Best Western Hunting Rifles: Recommendations from a Professional Guide
Backcountry Hunting Podcast
Joseph von Benedikt
4.9 • 1.1K Ratings
🗓️ 4 July 2025
⏱️ 88 minutes
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Summary
Can the rifle you choose for western hunting make or break your hunting success? In this episode, we sit down for a fire-side chat with professional outfitter Tate Bradfield to get his take on top choices for western hunting rifles. We talk through several price tiers, including the $600 to $1,200 range; the $1,200 to $1,800 range; the $1,800 to $2,400 range, and finally, top-tier rifles without cost restraints.
As a bonus, we get Tate's opinion on best bows for archery hunting the West, along with his favorite broadhead models. ENJOY!
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | Can the rifle you choose for your elk hunt make the difference between succeeding and failing? |
| 0:06.9 | I'm here with Tate Bradfield, owner of process-based hunter, outfitter, guide, friend, and passionate elk killer. |
| 0:14.9 | What do you think, Tate? What's the answer to that question? Can your rifle make all the difference? |
| 0:19.8 | Absolutely. |
| 0:28.2 | Okay, we're on part two of gear for El Cunning. Tell us why. There's a lot of gear to go over when you're in the West. Yeah, we thought we were going to do all of this in an hour when we started on sleeping |
| 0:32.9 | bags in tents. It's going to take us closer to three. Two hours later, we signed off and said, |
| 0:37.0 | we're going to make part two on rifles, so here we are. |
| 0:39.8 | Yep. And we're going to talk about Bowes, too, because we can. We might as well. All right, if you had to pick one rifle among those that you have available and that are on the market. The world is your oyster. |
| 0:54.9 | What are you going to set up to Elkhunt the rest of your life? |
| 0:57.6 | Now, can I customize it? |
| 0:58.9 | Absolutely. |
| 1:00.2 | Honestly, that 7 PRC that I built is my favorite rifle. |
| 1:06.8 | And that's with a Nerf gun action. |
| 1:08.9 | Exactly. |
| 1:10.1 | It shoots at 900 FPS. |
| 1:12.4 | Yes, perfect. |
| 1:14.4 | Tell us about that, right. |
| 1:15.6 | So it's Hunt 26 chassis, which is this chassis right here. |
| 1:18.9 | This one, yep. |
| 1:20.0 | With a pure precision action. |
| 1:22.2 | It's a 700 clone, which I bought that because it's just easy to customize that. |
| 1:27.9 | Yeah. |
... |
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