I am continuing my field testing of the 6.5 Grendel CCB MKZ bullets and so far they have done well. Here, I have switched back to the 118 gr. version, not because the 105s weren't doing a good job (they were) but because I had more 118s on hand than 105s and I thought I might need more for the large group of hogs I was going to stalk. As it turned out, by the time I got to the sounder with my noisy cattle posse in tow, I had more than enough 105s to do the job.
This really bummed me out. I spot a group of hogs from the gate. A bunch of cattle are bedded just east of the gate. I change out ammo, reset the scope to the correct zero for the heavier ammo, then scan with my rifle before starting my trek up to the hogs. The hogs are some 330-350 yards away. They are NE of me and the wind is out of the south. So I come through the gate and the cattle become agitated. As I start to move away to the NW to keep from being winded, about half the cattle get up and RUN ahead of me. The rest get up and start to follow. So I jink (walking) back to the NE to keep from spooking the cattle ahead of me and they RUN ahead of me again. This is all rather noisy and we go through this process about 4 times with me angling back to the west to get them out from between the hogs and me and the hogs take notice of the commotion and start disappearing over the hill. I get my rifle on the sounder and what was 30 or more hogs is now just 7. Sometimes cattle are great cover for sound or movement. Sometimes, they are terrible. Had they just walked along with me, there would not have been a problem, I don't think, but the running, the thrumming of the hooves on the ground like there was some sort of repeated crisis just was not helping me at all, LOL.
This really bummed me out. I spot a group of hogs from the gate. A bunch of cattle are bedded just east of the gate. I change out ammo, reset the scope to the correct zero for the heavier ammo, then scan with my rifle before starting my trek up to the hogs. The hogs are some 330-350 yards away. They are NE of me and the wind is out of the south. So I come through the gate and the cattle become agitated. As I start to move away to the NW to keep from being winded, about half the cattle get up and RUN ahead of me. The rest get up and start to follow. So I jink (walking) back to the NE to keep from spooking the cattle ahead of me and they RUN ahead of me again. This is all rather noisy and we go through this process about 4 times with me angling back to the west to get them out from between the hogs and me and the hogs take notice of the commotion and start disappearing over the hill. I get my rifle on the sounder and what was 30 or more hogs is now just 7. Sometimes cattle are great cover for sound or movement. Sometimes, they are terrible. Had they just walked along with me, there would not have been a problem, I don't think, but the running, the thrumming of the hooves on the ground like there was some sort of repeated crisis just was not helping me at all, LOL.
