Traditions Lady Whitetail $515 at Traditions
As a lifetime black powder shooter, it is impossible to not be a fan of Traditions Muzzleloaders, and surprisingly (for an old fart like me), that goes for the modern muzzleloaders as well. They make some really pretty and extremely functional guns with a lot of common sense and care in my experience, and they are always a very reasonable price. The Lady Whitetail is a short run limited edition, so I figured I’d get to it before you build your Christmas lists. They’ll probably be gone soon.
I still love black powder and traditional black powder firearms. and they have their place in my range time, but you would have to be a fool to not recognize the advantage of a high quality modern muzzleloader. That muzzleloader week before the regular deer season is about killing deer, plain and simple. You should take every competitive advantage possible.
The Lady Whitetail is build on the Traditions Pursuit G4 Ultralight chassis. It has a Chromoly barrel and the frame is made from an aluminum LT-1 alloy, both in Cerakote. And the alloy frame makes the gun really light, at 5.75 pounds, while retaining beefy tactile rubbery grips that feel great to hold on to, unlike hard plastic. If you watch the video, I tried to show how the forend is flared, so that even if you have a small hand, it gives you a ridge to get a good solid purchase for confident control. The HotLeaf camo pattern is both sexy and covert, um, I guess.
There are no sights on the Lady Whitetail, because it comes with a Traditions 3-9x scope mounted and boresighted. My first round out of the gun with one pellet was about 2 inches from point of aim. I don’t suggest it of course, but if my first shot had been at a deer, I would have a freezer full of venison. The gun also comes with a neoprene sling and soft gun case.
The only thing I had to figure out about the gun was the ramrod. The front of it unscrews and you flip it around and screw it back in. At first I thought it was just a nice extra cleaning jag, but then I realized that you need the extra 2 inches of rod in order to properly seat the bullet. I even had some hang fires because I thought I had seated the bullet all the way down when I hadn’t.
For performance, I measured basic function and accuracy at 100 yards using one pellet, and it was the new Blue MZ from Alliant that has appeared on the pegs at Walmart recently. Most of you will shoot this gun with two pellets, and ballistically, it is probably worth it to do so. I measured one 250 grain sabot slug at just over 1,100 feet per second on my Pact chronograph, using one pellet, and at just over 1,800 with two pellets. So with one pellet it is just over a .45acp ballistically (230 grains at 900fps), and two, it is better than a 44 Magnum (240 grains at 1350fps). It’s actually just shy of Hornady Lever Revolution in .45-70. Three pellets might get you there, but I have had bad experiences with 3 pellets in getting the breach plug out, so I didn’t try it.
I discovered a really nice feature of scope that comes with the gun as well. It is built for the ballistics of the 250 grain bullet, and it has three lines in the reticle. If you zero the top line at 50 yards, the middle line is dead on at 100. The bottom line may well be 150, but I didn’t have time for it because I spent most of the day on the other Traditions gun before rushing to finish this one.
So perhaps we’ll return with this gun and test a couple of different bullets in it, and maybe even shoot some 3 pellet magnum loads. Overall it is a very pleasant gun to shoot, with almost no recoil even with 2 pellets, and it seems to be extremely accurate. These Traditions guns are so easy to clean that they are the only muzzleloaders I will volunteer to shoot more than once. Next time maybe we’ll try Triple Se7en. And I’ll also work on more attractive talent for such a pretty rifle.