Originally Posted by New_2_99s


Fully concur Ted, mirrors my experience exactly.

We are meat hunters & try to stay off bone (generally), .243 - 30-06, 10-100 yards at most, average around 40 yards !

Here's the other thing I'd like to see discussed by those that need a blood trail:

We hunt the boreal forest of Northwestern Ontario. Every animal I shoot that does the death run, I can see the direction it goes & more often than not, I can hear where it drops (generalization).

When Deb & Doug (.243 & 100gr fed blue box) shot their 1st WT bucks, I put them on the blood trail & told them to follow it, then walked to the area I knew they had dropped & met them at the end of the blood trail.


I don't doubt that at all.
I hunt open areas often where I usually see the critter drop, but have hunted enough of the east coast, north Idaho/NW Montana and the Alaskan jungle to generally be confident that I can simply walk in the same direction that the critter took off to, and normally find them piled up just out of sight, to include bow kills. No blood trail needed. With poor hits, this is all off the table of course.

I generally avoid shoulders for the exact same reason as you. I don't exactly "need" the meat but I don't go out of my way to ruin what I legally need to salvage, especially when I see zero difference in how far the critter runs. This cow elk made it 20-25 yards with an obviously broken shoulder, which is about average distance I have seen them go when both lungs are punched (excepting hits to the back and top of the lungs). That gritty bone marrow blown all over is absolutely NASTY. The bullet stayed in her and I do not recall where I ended up finding it, but it didn't break the off shoulder despite being a perfectly broadside shot. She was hit with a .340 Wby and 200 accubond at about 300 yards and if there was a blood trail at all, it wasn't enough for me to recall, nor need.
[Linked Image from i.imgur.com]

Reason #2 to avoid shoulders on perfectly broadside shots.
[Linked Image from i.imgur.com]