I thought this bullet issue had been decided years ago. I have done this before and will reference it again as I am not aware of any one having been in on making more gut piles and looking into bullet performance then this Aussie guy, Bob Penfield.
"n 1988 the Barnes all-copper bullets, named "X-Bullets", were offered to hunters.
Reports on them from the game fields soon came in. Experienced hunters like Ross
Seyfried, who used .30 caliber X-Bullets on feral donkeys in Australia, were surprised at
their penetration and killing power. Perhaps the most impressive testimony came from
Australian professional hunter and game manager Bob Penfield (in an unsolicited letter to
Randy Brooks). Penfield mentioned a culling operation of several years duration that
involved 130,000 rounds fired at 40,000 feral donkeys, 10,000 wild horses and many
other animals. The cullers used a large number of rifles of all common calibers and
bullets. They reported that the Barnes X-Bullets were more effective than any of the
others, and that the slightly lighter bullets in a given caliber killed quicker than slightly
heavier ones-e.g., the 165-grain .30 caliber bullets versus the 180-grain ones, or the 210
or 225-grain ones in .338 size versus the 250-grain ones".
I would think a feral donkey is a bit heavier then a deer, but don't really know. Horses can be heavier then elk and moose and water buffalo are big. Any way, the reports for Barnes X bullets were good when it cam to making gut piles and I quit using Partitions in the late 80's and started shooting Barnes X bullets and have tried most of the X varieties, except the MRX. I recently picked up a 6.5 Creed for the grandkids to use and bought some 127 grain Vortex ammo for it, as caribou, moose and bear are on the menu.
If I lived in the "lower 48" I would probably use some thing besides the TTSX bullets I now use in my 30-06 and .338.
