The author took this Colorado mule deer with a Remington 700 in 7mm SAUM, a rifle/cartridge combination just as well suited to eastern stand hunting.

There was a time when there was a marked difference between what was considered an "Eastern deer rifle" and a "Western deer rifle." Generally speaking, the former was characterized by the slab-sided Marlin and Winchester lever actions--in other words, guns that were short, fast-handling and capable of six or more rapid follow-up shots. And because those shots were typically taken at ranges less than 100 yards, iron sights were the norm until the ascendancy of the scope started to gain impetus in the 1950s. It follows, too, that typical lever-action cartridges like the .30-30, .32 Winchester and .35 Remington were considered perfectly adequate for deer.

Out West it was a different story. Unlike the handiness and firepower associated with the Eastern deer rifle, the Western hunter wanted--no, make that needed--a rifle that was more accurate and had more reach. Rapidity of fire was not a major consideration, and scopes were considered if not mandatory, nearly so. By far the favorite cartridges were the .270 Winchester and the good ol' .30-06. Typically, such rigs sported 22- or 24-inch barrels and weighed between eight and nine pounds, field-ready.

These are very broad generalizations, for there were many exceptions. In the East, for example, the Savage 99 was an extremely popular rifle with whitetail hunters. Although it was a lever action, it was quite different from the Winchesters and Marlins in that its action could handle high-intensity rounds like the .250 and .300 Savage. Also, its box magazine made possible the use of wind-cheating spitzer bullets whereas the traditional lever guns' tubular magazines were limited to trajectory-challenged flatnosed slugs.

There were also hundreds of thousands of surplus guns pressed into service, most of which were, with the exception of simply sawing off the full-length forearms, used as-is in their original military calibers.

Out West there were just as many exceptions to the rule, the biggest one of which was the fact that the Marlin and Winchester lever guns were just as popular there as back East. The difference, however, was that they were primarily in the hands of folks who lived and worked in hunting country on a daily basis. These folks were primarily meat hunters for whom there was no urgency to fill a license within a few days' time. The game was there, and most encounters were by chance while doing something other than hunting. It was more important to have a rifle handy for mountain lions, coyotes and marauding bears than for deer.

When I talk about the Western deer rifle, I mean the guns used by serious hunters, hunters who traveled within their own state, to neighboring states or came from back East specifically to hunt mule deer in the American West. These hunters were quick to embrace the bolt-action rifle along with the high-performance cartridges and scopes that made them so much more effective at the longer distances trophy hunters had to be prepared to shoot from.

There are obvious physical differences between the typical Eastern and Western deer rifle. The Remington Model Seven in 7mm-08 is shorter, lighter and has a more compact scope with a lower magnification range than the longer, heavier Lazzeroni 7mm Tomahawk, a short-action magnum with a 3-12x42mm Schmidt & Bender Scope.

Today the definitions of Eastern or Western rifles are much more blurred for a number of reasons, the foremost of which are that there are so many more rifle types and model variations than there used to be and the tactics used by many Eastern hunters have changed over the last half-century.

If you were shopping for a new rifle in 1950, probably 90 percent of your options consisted of bolt-action sporters, a category dominated by the Remington 721/722 and the Winchester Model 70, or the various lever actions of Marlin and Winchester. Again, there were exceptions, like Remington's 81A semiauto and 141A slide action, and of course the Savage 99, but they were, well, exceptions.

Today the choices we have among the various semiautos, pumps, lever actions and single-shots chambered in viable game calibers are surprisingly few considering the plethora of bolt guns in the marketplace. Among the various first- and second-tier players in the U.S. bolt-action rifle market--Browning, Howa, Remington, Ruger, Sako, Tikka, Weatherby and Winchester--there must be more than 100 distinct models.

In the old days, if you wanted a bolt-action rifle there was little further delineation beyond that; it pretty much meant a sporter, i.e., about a 71?2-pound rifle with a 22- or 24-inch barrel averaging around .600 inch at the muzzle. Today we have ultralights; we have 18-inch-barreled carbines; we have 20-inch semicarbines; we have sporters and lightweight sporters with 22- to 24-inch barrels in standard calibers and 24- to 26-inch barrels in magnums.

We have varmint rifles that, when chambered in game calibers, become "beanfield rifles" to be hoisted into elevated stands and used to dump deer in the neighboring zip code. And this past year Remington may well have introduced yet another genre in the form of its Model 700-LV, for "Light Varmint." At the moment, this rifle is chambered only in varmint calibers, but I expect that to change. Here's a rifle with a stout barrel that measures .660 inch at the muzzle, but it's only 22 inches long, and it's fluted. That, coupled with a lightweight synthetic stock, results in a rifle that has the accuracy of a stiff, 22-inch target-weight barrel yet weighs just 71?4 pounds; that's no heavier than a typical nonmagnum sporter.

Lever-action cartridges are still extremely effective in appropriate Eastern hunting conditions, but most of today's hunters want that extra reach even though they may never need it (left to right.): .450 Marlin, .45-70, .444 Marlin, .348 Winchester and .30-30.

Among the viable non-bolt actions--the Benelli R-1, Browning's BAR and BLR, Remington's 7400 and 7600 and the various single-shots of Browning, Ruger, New England Arms, Mossberg and Thompson-Center--there are similar niche models with varying physical characteristics to make them more suitable for some applications than others, just as with bolt guns. All are available in the .308 Winchester family at the very least, and many can be had in belted and short-magnum chamberings that make them suited for hunting much more than just deer, East or West.

There is no question, though, that the bolt-action rifle now typifies the Eastern as well as Western deer rifle where recent sales of new guns are concerned. I emphasize "recent" because if you survey some regions in the eastern U.S. and Canada, you'd still find lever guns giving bolt actions a run for their money but only because the men and women behind them have been using the same gun for decades or, for that matter, generations. These are not the kind of folks who read magazines like RifleShooter or any other gun or hunting magazine on a regular basis. To them a deer rifle is simply a tool, one they already own, don't dote on and don't feel they need another of.

OK, so the bolt action has come to epitomize the deer rifle both East and West, and the lines distinguishing them are blurred. That doesn't mean there are none, however. Given the differences in terrain, conditions and the average shooting distance encountered on a typical whitetail hunt as opposed to a mule deer hunt, there are still differences that make one gun more suitable than another, and those differences have to do with physical characteristics, caliber and one's choice of scope.