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One other point on finding ammo,

If you're out in the sticks where the deer are, a small-town gun store will likely have as good a selection of deer cartridges as you could find in an all-day shopping trip around DFW for them. You will probably pay more for them though at the little store.

The Annoyed Man wrote:

mgood wrote:A wise man told me that it's better to put a thousand dollar scope on a hundred dollar rifle than it is to put a hundred dollar scope on a thousand dollar rifle.

That wise man was right, but the reason I said "a good rule of thumb for a rifle/scope budget is to spend roughly the same amount on your scope as you did for the rifle," is that a man who will buy a $250 rifle instead of a $1,000 rifle is not likely to be a man who will spend $1,000 to put a scope on that $250 rifle. And a $1000 scope that will give you 15 minutes of extra light to shoot by at the beginning and end of the day, won't be much help to you on a rifle that isn't accurate enough to place a shot through some trees in that low light. But a $1,000 scope mounted on a $1,000 rifle gives you lots of options.

Right, absolutely.
Point was just don't cheap out on the scope. At the gun store where I worked, we often had a customer who wanted to buy a $1300 rifle and then went looking at the cheapest scopes they could find. The owner of the store would tell them they had it backwards. If you have to save money somewhere, you can get a good rifle relatively inexpensively. Spend your money on good glass.

From what I've seen, .243, .270, and .30-06 along with .223 and .308 are about the most common, easy-to-find-anywhere rifle calibers.

.223 Remington is a little light, in my opinion, but plenty of deer and other game have been taken with it. Shot placement becomes extremely important to make a humane kill with a small caliber like that though.

.22-250 Remington, along the same lines, is like a .223 on steroids. Much faster and flatter shooting. Considered more of a prairie dog sort of round, but it'll kill anything a .223 will and then some. Fairly common.

.243 Winchester is an extremely popular deer rifle cartridge. Some states (not TX or NM) have a minimum of .24 caliber for deer and the .243 is the smallest common caliber that meets that requirement. It's a typical first deer rifle for a kid or a woman - anyone who doesn't want something with a lot of recoil, but there's nothing unmanly about it. Just not all that much to say for it either except that it meets the minimums. Very easy to find.

.270 Winchester, now you're getting somewhere. Very common/popular deer cartridge. Very easy to find. More umph than a .243.

In the same class as the .270, I prefer a .25-06 Remington. It's a .30-06 necked down to .25 caliber. Very fast and flat shooting. Similar energy as a .270, a little lighter, a little faster. Maybe not quite as common but certainly not uncommon. You might find ammo at Wal-Mart. If not, any gun store would have it. Awesome for coyotes. For hoggs, you may prefer the heavier .270 in that comparison.

.30-06 Springfield and .308 Winchester are almost identical, ballistically. If you have one, you don't need the other. The .308 cartridge is shorter than the .30-06, allowing it to be chambered in shorter actions. These thirty-caliber cartridges are going to hit your shoulder and your wallet a little harder than the lighter calibers mentioned. They are GREAT all-around cartridges though. It's really rare that you're going to need anything larger for North American game. (Lots of magnum calibers, 300 Winchester Magnum, 7mm Remington Magnum, et cetera, are wildly popular for deer and elk, but they seldom kill anything that you couldn't have killed just as dead with a .30-06. If I was hunting grizzly bear, I might prefer something larger, just to make sure )

Of course, there are a hundred other good choices. But .223, .243, .270, .308, and .30-06 are the most common (easy to find), IMO.

.308 is a good cartridge for just about anything from coyotes to elk.

Hard to go wrong with a Kimber.


What's your budget?

A wise man told me that it's better to put a thousand dollar scope on a hundred dollar rifle than it is to put a hundred dollar scope on a thousand dollar rifle.

I like Leupold or maybe Sightron. If your pockets are a little deeper, you might want a Swarovski.