Most of the experienced hunters that shot at my private range could not hit a gallon jug of water at a measured 300 yards, from a bench. They simply did not know their rifles. I finally dozed a berm at 400 yards and set up bowling pins, clays and a 10" X 12" "gonger" for them to practice on.
Most modern cartridges, if sighted to shoot 2" high at 100 yards, will be about 8" to ~12" low at 400 yards. After I showed them that the distance from the bottom "arrowhead" on their duplex reticles was about 8" below the h. crosshair at 400 yards and they used that for the aiming point (holding high on target) they could hit the gonger at that range. None of these hunters were candidates for "long range hunting".
Having said that, I built a few 7 STWS, 300 Ultra, 338 Ultras and 408 CTs for friends that did their homework and were quite successful at ranges up to 650 yards. They had accurate loads for their guns, top rangefinders, proper scopes for the task and shot their guns a lot. I do not encourage "average" shooter-hunters to attempt anything like this.
It is doable but only by those willing to put in the time to be properly prepared for the job.
