Can you remember when you first got into hunting at a young age?
If you’re like most of us, those beginning years were full of fun memories trying out different rifles.
If you were fortunate to have played with a variety of rifles and cartridges good for you.
A question that comes up is whats a good rifle for a youth hunter?
Lets take a look at three similar rifle calibers that most young hunters would enjoy shooting.
.223 Remington
Many have hunters have started with this. The single-shot, low-recoil, .223-caliber, breakaway rifle hunting have been very successful for many youth hunters.
The low recoil makes it great for a new or young hunter who worries about bruising their shoulder or securing the gun.
Most .223 rifles are very lightweight, so just about any hunter is able to carry them.
There is always a bad side to this caliber and that is the hunter needs to make a good accurate shots. There just isn’t a lot of knockdown power with this caliber.
The .223 is a great small-game hunting rifle, but limited.
With that said, you might need to check your local hunting regulations if this small caliber is allowed in your state for hunting big game.
.243 Winchester
This caliber may be the best of the three here in this list.
This rifle has the perfect combination of knockdown power and low recoil.
Hornady 95-grain SST Superformance is a great round to consider.
This round boasts a 2908 fps at 100 yards and 2648 at 200 yards, this will suffice for any young hunter that wants that long range capability.
7mm-08 Remington
The interesting thing about the 7mm-08 is that its a .308 converted to hold 7mm bullets. It’s doesn’t kick like a 7mm Remington Magnum, but it certainly has more bite than a .223 or a .243.
You can make adjustments to lessen the recoil, but a .243 is probably a safer bet.
Overall, the 7mm-08 is a great deer rifle, but it might be too much for a lot of young hunters.
Tidbits
The ideal thing to do when starting out is to take your young hunter target shooting first.
This gives them a chance to try out the different caliber.
Once they choose the rifle that they’re comfortable with, take them out deer hunting.
What do you all think? Let us know below.
