How often do you clean your bore while hunting?  After every shot?  I hear some in the mainland clean after each season or after so many rounds or until there is a significant amount of inaccuracy.

I clean mine about every 20 rounds unless gun is going to be put away for long periods of time only cause the humidity here in Hawaii

I clean mine about every 20 rounds unless gun is going to be put away for long periods of time only cause the humidity here in Hawaii

Mahalo Gunguy808!

How often do you clean your bore while hunting?  After every shot?  I hear some in the mainland clean after each season or after so many rounds or until there is a significant amount of inaccuracy.

I don't know about hunting applications, but for target rifle shooting the clean bore shot will be off the group a little, also will have different velocity numbers.  With a quality rifle and barrel that shot is predictable and can be accounted for.

My tikka 270 cold & clean shoots about 2" high.knowing that I usually bore snake it after each day I use it.

I don't know about hunting applications, but for target rifle shooting the clean bore shot will be off the group a little, also will have different velocity numbers.  With a quality rifle and barrel that shot is predictable and can be accounted for.

That is my experience exactly. POI is different from a clean cold bore than from a fouled cold bore on every rifle I own. I know a hunter who never cleans his rifle. He harvest a ton of meat with his gun.

I haven't shot my Rem 700 .308 in a while, but I want to say that the difference between cold bore and a fouled barrel for that gun is around an MOA.  Probably a little less factoring in the "handicap" (my shooting faults).   

For the hunters that I've talked to, most seem to not clean their guns during the trip and a few will boresnake every night if they took a shot.  From the guys that I've talked to, it's doesn't sound like they take many shots over a given hunting trip. 

I haven't shot my Rem 700 .308 in a while, but I want to say that the difference between cold bore and a fouled barrel for that gun is around an MOA.

Yes same here. In a hunting application, it's still in the vitals.

Once my rifles are zeroed l dont clean it while hunting unless theres a reason to i.e. dirt etc getting in there.  I dont normally clean them until l start seeing accuracy falling off. Which in hunting applications there's usually less shooting then target or competition. So it could be a long time between cleanings if used strictly for hunting.

Thank you all for your very helpful comments. Happy Hunting! 

Tikka does not recommend brushes believe it or not.  So I run cloth patches through it.  Most  of the time I do one cleaning before I zero in at the range and then I do not touch the dials.  Dirty cold bore always works for me.

Tikka does not recommend brushes believe it or not.  So I run cloth patches through it.  Most  of the time I do one cleaning before I zero in at the range and then I do not touch the dials.  Dirty cold bore always works for me.

Doing the same now.  After a successful hunt which only one shot is fired, I just run a bore-snake thru.  Purchased the new Otis RipCord which a lot tighter and harder to pull thru.

Tikka does not recommend brushes believe it or not.  So I run cloth patches through it.  Most  of the time I do one cleaning before I zero in at the range and then I do not touch the dials.  Dirty cold bore always works for me.

Many in the precision shooting circle are adopting this thinking.  I run an oil patch through the barrel after every range trip just to remove the carbon. I don't thoroughly clean the copper with solvent and brushes until several hundreds of rounds,

Many in the precision shooting circle are adopting this thinking.  I run an oil patch through the barrel after every range trip just to remove the carbon. I don't thoroughly clean the copper with solvent and brushes until several hundreds of rounds,

If you have a good, smooth, target grade barrel the copper doesn't stick well, so brushing excessively only tends to wear the (expensive) barrel faster, the crown is the most susceptible to damage.  And the theory is even rough bores could benefit from less extensive cleaning, to a point, because the copper actually fills in the rough and loose spots, thereby letting the barrel shoot more consistently.