How are pellets outside a deers vital area helpful? Seems to me that if my pattern were larger than 12" - 16" I'm wasting precious pellets. How many 000/00 pellets does it take to reliably kill deer cleanly? Just to be on the safe side, maybe 4 or 5? Then there is all that brush in the way and of course distance and the pattern opening up is a consideration. May have some bone to break. I'd rather have a center dense more concentrated pattern than a wide pattern to try to get as many pellets through cover and into the vitals as possible. Pellets in the gut or leg or whizzing through the brush completely missing the deer do no good. In fact, I think I'd work with Number 1 Buck for a close range load. Many more .30 caliber pellets would seem better to me than about half as many .32/.33 caliber pellets.
I prefer 00, all it takes is one pellet to kill a deer and it's not always in the vitals.
A 00 Buck pellet weighs 54 grains and clocks about 1,300 fps from the muzzle. Without dogs can you find a deer hit in a non-vital area by just one pellet in those super thickets mentioned in this thread? Honest question...
My first choice is a rifle, but I prefer a shotgun with 00 when I know the deer will be running by at warp speed. I've seen a lot of deer drop in their tracks that weren't hit in the vitals. Sometimes the pellet lands in the neck or head. I don't like to take marginal shots with a shotgun where the odds are the deer will run off a long ways even if hit.
To answer your question: If the deer doesn't run too far, but ends up in the thick stuff, I'm gonna find it. I think it's more of knowing when to shoot and when not to shoot. If I can't aim at the head of a running deer 50 yards or closer, I don't take the shot.
