Spent a little over half of my Navy career stationed in VA and did a lot of deer hunting in shotgun/muzzleloader areas. Tipped over my share of whitetails with buckshot but always went with slugs if allowed. A slug is just better out of a shotgun for deer but I can't remember losing one with buckshot but I had some fairly hard tracking jobs with the buckshot. Slug cuts a hole nearly an inch around and that lets a lot of blood out and a lot of air in.
