Editor’s Note: Carlos Vilorio of Vass, North Carolina, is an avid Muzzle loading shooter and hunter who truly loves the CVA Accura Muzzleloader.

Question: Carlos, in previous blogs, you’ve mentioned the types of groups the CVA Accura and the Bergara barrels deliver. But the real test of a blackpowder Muzzleloading rifle for most hunters is how well the rifle performs in the field. What type of results have you and your customers had with these rifles and barrels?

Vilorio: I was hunting last deer season here in North Carolina, and one morning, while sitting in a tree stand, I saw a number of does early. At 9:55 am, I decided to leave my tree stand and go home. But I thought I’d give the stand at least 10-more minutes. In a few minutes, I looked to my left and saw this really-nice-sized buck coming out of the woods in a shooting lane. I ranged him at about 250 yards. I made the decision not to shoot that far. The buck started to cross the shooting lane, but then saw the does, stopped and started walking down the lane straight toward me. When he was at 225 yards, he started feeding. All I could see was his rear end. I thought, “Carlos, either you’ll let this buck walk off, or you’ll have to take the shot through his rear end.”

About that time, the buck turned around and faced me. I checked him with my rangefinder and learned the buck was at 220 yards. I knew from shooting the CVA Accura on the rifle range that I could make the shot at that distance. I cocked the hammer and was ready to shoot when a doe stepped in front of the buck. I waited until she cleared the buck and then pulled the trigger. When the smoke cleared, I didn’t see my buck lying on the ground. I thought, “I can’t believe I missed that deer.” I got out of my tree stand, went to the spot where the buck had been standing and found a blood trail. The buck had run 50 yards and piled-up. He was a really-nice-sized 9-point buck. The bullet went through the left shoulder, destroyed the heart and came out the right shoulder. I didn’t hesitate to take the shot, because I’d seen the types of groups the Accura could produce at that range. So, I learned that the Accura not only would punch tight groups on paper on a rifle range, but that same rifle would deliver the same accuracy in the woods when a deer was in front of you.

Question: Carlos, you spend a lot of time on the rifle range developing loads and sighting-in rifles. Have any of the customers at Ed’s Gun Shop, where you’re the assistant manager, taken deer with CVA Accura rifles you’ve sighted-in for them?

Vilorio: Yes, they have – quite a few actually. I had a customer who said he’d be hunting central North Carolina when muzzleloading season started in November. The season began on Saturday, and this customer came in on Tuesday. I showed him the different muzzleloaders I had, and the patterns they’d shoot. He chose the CVA Accura and the Bushnell Dead On Arrival (DOA) 250 riflescope. He asked me to set-up and sight-in the rifle for him. I’m off on Wednesdays, and that’s generally when I go hunting in another area of North Carolina where the season starts early. I didn’t really want to give up a day of hunting to sight-in this guy’s rifle, but he wouldn’t buy the Accura, unless I put it together with the scope, sighted it in and had it ready to hunt. So, I decided to hunt Wednesday morning and then sight-in this customer’s Accura. Then he’d have it ready to hunt with on Saturday. The rifle was shooting a three-bullet group at 0.485 at 100 yards. I took it back to the shop on Thursday, the customer picked it up, and I told him to shoot the rifle himself before he went hunting. He came in the following Monday with a picture of a huge buck he’d taken at 180 yards with the CVA Accura I’d set-up for him. I asked the hunter where the bullet hit. He said, “Well, the deer wouldn’t turn sideways, and he was facing me head-on, so I shot him through the front. You can see where the bullet hole went through the front of his chest. When the bullet hit him, he dropped dead in his tracks.”

Question: Do you have another customer story?

Vilorio: I sure do. I have a customer who helps me out at gun shows sometimes. He selected a stainless-steel, camouflaged Accura with a thumbhole-type stock. I took it home, mounted the scope and sighted-in the gun for him. That gun shot a three-shot group that measured 0.3085. This customer took the gun home and shot it to make sure it was dead-on before he went hunting. About 2-weeks later, he took a monster 10-point buck with his CVA Accura at 150 yards. The shot went through the buck’s shoulder. The customer told me the buck only traveled about 10 yards before he piled-up. The Accura certainly can prove itself on a bench at a rifle range, but the real test of the gun is in the woods when you have a monster buck standing in front of you. I’ve learned, as my customers have, that you can bet-on the CVA Accura when that buck of a lifetime appears in your sights.

