The Stubblefield at Sunset

by Glen E. Fryxell

(originally published in One Good Shot, the journal of the Thompson-Center Association)

            America’s heartland has been lovingly described as “purple mountain’s majesty and amber waves of grain”, and there is perhaps no better summation of eastern Washington.  The Selkirks, the Blues, the Cascades, and miles upon miles of seemingly endless wheat fields, not to mention world famous Walla Walla sweet onions, corn and potatoes.  This is rugged, basalt-encrusted country that is graced with well-excercised, grain-fed venison.  Not too bad of a place to hunt deer, either.

            The Snake River slices through this rustic land, creating a labyrinth of canyons and brush-choked draws, forming ideal haunts for the many mule deer in the area.  The fingers of woodlands that extend between the wheat fields are favored by the whitetail population.  In the particular area that we hunt, there is almost a tangible dividing line between the two deer populations: the uphill (wheat field) side of Tramway Road (so-named for the old hand-built tram that took the wheat harvest down through the treacherous canyons to the river) is whitetail country, and the downhill (canyon) side is mulie country.  The mulies will occasionally exploit the upper wheatfields for an escape route, but mainly so they can get around a threat and back to their beloved canyons.

            Over the years, our group has done pretty well hunting in this country.  The majority of the 40 or so deer that we have taken out of these canyons over the last couple of decades have fallen to one “flavor” of Contender or another.  A while back I stumbled across a 10” 7 TCU barrel (complete with Redding dies) for a very friendly price.  I picked it up for no other reason than I had never worked with this cartridge in this particular barrel length before.  As I set up to load some fireforming loads, it became quite clear that this barrel had a much shorter throat (about .200”) than the newer 14” barrel that one of my hunting partners hunts with (almost .500”).

            A quick query to the President of the Thompson-Center Association (Thanks Joe!) confirmed my suspicions, that this barrel was early production (first year of production, in fact) and the chambers were cut with a shorter throat and the barrels were cut with a slightly slower 1-in-10 twist.  The original concept was that the 7 TCU would be a hunting cartridge and that the case capacity was best suited for the 100-120 grain bullets (the silhouette shooters later lobbied T/C and got the spec’s changed to a 1-in-9 twist with a longer throat to allow for long seating of the 140 grain bullets needed to topple over any stubborn rams).  This was an unexpected bonus, since this handy little 10” tube loaded with 120 grain bullets would be ideally suited to hunting deer in the rugged canyons of the Snake River. 

            I decided to use this 7 TCU for a late season doe tag that happened to be burning a hole in my pocket.  Some quick load development revealed this little barrel to be a real tack-driver with the 100 grain Hornady HP paired with AA 2460 and the 120 Nosler Ballistic Tip launched with a stiff dose of BL-C(2) (which is an excellent all-round powder for the 7 TCU).  The Hornady HP will be saved for summertime varminting and the Nosler BT selected for deer.  Both loads gave over 2100 fps and excellent accuracy out of this little 10” tube. Sighted in for 1 1/2” high at 100 yards puts the 120 BT pretty much dead-on at 150 and 4” low at 200 yards.  Also along for this trip was my 7 1/2” .45 Colt Ruger Blackhawk.  I had finally tracked down a Lyman 452424 HP mould (the hollow-point version of the classic Keith SWC) and found it to be extremely accurate when pushed to 1300 fps with W296.  The stage was set to hunt.

            The weather was beautiful for the first day of hunting, and we did find some deer.  I got a shot with the .45 Colt, but the bullet encountered some vegetation and was deflected off into the Unknown missing her completely. Day One ended with no venison hanging from the huge pine in our camp down on the Snake River.

            The second day was just as beautiful and it dawned with me snuggled into the rimrock overlooking a favorite canyon, about a mile and a half away from our “jumping off point”.  Spending a few hours surveying some major deer highways resulted in seeing only a handful of deer (and they were out of range), I got up and worked through a few brushy draws and ended up a couple of miles away in another of my favorite canyons.  Once again, setting up above a major deer highway resulted in seeing no deer (but I did see a fair number of chukar, huns, quail, dove, pheasant and a flock of turkeys).  As the sun started to sink in the sky, I once again decided to go roust out a few of the neighboring brush-choked draws and see if I couldn’t kick out a few deer.  No such luck.

