expected. For me, though, the 20-gauge was impressive, a 4-inch group at 200 yards.

Recently I purchased a 20-gauge single shot, designed for turkey hunting. It’s a gun of similar principle to a deer gun, shooting at a still target. A shotgun with slugs makes an excellent brush gun. The 20-gauge provides plenty of power for deer, with less recoil than a 12-gauge.

Equipped with a front sight, picatinny rail, sling swivels, and choke tube threads, it is ready for the field. An affordable field gun takes me back to my roots of using a shotgun for everything. From squirrel hunting in September to deer in late November, I was in familiar territory.

If you need a deer rifle and are uncertain, the 20-gauge is one way to get started with a multipurpose gun. There will be recoil, but turkey guns have generous recoil pads. At the range, a recoil-absorbing shooting rest helps when sighting in, as does shooting offhand for practice. You do not feel it as much.

A shotgun of any kind can be used as a dedicated deer gun. A slug gun comes ready to go, a combo is equipped with a smoothbore and rifled barrel. You can use a pump action, semiautomatic, even a bolt gun if you wish.

Slug or sabot?

A podcast from an arms and ammunition manufacturer said its premier sabot slug was one of its best-ammunition sellers online and in retail stores.

It amused the host to say sales are brisk, such that consumer complaints continue over availability in stores, not the price, which is much higher than rifle cartridges.

I prefer the old-fashioned rifled slugs in a smoothbore, and a rifled choke tube. The Carlson’s tube instructions said I can shoot slugs, rifled slugs, and sabots. It has a 0.10 constriction and 1 in 35 twist, for patterns at ranges of 75-100 yards, plenty of range for the average deer hunt.

A sabot is best fired through a fully rifled barrel to avoid keyhole landings, common with smoothbores and choke tubes.

When using a rifled choke tube, it helps to put automotive anti-seize compound on the threads, then check for tightening after every couple of shots. Constricted tubes that have rifling tighten a smidge with each shot.

I reload practice slugs with tailing-device wads that are accurate enough to hunt with at 50 yards, but will hunt with factory slugs, which are good to 100 yards.

After the initial sight-in at 50, I zeroed in at 75 yards, far enough. From there, I shot the four types of factory slugs sold locally to see if any stood out in performance.

Not sure if I have found a better deer gun, the perfect one may not exist. Until then, I will continue practicing for opening day. Toting a shotgun again will feel like old times.