Editor’s Note: Allen Treadwell from southwest Missouri is a professional hunter and videographer. He films TV shows for Bass Pro Shops, Hunter’s Specialties and “Winchester Whitetail Revolution.” 

 Treadwell: I was filming a show for “Bass Pro Shops 100% Real Hunting TV,” which airs on the Versus Network. I was hunting the early-season muzzleloader and shotgun seasons in Iowa, and I took my CVA Accura with me. The weather was perfect for deer hunting – miserable, cold, snowy with below-zero temperatures at night and never above 20 degrees during the day. There were 6-7 inches of snow on the ground, which is the best time for me to hunt, because the deer at that time of year have to go to the food sources and primarily to agriculture to survive. I was hunting with Nick Boley of Windy Ridge Outfitters in Van Buren County in southeast Iowa. 

Question: Why did you decide to hunt with this outfitter?
Treadwell: I’ve hunted with him in the past. I filmed a bowhunting show for Hunter’s Specialties’ “Primetime Bucks” video series there. This was an early December hunt. Nick had been scouting this area before my hunt. With the fresh snow we’d had the night before my hunt, Nick and I went out and did a little scouting around a soybean field that had been left unharvested for the deer, and there were tracks coming into that bean field from all directions. Nick had put a shooting house out in the middle of this field. That morning, we spotted a couple of nice bucks, but they were staying back in the timber. However, several does came out into the field. We were about a week past the full moon, so the moon was still bright at night. I try to plan my hunts around a moon calendar, because I really believe that the moon plays an important role in when deer feed. By 7 or 8 am, the deer activity was dying down on this day. I’d learned from hunting Iowa in the past that when these really-cold days occurred, deer wouldn’t move much in the middle of the day. I generally would hunt for a couple of hours in the morning and a couple of hours in the evening, because those times were when deer seemed to move the most. That afternoon, we got in the shooting house early and saw 30 or 40 does and several small bucks. An hour before dark, a big main-framed 10 pointer white-tail buck with split brow tines and a 22-inch-wide rack that would score in the 150s came out and presented the shot.

Question: Why did you take the Accura on the hunt?
Treadwell:  The CVA Accura is absolutely the best-shooting blackpowder rifle I’ve ever hunted with in my life. I’ve been shooting muzzleloaders and taking deer with them since I was 10-years old. I’ve shot every muzzleloader on the market. CVA has always produced the most-accurate, well-balanced muzzleloaders that I’ve ever shot. With the CVA Accura, I know that I can take any deer that I see from 200 yards out to right in front of me.

 
Treadwell: I shoot 150 grains of Pyrodex Pellets and a 245-grain PowerBelt bullet.

Question: How far away was this buck when you took the shot?
Treadwell: I ranged him at 145 yards. I used the Leupold Ultimate Slam riflescope with my first crosshair dead-on at 150 yards, my second crosshair dead-on at 200 and my third crosshair dead-on at 300.

Question: Where did you hit the deer?
Treadwell: The PowerBelt bullet hit him right behind the shoulders. The buck ran to the edge of the field and tipped over. There were so many deer in the field when I shot that they all took off running. I was 99% sure that I’d hit the buck. He fell down behind a tree. I could see his rack, and I saw him kick snow when he tipped over. But in my mind’s eye I didn’t know for a fact that he was down. So, I stayed in my shooting house and let things calm down in the field. Then I slipped out of the shooting house as quietly as possible, went back to the lodge, ate supper and waited a few hours before returning to find the buck.

I think one of the reasons many hunters lose the bucks they take is they go running after them after the shot. Sure, I had just shot a big deer, and I wanted to get my hands on him. But, I’ve learned over the years unless I’m 100% positive that the deer’s down, I’d much rather back-out, let the deer lie-down and go back in a few hours. I’ve learned that you can recover more deer using this tactic than if you get excited, go chasing after the deer and spook him so bad he runs out of the county.

After supper, we returned and recovered my buck, and he was lying exactly where I thought he would be. The buck scored 145 points on the Boone & Crockett scale, and he weighed over 300 pounds. The real secret to hunting with black powder is to know when you squeeze the trigger that the bullet will go where you intend it to go. When I’m shooting the CVA Accura, I know for a fact that out to 300 yards, when I put the crosshairs on the deer where I want the bullet to land, the Accura will deliver the PowerBelt bullet to that place.

To hunt with Windy Ridge Outfitters, visit www.huntiowawhitetails.com or call (641) 919-2801.