REVIEWS
One Shot, One Stag
NEF's Handi-Rifle proves its worth on a hunt for free-ranging red deer in Argentina
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I'm a bit of a bolt-rifle snob. I have nothing against modern single-shots. There's no shame at all in being the proud owner of a Ruger No. 1; I've seen them produce spectacular accuracy. There's also the Thompson/Center Encore, a versatile rifle I've become quite fond of during the past several years. Then there are the centerfire autoloaders, which, fun as they are, have proven too heavy for my needs. And although I've always had interest in leverguns, they don't fit into my hunting style--I've rarely carried one afield as a result.
So I found myself in an interesting predicament last April as I prepared for my first elk hunt. Well, red stag, really. But since I had yet to hunt either, and since the red stag is a close relative of the elk, it seemed a little more exciting--if not confusing--if I mixed the two in my mind. The dilemma was in choosing a rifle to hunt them with.
Fully aware of my bolt-action narrow-mindedness, and since this hunt was to take place in Argentina, Why not get a little out of character? I thought. So I decided on a synthetic-stocked New England Firearms Handi-Rifle, and my quandary was settled. It was chambered for .30-06, which meant I could also shoot the new Hornady 165-grain InterBond loads that had recently arrived.
HANDY IS AS HANDI DOES
New England Firearms is a subsidiary of Harrington & Richardson (more properly, H&R 1871 LLC), which is owned by Marlin Firearms. More history would take up more space than is available here. Suffice it to say Handi-Rifles are marketed under both the H&R and NEF brands, and every bit of attention to detail that has made the Marlin lever-action line so popular has been carried over into these little single-shots.
Varmint, Youth and Ultra Superlite models are among the available versions, with stock and finish variations available in most. Depending on the model, available calibers range from .17 HMR to .45-70. These breechloaders feature a single, solid-locking underlug, which is released via a push-button lever to the right of an exposed hammer. The hammer is thumb-cocked (you'll want to use the supplied spur extension for scoped rifles) and falls on a transfer bar that presses the firing pin. The hammer itself never makes direct contact with the firing pin. And since the transfer bar is moved into battery only after the hammer has been deliberately cocked, it cannot be jarred into firing when in the rested position.
The rifle is taken out of battery by letting down the hammer with your thumb, as you would with a single-action revolver. However, for added safety, once the trigger sear has been disengaged and the hammer is free to fall (you're holding it firmly with your thumb), fully releasing the trigger allows the transfer bar to drop out of the way of the hammer--which, as noted, cannot otherwise engage the firing pin. Slick and safe. Spent cartridges are ejected clear of the chamber.
Mine was a Synthetic variation featuring blued steel and a black polymer stock with a 22-inch barrel and an overall length of 38 inches. There are no iron sights; the rifle comes equipped with a scope-mounting rail.
With a trigger that broke consistently at three pounds, the rifle produced 1 1/2-inch 100-yard groups fairly regularly. This is a very narrow rifle with little fore-end width, so I really had to bear down to keep my groups at the same point of impact. If I wobbled, groups moved. However, from a bench in Argentina, the first two rounds hit dead center--almost touching--about an inch and a half high, where I left them.
THE GAME, THE LOAD
Describing them as "closely related" doesn't quite do justice to either red stag or elk. Red stag, often called red deer, thrive throughout much of their European homelands. Having crossed over a frozen Bering Sea during what must have been a spectacular migration--as is the case with so many of our "native" game--red deer filtered down through much of North America and evolved into what we call elk. As is the case with our elk, red deer are quite at home in a variety of environments, from dense forests and open moors to the steepest alpine basins and high-desert plains.
Size-wise, a mature stag weighs about as much as a caribou bull, but older stags that enjoy premium habitat can weigh as much as 500 pounds--sometimes a little more. It doesn't take a hotrodded magnum to bring one down. But it does take a well-constructed bullet. The Hornady InterBond, introduced last fall, proved wonderfully effective.
Late last year I had the chance to shoot some of the very first production InterBond .308 loads while hunting deer in Texas, and I reported on them in the February 2003 issue ("In The Field," "Gun Gear"). I noted then that shooting consumers were clamoring for more polymer-tip bullets with controlled expansion following the successful launch of the Swift Scirocco. Hornady, having the perfect platform for such a bullet in its Super Shock Tipped (SST) design, decided it could serve that market and developed a thicker-jacketed, core-bonded polymer-tip bullet. The result was the InterBond.
In Texas I shot both a large wild boar and an average, mature whitetail buck. To make a long story shorter, I didn't recover either bullet. This was no fault of the projectile; one exited the boar's ribcage, and the second was assumed lost in the buck's innards. But I ended up feeling a little dejected; I'd wanted to see a spent InterBond first hand.
I've never had a reason to doubt Hornady's factory ballistics. Most times, they're actually a bit conservative. But there's no denying a bullet's terminal performance when you're holding it in your hand. It's just one of those things hunters like to see with their own eyes. A red stag, I hoped, would offer that insight.
THE GRASSY PLATEAUS
Algar is a very large ranch. It's located in the province of Neuquen at the foot of the Andes in the southern region of Argentina known as Patagonia. It seems so far away, but it's relatively easy to get there as commercial flights to Bariloche from Buenos Aires shuttle passengers back and forth several times daily. From Bariloche, Algar is an easy, leisurely drive through a river-scoured canyon that rivals in scenery--and trout fishing--that found throughout the Rocky Mountains.