            Kyle had gotten his deer earlier in the day (a mulie, also with a 7 TCU, a long-throated Super 14” with the 140 BT), so he and Ed were already back at camp skinning and washing the meat.  Being up in the hunting fields alone, I didn’t want to shoot anything down in the canyons just before dark, because getting venison out of those canyons alone is a major chore and Lower Granite Dam closes early in the winter (our camp was on the other side of the Snake River and I needed to be able to drive across the dam to get to it -- this was all taking place before 9/11 and we could still drive across the dam at that point).  So, I  worked my way up towards the wheat fields as the sun turned to kiss the horizon.

            As I crested the top of the hill, I stopped to re-live Kyle’s shot from what he and Ed had told me earlier in the day.  “Let’s see...the deer crossed there,  Kyle swung around here, stalked around behind that knoll, and shot from there, and the deer were over there...”  From this vantage point on top of the world, there were miles and miles of Snake River, canyons and wheat fields, beautifully illuminated by the rosy western sunset.  It was worth soaking in for a while, so I did.

            I turned the truck out onto Tramway Road and headed back towards camp, with thoughts of a hearty dinner, a glass of wine and a good night’s sleep.  As I came around a bend in the dirt road, a lone whitetail came into view, standing in the middle of one of Roger’s stubble-fields off to the left.  There was no cover of any kind between us, no bushes, no trees, no fenceline, and I knew if I just stopped the truck in plain sight that the deer would certainly spook.  100 yards ahead of me, there was one lone silo, just off the road, on the left.  I decided to try an experiment -- I took my foot off the gas and slowly and quietly coasted to a stop, right behind the silo.  Grabbing the Contender and some ammo, I slid quietly out of the truck.  Sneaking up behind the silo, I got down and slowly belly-crawled around the perimeter of the silo (on the shaded side) and out to the last line of weeds and bunchgrass, bordering the harvested field.  The whitetail hadn’t moved.  Roger’s discs had turned volleyball-sized dirt clods on the edge of the wheat stubble, one of which made a dandy impromptu field rest.  Examining the whitetail through the 4x Burris confirmed that it was indeed a doe.  She was facing away from me, looking back over her back trying to figure out what happened to that truck that disappeared behind the silo a few minutes ago.  Not being suitably armed for a “Texas heart shot”, I waited for a better presentation.  This took several minutes, as she continued to feed in place and periodically look back to inspect the silo.  I used this time to estimate the range (150 yards), and then check and re-check that estimate.  Finally, she took two steps to her right, giving me a classic broadside presentation.  The crosshairs locked on to her right shoulder and the 120 grain Ballistic Tip was launched as if by reflex.  The bullet’s impact was clearly audible, followed by the nasal whine as the deformed slug sailed off over the wheat-stubble beyond her.  Her reaction was the typical jump/lunge/kick of a heart-shot animal, followed by an all-out, full-throttle sprint.  After covering 50-60 yards, she piled up in a dramatic triple forward roll.  As I began to stand up, she regained her feet and took 3 or 4 drunken steps before finally succumbing to her wounds.  The 120 BT had entered about 1/3 of the way up on the right shoulder, shredded the forward portions of both lungs, took off about the top quarter of the heart and exited through the middle of the left shoulder.  Expansion was excellent at an estimated impact velocity of about 1900 fps.  Dynamite does indeed come in small packages.  Very accurate dynamite, I might add.

            As I approached the lifeless whitetail, I reflected on the spectacular stage setting upon which she had played out her final scene.  Soaking in all the autumn colors and the vivid sunset, the tired-muscle afterglow of a day spent hunting the canyons, the satisfaction of one well-placed, cleanly killing shot -- ah yes, to bask in the timeless pleasures of the hunt!  The warmth of these sentiments was brutally punctuated by a cold slap from reality -- the sun was already setting, it would be dark soon and I needed to get back across the dam.  With this motivation, the field dressing chores were performed faster than I’d ever done them before (6 minutes) and 10 minutes after those were done, I had dragged her back to the truck.  At that point, the sun had set and the light was fading rapidly from the sky.

            I got her loaded up and pointed the truck towards the dam (!7-8 miles) to get back across before they closed it for the night.  Back at camp, less than an hour after the shot, we hung the deer from the big pine and Kyle and I skinned while Ed held the lantern.  Then we opened a bottle of wine and celebrated a good day’s hunt.  The temperature dropped to about 40 degrees that night, and chilled the venison nicely.

            Deer are where you find them.  So, for that matter, are interesting Contenders.  Both are quite at home in the stubblefields at sunset and both add their own special touch to the beauty.