The first
varmint I ever killed dropped dead not from a blazing Nosler B-Tip at warp speed,
but from a lowly Port Orford cedar shaft arrow launched with a Ben Pearson
fiberglass bow. It was the same summer that man first walked on the moon and
the only year that Mario Andretti won the Indy 500. The war in Vietnam was
still going strong and I was all of 10 years old.
While I was too
young to own my dreamed of .22, I loved that bow and the others that followed.
In time, I learned simply holding over was just not good enough and soon
purchased a bowsight – it was perhaps my first in a long line of gadgets
designed to make killing easier. Instead of guessing how far to hold over, I
simply estimated the range, plunked the appropriate sight pin on the target, and
let fly.
Of course, in
time, I soon graduated to firearms, and learned the problems of holdover were no
different than with a bow. To be sure, estimating range was a bigger challenge,
but for the longest time, I simply held the crosshairs higher, much as I did in
my bowhunting days before the purchase of that sight.
Isn’t it funny
that in a way, bowhunters have long had a method to compensate for holdover, and
yet we rifle hunters have had none, spare those brave enough to crank on target
knobs? Make no mistake, cranking on the elevation knob is the most precise
method to vaporize long-range prairie poodles, but it has two big disadvantages:
it takes time and it can create confusion. The later problem is easily remedied
by noting on the rifle stock what your reference zero is. For example, I might
note that my 200 yard zero on a 223 is “O/16” which means put the elevation knob
on zero, then go up 16 clicks. Of course, if you do not have target knobs (not
to be confused with finger-adjustable knobs), this can really get confusing,
since you have no rotation counter. But even if you do have a perfect system to
avoid confusion, the problem of time can still rear its ugly head. One possible
solution is a sight that tells you just how far to hold over, much like the
bowsights archers use. I recently tried one such scope from Burris. I
mentioned it briefly in a previous article on scopes, but after using it for a
while, I would like to share my observations with readers – it just might be
what you need to increase your odds on long range hits. And I think I was
perhaps too harsh on the concept at first glance – this system has a lot of
merit, and the obstacles, obvious at first glance, are easy to overcome.
But first,
let’s look at the scope itself. The model I used was the 6X-24X in the
Signature Series. I used this scope while testing two Remington 700 Composite
rifles. If you read the review on these rifles, you will recall that both
rifles shot around the ˝ inch mark, so this scope was certainly up to the task
of shooting accurate groups. This being The VARMINT HUNTER Magazine and not The
Surrogate Advertiser, I feel free to talk about what I did and did not like.
The scope seemed bright enough; I especially liked the “Light Collector” feature
– like a camera adjustable aperture, it allows you to control how much light
comes into the scope. The only thing I did not like on this scope were the
target adjustment knobs – 10 clicks did not quite seem to line up with 10 hash
marks on the turret. Burris uses a total of four erector assembly springs
instead of the usual two, which should result in superior adjustment
repeatability, but I did not test the reliability of the adjustments, due to the
simple fact that the reticle in this scope is designed to eliminate holdover.
Though guys like Premier Reticles have created reticles like this for years, it
really is a remarkable innovation.
