Stainless steel or Blued finish for deer hunting?

[Hookset]

Do you have a preference between a stainless steel or blued finish gun for hunting deer? Do you feel the color makes a difference when deer hunting?

After over hearing two people talking this weekend at the gun show that a blued finish is better since it won't spook animals as much as SS I begain to wonder wheter this idea had any merrit. I can understand a brightly shinny barrel having adverse affects, but what about a dull SS finish....the grey look shouldn't create any problems since it doesn't reflect light. According to the two people, they didn't think the cost of SS was worth it and that pretty much shocked me since I thought stainless steel was optimum for Oregon weather.

[toas243]

Stainless ,limits rust down ,and if you get one with the all weather coating ,it is sweet

[baltz526]

if you only have one wet weather rifle buy stainless synthetic

[ICHTHYDEMON]

I haven't killed a Deer or Elk more than about 75yds away in years. I've killed them with blued and SS. If the barrel on my rifle made any difference,I didn't notice.

The color of my rifle is way down the list of things I think make you a succesfull hunter.

I don't hunt much with blued rifles anymore. S/S rifles are much better suited for the NW IMO.

[pdxkevin]

Originally Posted by baltz526

if you only have one wet weather rifle, buy stainless synthetic

2X

[Hunt'nFish]

Stainless hands down!
Barrel life is slightly less but the avg hunter would be hard pressed to shoot that many anyway.
Hunt'nFish

[Bull Hunter]

Stainless and synthetic with camo tape over the stainless! It is the bomb!

Take the tape off and clean real well after the season!

[PGJPJ]

No question, go with stainless.

The only problem I've had though is with glare in my scope. My ruger has kind of a shiny finish, and when the barrel is wet, and the sun comes out, I've had problems with glare.

I have a cheep scope thought, so that probably adds to it.