Choosing the Right Caliber for Deer Hunting

By Jason Baird

Which caliber long gun (and its associated ammunition) to select when hunting deer is an age-old topic among experienced hunters, something that confuses the neophyte hunters I’ve known. Judging from anecdotal evidence regarding web searches and online posting popularity, it is the subject of much angst.

The topic is more complex than it would seem on the surface, because of the variables involved – firearm characteristics (length, weight, magazine capacity if not a single-shot and perceived recoil are some), ammunition performance in general and in a specific firearm, expected distance from the hunter to the deer and the characteristics of the terrain where the hunting takes place. So, I decided to revamp the usual method of promoting one caliber or another and instead to talk about the similarities and differences among them. I’m not going to include all the possible rifle calibers available that may be used for deer hunting; due to article length limitations, I’m only going to outline ones applicable to guns from the Rossi line.

Regarding my credentials for this subject, I am a ballistics and explosives engineer who runs a small business that (among other things) performs ballistic testing on armor concepts for other firms. I am also an expert legal witness on topics regarding the effects of ballistic impact and shock hydrodynamics on objects. I am a hunter, and have successfully pursued the wily whitetail deer in several different areas of the country.

To start with, naming of calibers is an arcane combination of art, merchandising and engineering; don’t be confused by trying to decipher them unless you are into that sort of thing. Just make sure that the caliber label on the box matches the caliber engraved on the rifle barrel or receiver. You don’t have to use a Remington gun to shoot calibers named “XXX Remington,” or a Winchester gun for Winchester named calibers (good luck finding a “Creedmoor” gun company; Creedmoor is the name of an extinct but famous rifle range on Long Island, New York).

Generally, the first two or three numbers of a name mean the caliber belongs to a general group of calibers separated by the bore diameters of the guns that use them. For example, the .30-30, .30-’06, .300 AAC Blackout and .308 are each .30 caliber rounds.

Also, good shot placement is what kills a deer – no matter what small arms caliber rifle the hunter uses. Be sure you know where to place your shot on a deer from all aspect angles; a heart-lung shot is a good one because that volume (it is three-dimensional) is the largest kill area. There are several YouTube videos that show where the lungs and heart reside inside a deer. The main thing when you are setting up for a shot is to mentally draw a straight line from you to the deer’s heart, and then aim for the spot on the deer’s hide where that line passes through.

So, choose a rifle and caliber combination you can shoot well from just about any field position (standing unsupported, standing supported, sitting supported, etc.) and shoot it enough to build confidence that you can make a killing shot before you go deer hunting.

Given good shot placement, the calibers I’ll discuss are each completely capable of clean kills on deer within the ammo’s effective range. I’ll also discuss each caliber’s limitations, if any. The effective ranges I cite are for the typical hunter; trying to reach out farther makes good shot placement imperative for a clean kill. Every bullet loses energy while in flight to its target, some do so faster than others, so know the range limitation for your specific firearm + cartridge system. In addition, whatever rifle/caliber combination you choose, be sure to test-fire the specific cartridges in your chosen gun before you go out to the hunting field. Some combos of rifle and cartridge brand/bullet weight/powder load work really well together, but some are miserable to deal with. Each of the calibers has some sweet-shooting family members, and each has some real boogers (heavy recoil, bad muzzle blast, etc.) – depending on the gun you use. The only way to tell for sure is to test fire.

As always, be sure to consult the deer hunting regulations for the state in which you will hunt. Some states restrict the calibers and types of firearms that can be used. As far as the maximum range at which to shoot at a deer-sized animal is concerned, the oft-cited minimum energy for an ethical kill is for a bullet to deliver 500 foot-pounds on the target. To help you get an idea of the limitations of the cartridges you might be investigating for your deer gun, use one of the several energy calculators online (for example, https://larrywillis.com/bullet-energy.html), combined with ballistic tables published by ammo manufacturers. Just be sure to choose cartridges specifically designed for hunting deer and other medium-sized game, to ensure the projectiles (bullets) have enough velocity remaining to perform well when they hit the animals. Your part as hunter to make this performance happen as designed is to ensure you understand your gun + ammo system range limitation, combined with your capability to place the shot for an effective kill, and not to attempt shots at animals outside that envelope.

Another rule of thumb is that increasing caliber in a given weapon design increases the felt recoil experienced by the shooter, so take that in account during your selection process.

Deer Hunting Rifle Calibers

6.5 Creedmoor

Let’s lead off with what seems to be the latest most popular kid on the block, or so it seems – the 6.5 Creedmoor. Rossi chambers one of its LWC (Lightweight Carbine) single-shot guns in this caliber. The round was designed in 2007, originally for long-range target shooting competitions, hence the Creedmoor name. The 6.5 in its name is the approximate caliber – .264 in inches. Since it was designed from the get-go as an accurate long-range round, hunters have picked-up on it for shooting medium-sized game (like deer) at longer ranges. The cartridges fit in short-action rifles. For deer, cartridges using bullets around 140 grains in weight and designed for medium-sized game work well out to about 300 yards. So, if the 6.5 Creedmoor is in your plans, be sure to secure a good source of ammunition prior to your hunt, and test it in your gun.

