Experience is invaluable. I don’t have 50 years experience but getting very close to 40. I’ve taken and been part of more than a “few” elk. I started with a 270 when I was 14. Killed elk with that rifle and non “premium” 140 gr hornady btsp’s. Those bullets killed fast but I spent my off season reading Outdoor life and the like where Jim Carmichael, Craig boddington and others told us about Magnums, kinetic energy and knockdown power and how tough these flesh and bone elk were. I drank the koolaid for years. 30-06, 300 Rum, 300 win mag, 338. I killed 10plus bulls with the 338. Partitions, Barnes you know the premium stuff.
Then I went back to a 270. Died the same. If not faster. Hmm. 7mm-08 same deal. 243 with a 95 ballistic tip. You can’t do that people say. Died the same. 6.5 with 147 eldm’s. 3 elk with that combo. No drama.
The big guns work fine but I’ll take the lighter recoil and all of the other benefits that go along with it. .
No one is arguing about the killing ability of the big magnums and premiums but the question is if it is really needed anymore.
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