shaman,
One of the animals I've shot where the bullet apparently didn't open was a big mule deer, standing broadside on the edge of a 15-foot rimrock with 3-4 does and fawns. I was on top of the plateau just about 100 yards from the deer, and at the shot the buck turned and disappeared over the rimrock. My shooting position wasn't the steadiest, but the crosshairs had looked to be on the buck's shoulder when the rifle went bang.
I walked over there, and below the rimrock was at least 250 yards of cured fall grassland, ending in ponderosa pine timber. I expected to see the dead buck somewhere in the open grass, but didn't, so looked around for some sign of a hit. Couldn't find any until I got down on my hands and knees, eventually locating one drop of bright red blood about the size of a wooden match-head. And that was it.
It took a while to find a way down the rimrock, and a search of the hard dry ground along the base found a bunch of partial deer tracks but nothing sufficient to be identified as the buck's. Didn't find any more blood, so started working back and forth in a fan pattern from the spot where he'd jumped down. In places the grass was somewhat taller than it looked from above, so it took a while. Luckily the shot had been taken late in the morning so there was plenty of daylight.
After 45 minutes (which seemed longer) I still hadn't found any trace of blood or even a track to follow. Was skirting the edge of some taller grass when I noticed an odd branch rising out of the grass. When I walked over to investigate it turned out to be the dead buck, with the side that had been facing me on top.
There wasn't a drop of blood around, and in fact I couldn't see any entrance hole, but found it during field-dressing: The bullet had entered the muscle at the rear of the shoulder, gone through both lungs, and exited the far ribs, but the hole through the ribs was tiny, with the bruised tissue around it in the lungs no larger in diameter than a quarter, and mostly smaller. The exit hole was almost as small as the entrance. The buck had traveled at least 200 yards after being shot through both lungs, and the only blood found along his path was that tiny drop on top of the rim.
Had something similar happen with a pronghorn buck about 20 years later, the range about 250 yards. In that instance the buck went at least 250 yards, and only started leaving blood on the ground about eight feet from where he died.
In both instances the rifle was a .257, on the mule deer a Roberts and on the pronghorn a Weatherby. (The bullet used in the Roberts is no longer made, but the one used in the Weatherby is.) Luckily the country was wide-open, and both bucks were eventually found, though both should have been dead within 30 yards. Or at least that's my experience on quite a few other mule deer and antelope killed with both rounds, since 30 yards far as any of them traveled after being hit broadside through the center of both lungs.
I would not, however, have liked to try to find a whitetail buck killed in the same fashion in typical Montana riverbottom brush, or in some of the thickets in our western mountains, or in many other places I've hunted whitetails in several other states. Yeah, I could "measure" the bullet hole, but it was tiny and didn't leak much blood at all, despite a wound channel through both lungs and an exit. So no, I don't think the bullet did its part in either instance. Which is why I never shot another animal with either one.
