Modern Muzzleloading and Hunting Articles

It was a cold December Sunday, but that did not hinder Matt Hughes. He was in southern Iowa for the Knight Invitational Hunt during first season. Opening day saw over an inch of freezing rainfall, but Knight Rifles are designed for the most extreme weather conditions.

Nine-time Ultimate Fighting Champion (Welterweight) Matt Hughes recently met another champion in Tennessee, and again Hughes was the only one left standing. This time, however, the opponent was a big 8-point buck.

For several days, the snow had fallen so hard that just seeing a deer beyond 50 yards had been impossible, let alone getting a shot. Still, I had hunted. And while I had managed to ease up on a few bedded does and fawns, I had not spotted anything with antlers since the first snowflake had floated down from the heavy cloud cover. Fortunately, the storm had passed through during the second night, and morning broke with a high, light layer of cirrus clouds- and without a hint of a breeze. I knew it was going to be a great morning, and I knew exactly where I wanted to be.

Extremely few of us go through life specifically remembering something seemingly as trivial as a phone call. However, back in late December 1985, I enjoyed a telephone conversation that I will always remember, and one that pretty much changed the rest of my life. That call was from a beginning gun maker by the name of William "Tony" Knight. And he had a brand new muzzleloading rifle system he claimed would change the sport of muzzleloader hunting.

The interstate mile marker signs are flying past at a mesmerizing pace. After only ten hours in the truck seat my legs are beginning to go numb and my back side is getting sorer by the mile, and too think, there is another ten more grueling hours ahead before we get to our hunting destination. Yep, we are heading out west again for the ultimate kick off of hunting season. Wyoming, what a place with tons of history!

With so much interest in hunting with today's modern muzzle-loaded in-line ignition big-game rifles, more and more Eastern and Midwestern hunters are now heading into the West with hopes of tagging an elk with the same .50 caliber rifle most have used successfully to hunt deer. And for the added knockdown power they'll need for an animal that is two…three…even four times larger than the deer they hunt, their first order of business is usually to work up a harder hitting load, and that means loading with a bit more powder and going to a heavier bullet of at least 300 grains.

The most significant advancement in today’s muzzleloaders is the way the powder charge is ignited. By this I mean that for the gun to go off, some sort of fire has to be sent in from the rear of the barrel to make the powder explode. Thus, the reaction to the explosion is the bullet moving out the front of the barrel at a very rapid rate of speed.

Favor for muzzleloader calibers has shifted slightly over the years with a new caliber taking the limelight, then sliding away and making room for a different caliber in short order. The mainstay, of course, is the .50 caliber — a solid caliber excellent for many types of big game. The petite .45 had its day in the sun, and the rotund .54 also made a showing, but the .50 has remained most common. Now, the .52 caliber is on the rise, and for good reason.

Feral hogs are tough. They have tough hides, live in tough country and demand a tough gun and load to bring down. The gun we used on our trip is the .52 caliber Knight Extreme.