Pistol Calibers in Long Guns (.357 S&W Magnum, .44 Remington Magnum, .45 Colt, .454 Casull)

Rossi chambers several of its traditional R92 and newer R95 lever-action long guns in these calibers. The longer barrels of these carbines and rifles, combined with not having a cylinder gap in the R92 and R95 that allows propellant gases to escape during firing, help pistol caliber cartridges to produce higher muzzle velocities from them than from revolver firearms. Rossi also builds the Circuit Judge revolver-carbine in .45 Colt (and .410 shotgun), that has a longer barrel than pistols, so muzzle velocities of rounds fired from it will be higher. I know revolvers will kill deer at shorter ranges (50 yards or less through personal experience), and skilled hunters sometimes hunt with them exclusively. Larger calibers, when combined with the higher velocities attainable from long guns, will allow you to make ethical kill shots at longer ranges out to 100 yards.

.300 AAC Blackout (or simply .300 BLK)

This cartridge was developed for military use in M4 carbine firearms, giving better performance with subsonic ammunition in a suppressed weapon than 9 x 19 mm pistol ammo, and better short-range terminal performance through short-barreled firearms with supersonic ammo than the standard 5.56 mm NATO cartridge. We civilians benefit from this development, because it gives us a larger caliber (i.e., heavier bullet) medium-range performer that fits in a short chamber. As with the 6.5 Creedmoor, Rossi produces an LWC platform in .300 BLK. There are several manufacturers that supply ammunition suitable for deer hunting in this caliber, with bullet weights typically ranging from 125 to 150 grains. Use supersonic ammo designed for deer hunting, and keep your shots to about 200 yards or less.

.30-30 Winchester

Believe it or not, this cartridge has been around since 1895 and was one of the first small-bore rifle calibers designed to use smokeless powder. Rossi chambers several of its newer R95 lever-action long guns in this calibers. Designed to use a .30 caliber bullet on a case containing 30 grains of powder, this cartridge is still one of the most popular for deer hunting. It generates about the same recoil as the .243 Winchester, but with worse downrange performance. One of the reasons why this cartridge suffers in performance compared with newer guys is that the cartridges must be safe to load in the tubular magazine of a lever-action rifle. So, pointy bullets with good ballistic characteristics are a no-no, as their points could possibly set-off the primer of the next cartridge in the magazine during recoil. In an effort to overcome this limitation, companies created new bullet designs with polymer tips that are not supposed to set-off the primers of other cartridges in a tubular magazine. A typical 150-grain bullet-loaded cartridge can effectively kill deer out to about 150 yards.

.350 Legend, .360 Buckhammer

These calibers are part of a particular niche in the deer hunting world. Each can be used, as far as I am aware, in states that for some reason have decided that bottlenecked rifle cartridges, such as the 6.5 Creedmoor, are verboten for deer hunting. Rossi produces a version of its LWC chambered for .350 Legend, and R95 models chambered in .360 Buckhammer. Each of these calibers features a straight-walled case design, with the .350 Legend introduced by Winchester in 2019 and the .360 Buckhammer introduced by Remington in 2023 specifically for use in those states. The .350 was developed to have enough energy to kill deer out to 200 yards; the .360 has slightly better performance than the .350. Each will kill deer at ranges beyond what the typical lever-action rifle shooter can effective utilize accurately

.444 Marlin, .45-70 Government (or .45-70 Springfield)

Rossi produces a version of its R95 chambered in .444 Marlin. The .444 Marlin is another straight-walled design, but it was developed by Remington (and Marlin) in the mid-1960s to fill a gap in large caliber lever-action gun choices that was left due to the near-disappearance of the .45-70 caliber chambering in then-new rifles. The .444 Marlin is only slightly less capable, ballistically, than the (modern) .45-70 cartridge, and will fire a 240 grain bullet at velocities creating over 3,000 foot-pounds of energy at the gun muzzle.

So, what about the venerable .45-70? Designed in 1872 as a black powder cartridge, the .45-70 has experienced a comeback in the past few years. Rossi chambers its lever-action R95 model in .45-70 caliber. A straight-walled cartridge firing bullets typically weighing from 300 to 500 grains, modern .45-70 ammunition is capable of killing deer-sized game out to several hundred yards – depending on the firearm and the specific ammunition used. Because of their relatively heavy weight, bullets from each of these calibers have high, arching trajectories to long ranges that must be accounted for by the shooter.

So there you have it – a primer on deer hunting rifle + ammunition systems.

About the Author

Jason Baird is a retired Air Force B-52 navigator and “rocket scientist” and also, a retired professor of mining and explosives engineering. He owns and operates Loki Incorporated, a successful small business participating in a wide range of energetic materials and ballistic resistance topics and performing test and expert witness services. As a hobby, he enjoys building useful stuff out of wood and steel. He also runs a brush hog on his own property, and enjoys using a wide variety of power tools. Oh, and he’s known as “Dr. Bomb,” or “the Bomb,” to friends.