Brush-busting deer guns: Still useful, increasingly popular

Grandpa and great grandpa loved their brush busting, lever-action .30-30s, .35 Remingtons, and .32 Winchester Specials, but should you?

Yes. But not for the brush busting.

Because the bullets aren’t all that good at busting brush. But the rifles are.

So-called brush rifles and the cartridges they shoot evolved alongside the metallic cartridge and repeating rifle. Prior to these, hunters slipped through the relatively open forests of North America with long barreled flintlock and caplock single-shots that spit .70 to .50 caliber lead balls. A .70 lead ball weighs about 500 grains, mass that many discovered would splinter sizable branches and keep on keeping on.

Such bullet mass was needed to kill game, especially animals the size of elk, moose, and – most particularly – grizzlies, as Lewis and Clark discovered in 1805. The limited velocity possible with black powder (under 2,000 fps) left increased projectile mass as the only option for busting brush and game.

The big bullet paradigm carried over into elongated bullets and metallic cartridges like the .50-110 Sharps and .45-70 Govt., but quickly faded after smokeless powder arrived. With it, little bullets like 150- to 220-grain .30 calibers could be driven fast enough – 2,400 fps to nearly 3,000 fps – to produce more energy than the heaviest old round balls. Nevertheless, traditionalists had a hard time forgetting the branch-splintering plows of yesteryear.

Combine that with the dense brush that had grown (because wildfires were controlled and cut-over forests were blossoming with second growth) and you created a demand for “brush busting rifles.”

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This coincided with the popularity of the Marlin, Savage, and Winchester lever-actions and some pump actions by Remington and others initially and traditionally chambered for then-novel rounds like the .30-30, .35 Remington, .32 Win. Special, and .303 Savage. As if by osmosis these cartridges and rifles seeped into the hunting culture as brush busters, never mind that dozens of rough tests showed otherwise.

While a heavier and harder flat-nosed bullet penetrates brush more readily and resists deflection a bit better than lighter and more frangible spire pointed bullets, they do not escape the deflection inherent in contact with another object (force.)

A soft-point, 170-grain .308 bullet isn’t a flying Caterpillar. Neither is a 200-grain .358 at 2,100 fps. Even a 500-grain .458 bullet will be deflected upon contact with a branch. Certainly the heaviest will resist deflection more than the lightest, but a hunter can’t depend on them to reach a target beyond. The farther the target beyond the intervening limb, the farther the deflection. A heart shot can turn into a rump hit.

So why brush rifles? Convenience. Comfort. Maneuverability. Fast follow-up shots. Yes, they are brush rifles, not brush busting cartridges.

Since no bullet can be trusted to plow through a forest en route to a buck, we can give up that idea and concentrate on the brush busting rifles that make it easier to carry and thread a bullet through the brush.

Short-barreled lever-actions excel at this. You’ve seen them. The Winchester M94, the Marlin 336s, the Savage 99s, Henry Side Gates, and replicas from Pedersoli, Cimarron, Big Horn Armory, and Rossi.

They look old school, cowboy, John Wayne and Lucas McCane fast and lively. If the Rifleman could mow down bad hombres from the hip and Rooster Cogburn could lever and shoot from atop a running horse, well by golly, we can swing with a buck walking through the woods and slip a flat-point behind its shoulder from 70 yards.

That’s brush rifle performance. You want a tool that is short, balanced between your hands, and “natural pointing,” a rifle that leaps to your face like a wand without getting hooked in the brush. Your granddad also valued the quick cycling for follow-up shots because he was often shooting driven deer.

These days most of us await the perfect, standing broadside shot, so the fast, slick levering of these rifles is less important, but many heart-shot deer dash off as if merely wounded, so quick follow-up shots are still useful. Light recoiling .30-30s and .35 Remingtons contribute to quick follow-up shots, too. 

Pump actions are, I think, even better for this because the cycling action is in-line with the barrel. Alas, few, if any, high-powered pump actions are made anymore. If you can find a used Remington M14, 41, 760, or 7600, consider it. Think twice before grabbing the harder kicking calibers like .280 Rem. and .30-06. They add versatility for reaching farther, but their recoil could make getting back on target a bit tougher.

The classic lever-action carbines include the aforementioned in .30-30, .35 Remington, and .45-70, though in that caliber rifles are beefier and less nimble. For straight-wall only states there is now the Remington .360 Buckhammer from Henry. It matches the performance of the old .35 Remington.

Other straight-wall options are the revolver cartridges .357 magnum, .44 Remington Magnum, .44-40, .45 Colt, and .454 Casull in the shorter format Model 92 Winchester style lever guns. Henry, Winchester, and Rossi offer many variations of these.

Aiming brush rifles requires young eyes if you stick with iron sights. A peep sight upgrade from Skinner Sights improves success for older hunters. A red dot or compact, low-power scope might be the best option, although those take the nostalgic glow off these roses. 

Regardless which rifle and chambering you get, keep in mind you will not be mowing down brush and branches like a scythe. You still need a clear flight path to your target, but a brush-busting rifle will help you find it.