Bergers for Grizzley Bears

[scsims]

I just saw an episode of The Best of the West that they took a large bull elk at 925 yards with a 6.5-284 shooting 140 Bergers. I beleive they exclusively use Bergers on that show and they do take bears.

 

[jwp475]

penatration with a berger would be fine. Walt berger took his team to africa and hunted all big game and dangerous game with the berger and all were one shot kills. even a lion at over 400 yards. but you need to shoot a bullet you are confident in.

400 yards is not up close and personal now is it. The close shot which is more likely than not the one that's avaiable when hunting Grizz and the up close shot is when the J-4 jacketed Bergers may not penetrate as far as needed..

 

[dakor]

Bergers

I shot a Cow Elk this year around 60 to 80 yards and broke her spine with a 180 Berger out of my 7mm STW. The bullet went through and she dropped on the spot. Last year I shot a Cow at 280 yards with my 300win mag and a 210 Berger. I shot her in the lungs and the bullet exited. But I took that same 210 Berger and shot a small Doe at 50 yards quartering the bullet broke the off shoulder but did not exit and it weighed around 80 grains. After seeing what happened with the 210 on a small doe if you are going to be hunting at close range I would aim for the lungs and not the front shoulder.

 

[mikebob]

400 yards is not up close and personal now is it. The close shot which is more likely than not the one that's avaiable when hunting Grizz and the up close shot is when the J-4 jacketed Bergers may not penetrate as far as needed..

Not all shots were taken from 400 yards, most were taken way closer than that. A bullet doesn't need to exit, it needs to do enough damage to take the animal down quickly. A hard bullet gets more penetration but does less damage in the process. take some kind of shooting gel and shoot a berger, swift, accubond, grand slam all at the same speed. inbed bone if you like i did with still the same conclusion. The swift II went all the way through but little damage, accubond and grand slam did more damage than the swift but didnt do as much damage as the berger. I shot the gel block from 20 yards at 3009fps muzzle velocity. I used pig bone. I didn't test any farther shots because best of the west already did that. It was a pain in the butt to do all that testing so i ask you to do it for yourself and draw your own conclusions. berger, barns, accubond, partition, swift, grand slam are all good bullets just pick the one you have most confidense in and use it, if someone else doesn't like it who cares. I wouldn't be afraid to shoot anything with any of those bullets after i tested them.

 

[jwp475]

I do not need a lesson about bullets to kill game with. I know and have seen bullets that came apart and failed to penetrate deep enough to kill even thou the shallow wound was massive, and a hole through the vitals works very well every time even with flat point solids. Breaking bones and continuing to penetrate deeply is a bullet trait that I want on potentialy dangerous game. I seriously dought that a promotional vides from any bullet maker will ever show any downside to their product..

 

[Coues 'n' Sheep]

Outcome

I'd sure like to know how that 210 Berger does on that Griz! I think it should work great on a cavity shot.

Keep us posted!!

Thanks,

CnS

 

[eaglesnester]

Bergers for griz

Thanks for all the replies on the burgers. Many good points to consider. I plan to do some extensive range testing and reloading. Have a Beta shooting chrony to help with load development. I thought the comment about Burger bear baiting was funny as hell, it took me a second to catch on and then it was even more humorous.

Cheers&Tight Groups: Eaglesnester

 

[davewilson]

i'm with 475 on this one. a barnes, partition or A-frame would be the "whimppyist" bullets i would even consider for dangerous game.

 

[Pdvdh]

Now look what you've done Len... renamed the berger bullet company to burger bullet company. All it took was a little prod and now you've got us all confused!

 

[mikebob]

I do not need a lesson about bullets to kill game with. I know and have seen bullets that came apart and failed to penetrate deep enough to kill even thou the shallow wound was massive, and a hole through the vitals works very well every time even with flat point solids. Breaking bones and continuing to penetrate deeply is a bullet trait that I want on potentialy dangerous game. I seriously dought that a promotional vides from any bullet maker will ever show any downside to their product..

I am not giving anyone a lesson or telling anyone to use certain bullets I just stated that in the test we ran the bergers penetrated as much as any other bullet except the swift which left a little hole or the barns but the pedals broke off the barns in the gel both times so I didnt mention it. They were all stopped by the last bone except the swift II it went another 3" into the next block. Which was about 4" farther than the ohters, so if I was promoting I would have promoted the swift II. I did not tell him what bullet to use, I just told him penetration would be fine berger tested them on african game, someone else wanted to know more about it so I told him to call berger, then i got snide remarks so I gave the results of the test we ran on some bullets where berger penetrated as much as the others at 20 yrds. I never said berger was the best, I said berger did the most damage, I also said they were all good bullets pick the one you feel most confident in and use it regaurdless of what anyone else says. We did these test to prove to ourselves what bullets actually did because we've heard alot about a bullet does this or that. If you dont like the results thats fine. I dont shoot the best bullet I shoot the bullets I like, I dont shoot the best rifles I shoot what I like, That is what I tell people shoot what you like not what someone else likes. We didn't spend all that money and time to test those bullets to get into arguements about it, so just forget I ever mentioned it or the results we came up with.

 

[Coues Sniper]

mikebob, thanks for the information - especially about the testing you did with various bullets. That would be great if Berger did a dvd of that Africa trip. I'd like to see that.

 

[Natty Bumpo]

I saw an Alaska episode of Best of the West once where John Burns shot a brown bear with a 7mm Berger bullet from around 600 or 700 yards. Put him down on the spot. Not sure what the cartridge was.

Armchair experience is all I've got when it comes to bullet choice for grizzlies.

 

[Varminator 911]

Long range dangerous game

Shooting a deer or elk at long range seems far different to me than shooting lion at more than 400 yds or a brown bear at 600-700 yds. I'm sorry but that's where I draw the line. I don't care what bullet you use on dangerous game it's not a long range affair. Try that very long and you're going to get someone hurt. Black bear, that's OK, I don't consider them dangerous. But I'm surprised any guide would want to be part of brown bear or lion past 400 yds. Try that very many times and you will have a nasty mess. Who's going to go in and clean up. I hope it's the guy who pulled the trigger on such nonsence.

Furthermore, if I went after a lion or big bear, I'd want to be up close. That would be the thrill of the hunt. Take them on up close, see if you're man enough to look them in the eyes before you shoot. No long range for me here.

But hey, to each his own. Just clean up your own mess. Don't ask your guide to lead the way into the adlers.

 

[rgrjeep]

A couple of thoughts from a hunter in Alaska:

Bears can be dangerous. They will eat you if you let them.

Bears bones get stronger as they get older. They can take alot of hits on bones and shrug them off.

Shooting long range for a bear in Alaska is not recommended. With the terrain and vegetation up here it makes finding the animal difficult. Finding an animal in 20 yards of alder can be difficult. Very difficult if the bear is not quite dead yet and the alder is so thick you can't hardly get your muzzle up to make another shot.

Penetration is great. Knocking a bear on its *** is the way to go. Like mentioned before a bear can cover alot of ground quickly. A fast bullet going through a bear won't stop him. A big heavy bullet that expands quickly will slow him down for a finishing shot. I use a 45-70 for bear because it is a big bullet. I don't use straight lead because it goes through the bear but not necessarily knocking him down. Expansion slows a bear down when you need them to slow down.