What would you consider the best slug gun for whitetails?

[hobbes1101]

I had been using various 12 ga's over the years including Remington 870, a Mossberg 695 bolt-action and an Ithaca until I bought a pair of Mossberg 500 20 ga's for my neice and nephew. Those are some sweet shooting guns! Don't let the low price fool you into thinking it can't possibly be as good as the other options out there.

I bought one for myself with open sights and the kids each have scoped versions. Where we hunt, very few shots are encountered beyond 100 yds & the rifled barrels can place a sabot-type round very effectively at that range without the recoil causing you to flinch.

I've used mine in rain, snow and even -7 degrees without any malfunctions of the gun. It's a very good field gun at twice the price.

[BSwinbank]

No one ever talks about rifling twist in slug guns. I'm convinced that 12 gauge, 1-28 twist which is only to be had in Benelli & Browning guns is the only way to go. Long sabots require faster twist to stablize and my son's BPS loves white box Lightfields and my SBE loves Rem Copper solids. 1-34 twist found in most guns is not fast enough.

[dirty]

i need to correct on my earlier statement, instead of rem 1170 it should have been rem 1100. also forgot to mention the mossberg 835, another group member and myself both had these about 10 years ago. it was an awesome shooter with rifled barrel and scope,kicked less than the 500 or 870(little heavier). we had them from goose huntin days and just bought cantilever barrels to switch out. but the price of a new one is alittle more than a 500 or 870. best thing about our pumps is we dont clean them until we cant pump them, the barrels on them have rust from leaving sit out, wood is faded, and they are a cheap "tool" not beauty contestant. however they will shoot and last with any of the more expensive autos. dont get me wrong, autos are very nice, but if you dont take care of them they will get you sooner or later.

[dirty]

also like to say that whatever slug gun you shoot you need to try lots of ammo. i know this is expensive with sabots but every gun will find a slug it loves, some it will tolerate, and some it will not shoot. if you are shooting over 100 yards and at running deer you need to find the loves and will tolerate ones. my dad has a mossberg auto that he bought 3 years ago and insisted that he shoot the hornady sst(i think 2100fps). the gun is not the top of the line but he could not shoot them. none of our guns loved the hornady but his gun hated them. went back to rem coppers 3/4 and federal barnes 3/4 oz and it is a tack driver. also..my cousin who passed away last year from a brain tumor(he was the 8th guy in group) had a rem 11-87 and i watched his gun blow up. we were both shooting at a deer side by side and the bottom of his action blew out when he fired. he was using win platinum tips. probably just a fluke, but scared the heck out of both of us.

[LureLarry]

I use a 12 gage 11-87 I bought in 1990. When it was new it had such a stiff lock-up it wouldn't eject low brass shells. When Remington came out with a cantilevered rifled slug barrel in 1995 I bought one and have never had the scope off of it, or even had to adjust it since then. The scope is a Gander Mountain 2.5X Wide View they had a clearance special on. It will drill holes right on, or within an inch of the bullseye on my back yard range of about 90 yards. It likes to shoot Winchester BRI 2 3/4 inch Sabots.

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With today's available technology, your shotgun can almost be as deer deadly as a rifle. I would suggest a pump 12 gauge shotgun with a synthetic stock for all kinds of hunting weather.Buy a separate rifled barrel with a cantilevered scope mount which will allow you to flip back and forth to your smooth barrel quickly and without disturbing the scope adjustment. A low powered variable scope for less than $85 works fine.Use saboted slugs that mushroom at contact to go in like a dime and come out like a quarter to insure a quick kill. You don't need 1900 fps slugs. 1450 fps is effective and won't knock off your cap. My reliable and cost effective choice would be a Remington 870 with Remington Copper Solid slugs.

[hobiehicks]

1100 Remington. Never failed me. Put a lot of meat on the table.
870 is another fine choice.

[tkreload]

Any rifled barrel shot gun that has a decent trigger pull.
Remember you are shooting it as a rifle.

[DocterB]

Ithaca 37 Deerslayer.

[jmanke]

I have Remingtons. Gold supremes. They go in and mushroom really well. They also go about 1900 ft. per sec. so yeah. those are my favs.

[hjohn429]

Mossberg 835Ulti-Mag or Remington 870. As a single-shot,I would choose a NEF or H&R in 12 gauge.

[Xplorer]

I've had a remington 870 since day 1 of slug hunting. When it was stolen 2 years ago & promptly when out & bought another one, this time with 2 barrels. Shot more deer with those 2 guns than all my rifles put together. With the right ammo can nail tacks at 100 yards

[Huntandtrap09]

Remington 870. There has to have been more whitetails taken with this gun than anything else.

[tgrif]

I have a Remington 870 with a rifled cantilevered barrel. I have a Swift 2x-7x-40 scope mounted and it will shoot Federal 3" shells loaded with the Barnes Expander 1oz slugs into a 3-4" circle at 100 yards all day.
This is hard to beat and it will put the smack down on a deer.

[shane]

I just saw the Ithaca Deerslayer III shoot 3.5-4.5" groups at 200 yards.

The 870 is a great gun, but something tells me it won't print like that.

If we are really talking about the BEST slug gun, it would have to be the Tar-hunt bolt action. Just about all other slug guns are bird guns forced into be slug guns. This thing is built from the ground up to shoot slugs. Savage makes one too, but I haven't heard a thing about it. I asked a question about it, but no answers so far. I guess I'll go check.