Remember your First ML kill?

Muzzleloading Forum

Help Support Muzzleloading Forum:

This site may earn a commission from merchant affiliate links, including eBay, Amazon, and others.

Stykbow

50 Cal.
Joined
Aug 2, 2021
Messages
1,080
Reaction score
2,537
If you guys can remember your first kill with a ML, let’s hear about it. Remember, we love pics so if you have a pic of that first kill share it with us if you would.

The only thing I’ve killed with a traditional ML is a few squirrels. I can say that I vividly remember it though. Punched a perfect 50 ca hole thru him. Killed a bunch of squirrels with that first rifle, killed a bunch of deer with a modern ML, but not a traditional one. Hoping to change that this season. Should changed last season, but I kept coming up with new and exciting ways to screw it up.
 
Well now, not really sure I remember exactly. First bow kill was a bear, followed by a 5x5 bull elk at 3 paces that same season. Muzzleloader was most likely a mule deer but can’t say for certain.
Walk
 
I know it was a medium size doe. We didn't buy beef for the rest of the year. All the red meat I served was venison. But I can't remember if it was the one I shot in that one place, or the other place or the other place... All my hunts over the years seem to have blended into single memory set. Getting older....and it has always been in the same type of situation. Forest hunting on or near trails out in the country. :)
 
My first deer was downed with my newly built from kit TC Hawkins 50 cal, in 1975. I used a Maxi ball. I found out that was not necessary. Round balls will do just fine. I didn't like having to pound a maxi down the bore anyway.
 
My parents got me a CVA Kentucky rifle kit in 1979. I assembled it in 8th grade shop class. I shot a ton of small game with my CVA Kentucky rifle. Birds, rabbits, etc. But the first Big Game was a Bearded Hen Rio Grande Turkey. I had cast the .440 prb, 60grs ffg, Remington #11 caps. I had a rest about 40 yards. She dropped at the shot.
I think I was 16.
 
Thinking about your question, I really can't remember my first.
I've taken a lot of deer with traditional guns over the years.
My last, however was a spike buck that I shot last season with my old CVA Mountain Stalker. 80 grains (V) of 2f Swiss under a Hornady PA conical bullet. The shot was at about 40 yards.
20211025_085444.jpg
 
Thinking about your question, I really can't remember my first.
I've taken a lot of deer with traditional guns over the years.
My last, however was a spike buck that I shot last season with my old CVA Mountain Stalker. 80 grains (V) of 2f Swiss under a Hornady PA conical bullet. The shot was at about 40 yards. View attachment 167277
 
1971, perched on a high rock on a mountain in Pendleton County WV. Killed a spike buck with a H& R break action. Was hooked for life!
 
180 lb. 6 pointer. Shot in the last two minutes of legal light.
Problem with dark and old age, every time I pulled the barrel up, I could see the front sight. Whet I steadied, the sight disappeared. Soooo.... I sat there with the gun up, making small circles with the barrel. As long as it was moving, I could see both sights. It just became a matter of touching off the shot as the circle passed by his shoulder. 85 grains of fff, 50 cal.;)
 
I
I've taken a lot of animals and birds over the years but nothing with a BP gun of any kind. Came to BP stuff late in life and between not being drawn for anything and some health barriers haven't hunted with BP guns. I did hunt javelina one year back in 97 but didn't get a shot with my deceased wife's .36 cal Seneca.
 
I was hunting on the newly opened Carter Mountain Mgt Area in TN with an unmentionable H&R Huntsman in .45. A spike fed by, I took a shot, he kept on feeding like nothing happened, I thought I missed him. He fed on for about 20 yards and fell over dead. I sold the Huntsman and bought a .50 TC Hawken for more punch.

This was in about 1974 give or take a year.
 
My first ML kill was a white tail buck killed on public land in Kansas. Me and my brother both had tags but I was going to wait for firearms season. My brother had a new cap lock 54cal muzzleloader that he had zeroed and practiced with. We both went out during muzzleloader season and I was just going to observe. When a buck walked up the draw it was blocked by a tree. I had a shot so my brother slid me the muzzleloader. I had never even fired the muzzleloader but I aimed and fired at the buck (me and my brother both sight in the same way). The buck staggered only around 10 yards and fell over. The lee REAL hit through both lungs and nicked the heart and lodged just under the skin on the far side. It was my first time I had ever fired a muzzle loader and I was hooked. It turns out it was also my largest deer to date (12 point total). Sorry for the blurred faces we are just security conscious.
E8A07818-B269-4BF6-BD4A-B49CFBEE9DA6.jpeg
 
I have put a bunch of deer on the ground over the years, the first muzzleloader kill was with a C.V.A. 54 cal mountain rifle 80 grs. 3 f .530 ball and 15 thousands pillow tick patch lubed with crisco, big 8 point at about 40 yards perfect heart shot, the deer made a run in a circular route around me as I watched the blood pump out of him went about 80 yards as I re-loaded the rifle watching him the further he went the lower and slower he got until finally crumpling up. He will not be the last, been watching four really nice bucks since late summer the one is at least a 10 point and has a drop tine on his right side, hope he hangs around for another 2 weeks then we are goinge to turn the .62 cal morovian loose on him. Frost this morning time is getting close for a date with this fella.
 
My second muzzleloader deer hunt. I was with a friend hunting west of Oak City Utah. We didn't see any deer. We had walked couple miles when i kicked up a jack rabbit. I shouldered my rifle and my friend said you won't hit it. I took the shot and connected.
 
Yes I went on a doe hunt in south Texas. I was the only one using a muzzle loader No one expected me to get anything. Two does came out the first morning about 80 yards from my assigned blind. I shot high and hit her in the spine and she immediately went down and started screaming.After the smoke cleared the other doe came back so I had a ramrod going out the window of my assigned box and made much better shot on the second doe. 1981 Johnathan Browning Mountain Rifle 50 cal 1/60,90 gr 490 ball 18 patch. I still have the rifle wish I would have bought more.
 
Not really sure of my first deer with BP and never had a camera with me when I dropped one. But I do remember my last one and have a photo of it. I found a deer trail being used and climbed up in a nearby ladder stand. Soon a big doe came along, looked behind her and took off running. I've shot moving deer with a muzzleloader before and was confident I could pull off the shot. I was using my .62 flintlock smoothbore with a 330 grn patched ball over 70 or 75 grains of 3F (can't recall which). At the shot she went straight up in the air and came back down right in her hoof prints. I heard a noise and looked back where she had come from and barely saw a big deer, buck I'm sure, scamper away. Maybe if I'd waited a few more seconds I'd have shot a buck? The shot was paced out later and proved to be just barely over 20 yards. The doe was still breathing slightly so I put a "coup de grace" shot into her back.
PICT0586-2.jpg
 
Back
Top