A new rifle, a new calibre, and a hunt that has been a long time coming. In this edition of The Hole Story, Dr. Mike Arnold turns his attention to the .308 Winchester — a notable omission from his extensive shooting experience — as he prepares for a return trip to Oklahoma in pursuit of a truly unusual animal. From careful range work with Hornady ammunition to the anticipation of encountering the rare mule-footed hog, the story blends technical insight with the curiosity that often shapes a hunter’s path. It is a reminder that preparation is part of the pursuit, and that some hunts carry a significance that goes well beyond the shot itself.

“You’re kidding, right??!!” That was the incredulous reply of a good friend when I stated that a missing piece in my shooting resume was ever firing a rifle chambered to .308 Winchester. Since I figured I’ll die not having fired a LOT of calibers, I was not too worried about my friend’s attempt to shame me. Also, I have experience with quite a few, really interesting chamberings – 50 BMG, 458 Lott and .700 N.E. being some of those. Regardless, I was very excited to finally be working with a rifle and Hornady ammunition in the caliber so long recognized as the sniper’s #1 choice; the military round is the nearly identical 7.62x51mm NATO. Before I move on, let me remind us all, especially those of us (like yours truly) who know little about this chambering, that using .308 Winchester ammunition in a 7.62x51mm NATO rifle may be dangerous due to the higher pressures generated by the .308 ammunition. Yep, that is a disclaimer so that ignorant folks like me won’t blow our heads off with an exploding firearm.

The rifle sent for my review by the folks at Blaser USA was the new Synthetic Thumbhole-stocked, J.P. Sauer & Sohn 505. A beautifully compact firearm, it carried a 20” barrel (OAL of 40”) and a Saddle-mounted Blaser B2 3-18x50iC riflescope, registering 10.2 lbs on my bathroom scales. Pairing with Sauer’s new offering were three types of Hornady ammunition; Precision Hunter, Outfitter and American Whitetail tipped with 178-grain ELD-X, 165-grain CX and 150-grain Interlock projectiles, respectively. Needless to say, I could not wait to get to the range and see what combination of rifle and ammunition worked best!

Before discussing how well all ammunition + rifle groupings worked…oops, spoiler alert…I should explain the title of this article. In January 2026 I was heading back to one of Frances’ and my favorite destinations, the Choctaw Hunting Lodge in Blanco, OK. “Mr. Whitetail”, Larry Weishuhn, introduced us to this wonderful corner of the hunting world. On our first trip, we hunted whitetail deer and a funky old feral ram that I’m looking at on my trophy room wall as I two-finger-type these lines. While there, I learned of another, weird and wonderful (to a biologist such as myself, anyway), feral mammal lurking in the woods and pastures of the CHL property. The so-called mule-footed hog, a.k.a. Choctaw Hog, Cherokee Hog, and a bunch of other names, came down the Trail-of-Tears with Choctaw and Cherokee agriculturalists. The hog’s moniker denotes the fact that unlike other members of the porcine family they demonstrate syndactyly, a scientist’s way of stating that they don’t have cloven hooves. Likely introduced by the Spanish colonists to the Southeast in the 1500s, the Indians of various nations adopted them and finally herded them along as they made their forced pilgrimages to various locations west of the Mississippi river.

Readers of my books, magazine articles and blogs, or listeners to my Podcast, Bringing Back the Wild, will recognize my near obsession with weird lifeforms. For example, I once spent hours of good hunting daylight photographing tiny termite mounds in the northern, Cameroon savanna ecosystem. What can I say? I am perfectly comfortable with my nerdiness. But, back to the syndactylus (I love that term) hogs found on the Choctaw Hunting Lodge property. Though I did not have the opportunity for a mule-footed hog hunt on our first trip, I told manager-guide Dusty Vickery that I would return for one of these unique animals. Getting ready for the return performance to CHL was the purpose for the range workup with the Hornady and Sauer & Sohn products.

Preparing for a hunt and/or reviewing rifles and ammunition means, for me, hours at the range. I begin from the bench. However, most of the bullets head downrange from my much-loved 4StableSticks shooting rests. The use of the latter has two motivations. First, my reviews have hunters and not bench shooters in mind. Don’t get me wrong, I love trying to obtain the tiniest groups from the bench. Yet, I am primarily a hunter, so I want my readers to know how the rifle/ammunition did in my hands, from my standard fieldrests. In the case of the Sauer 505, I bore-sighted at 100-yards, and then used the Precision Hunter cartridges for sighting-in. I fired a total of 76 rounds during this range session. As it turned out, all three ammunition types printed close enough to the same mark for me to collect accuracy and trajectory data at 100, 200 and 300-yards, with no B2 adjustments.

The muzzle velocities for each of the three ammunition types, as measured with my LabRadar unit, were consistently lower than the expected velocities provided on the Hornady websites (and cartridge boxes): American Whitetail = 2638 fps (LabRadar) and 2820 fps (Hornady); Outfitter = 2489 fps (LabRadar) and 2610 fps (Hornady); Precision Hunter = 2478 fps (LabRadar) and 2600 fps (Hornady). One contributing factor for the variation in the muzzle velocities may have been the differences in the barrel lengths used for testing by Hornady (24”) and that of the Sauer 505 (20”). The trajectories of the three ammunition types were similar at 100, 200 and 300-yards: American Whitetail = 0”, -4” and -12”; Outfitter = +2”, -4.5” and -12”; Precision Hunter = +2”, -4.5” and -12”.

The bar graph provides the relative accuracies of the various cartridges. As a reminder, 1xMOA is roughly 1”, 2” and 3” at 100, 200 and 300-yards, respectively. As mentioned earlier, all three varieties of ammunition performed extremely well. For example, the diameter obtained from the fieldrest, at 300-yards, was ~3” or less for all three cartridges. Though I would confidently carry the Precision Hunter, Outfitter or American Whitetail on a hunt with the Sauer 505, overall, the rifle performed slightly better with the Precision Hunter and its 178-grain ELD-X bullet (the target shows the results of two shots at 300-yards, from the 4StableSticks rest). Also, given the muscle mass, and large-boned characteristics of hogs, the heavier bullet may come in handy when I headed to Oklahoma.

Simply put, the accuracy results from the range work with the Hornady ammunition and Sauer 505 were very encouraging. On the other hand, in terms of my upcoming mule-footed hog pursuit, if an opportunity presents itself for me to take my bucket list animal, and I miss, I won’t be able to blame the rifle or ammunition!

Author profile

Mike Arnold is a professor in the Department of Genetics at the University of Georgia and author of the 2022 book, BRINGING BACK THE LIONS: International Hunters, Local Tribespeople, and the Miraculous Rescue of a Doomed Ecosystem in Mozambique. Mike’s newest book, BRINGING BACK THE WILD – Stories from Revitalized Ecosystems Around the World and How Sport Hunting Supports Them, appeared in June 2025. You can find a description of Mike’s travels, talks, articles, podcasts, and books at mikearnoldoutdoors.com.