For the most part, Algar sits atop an open plateau, an expansive rangeland perhaps as high as 1,000 meters above sea level. It's cloaked in yellow-gray sage-like vegetation and a tall grass known as pampas. It's also dotted sparingly with small evergreen plantations. The pines provide additional wildlife habitat on the cold, wind-swept barrens, and the lumber they produce supplements property income.
To the casual eye, the true topography of Algar does not become evident immediately. However, it takes nearly an hour to drive from the highway to ranch headquarters, and in that time we wound our way through basins, draws and spring-soaked canyons. It is truly phenomenal habitat, the likes of which could seemingly hold any variety of American game animals, from mule deer and pronghorns to bison and elk.
As with our elk, red deer have become popular as alternative livestock, meaning they are commonly bread and raised under high fence for the purpose of hunting and for meat. However, they still can be found roaming freely on the open rangeland throughout much of their ancestral range as well as in a few regions of South America, mainly in Argentina. With the exception of one large enclosure in which you can hunt, they are unbound by wire fences at Algar, too. Algar was once a working cattle ranch, but its managers have turned to sportsmen as their primary source of income; in fact, the few cattle remaining on the property are solely used for food. On this ranch you'll see more red deer than beef cows. It's a nice change of pace.
I shared a room with another hunter while at Algar, but most rooms are for single occupancy. And all of them that I saw were very well kept, not unlike those you'll find at the better bed-and-breakfast establishments throughout this country. All visitors eat in one dining room at a stately, long table. And the food is wonderfully authentic--right down to the exquisite Argentine beef and wines.
THE CROWN JEWEL
Hunting is done from horseback or truck, your choice. Either way, you ride and glass, and if you see something you like, you climb off or out and stalk on foot to within shooting range. Ours was a somewhat large group. A few guys wanted nothing less than to see wild Patagonia from horseback, and there weren't enough horses for everyone. So I opted for the truck and rode with Emilio, a ranch hand and Algar hunting guide with several years' experience.
I have written before that one of the most enjoyable aspects of hunting is spending time with interesting people from various regions of the world. This was my first trip to Argentina, and though we had difficulties keeping up conversation, I truly enjoyed Emilio's company. It was a wonderful learning experience. Having hunted in parts of Mexico, I know only a handful of Spanish words that might be commonly used in hunting camp. However, Argentine Spanish is not necessarily the same as that spoken in Mexico. But we did well enough as we looked over probably 20 different stags during the first two days of the hunt.
Red stags are really no different than elk when it comes to field-judging. The first thing is to be sure that what you're looking at is a mature animal. Ideally, you want a stag that is in the neighborhood of six years old or older, and you can tell this by the overall mass of its antlers as well as the formation of crown points. At the end of its main antler beams, a mature stag generally has three long tines reaching upward, somewhat like an inverted tee-pee. Older stags may have additional crown points, making them more desirable.
Along with a good crown (or corona, as Emilio would describe them) formation, a mature stag will have at least three long tines protruding from its main beams, starting with an eyeguard. Generally speaking, a stag with good mass and six or more points on each antler is a mature animal. You can take it to the next level of scrutiny and consider the length of its beams and tines (SCI requires 200 or more inches for record-book inclusion) if you so wish. But in the grand scheme, score means very little to me. Emilio understood this, and so we looked for a mature stag with good crowns and gave little consideration to record books.
On the third day we drove to the rim of a deep, glacier-carved canyon. A stream--the headwaters of which undoubtedly bubbled up from somewhere high in the Andes to the west--trickled along its length. Non-native valley quail hustled about near the base of the canyon wall. A few cattle grazed through the lush grass growing along the streambed. And all around us we could hear stags roaring as the final days of the rut (or, more properly, "roar") were unfolding. A stag's roar is the most unusual sound. It's deep and guttural but not as bellowy as that of a bull Angus. It's more like a growl with little if any grunting as it is tapered off. I expected it to sound more like an elk's screaming, but it's hardly similar with the exception of sheer volume.
As we listened and watched, Emilio picked out a group of red deer across the canyon that, after viewing them for several minutes through his 12X Zeiss binocular, he decided needed closer inspection. So we moved to the bottom of the canyon and started climbing up the other side.
When we got to within about 200 yards of the small herd, Emilio motioned for me to sit tight, which made me anxious, though I wasn't about to argue with his experience. He was going to crawl a little closer for a better look, and he almost immediately hurried back with a smile on his face. "Puntas?" I asked him how many tines it had. "Doce," he said calmly. Twelve. "A shooter?" I asked. He nodded his head, "Yes."
We crawled back up through the brush to where I believed we were close enough for a shot, about 125 yards. I lifted my head and looked at the stag through my binocular and decided quickly that it was well within the parameters of what I was looking for. Quickly, I loaded a red-tipped cartridge into the Handi-Rifle, placed it on shooting sticks and centered the crosshairs on the stag's shoulder. Then I quietly thumbed back the hammer.
At the shot, the magnificent deer ran downhill maybe 20 yards before falling. It was a wonderful stag with antlers so thick I could barely get my fingers around them. It was gray in the face and showed signs of a hard breeding season; more than one of its tines were broken off at the tip, and it oozed with the pungent aroma of dominance.
Oh, and the bullet, I'm pleased to say, was recovered from the hide on the off-side shoulder. It had penetrated nearly completely, and it had mushroomed nearly perfectly. I held it in my hand for a while--proof, finally, that it was performing exactly the way it was designed to. I will save it in a jar with a few others. And it will serve as a reminder of good times in a far-away place where the stags roam free and the snow-covered peaks of the Andes loom ominously to the west.
