I've taken just over 20 moose. About half have been head or neck shots, if I can get them per above listed criteria. Moose are big, the neck bone is fairly big (6-8") and I limit myself to about 100 yards, and these were usually "do it now!!" shots, standing, offhand. For reason....thick cover after I lost one that over the course of the day I had walked within 5 yards several times. The next weekend I followed my nose to what was left of him, about 3 inches of maggots, hair and some bone. As I forced my way through the spruce branches, I literally stepped on his remains. He was invisible from 1 step out. I really don't intend to feed bears, maggots, and wolves anything but guts.
He had made it into a 10' circle of 10' tall spruce ,with over-lapping branches, obviously an old squirrel midden, so surrounded by 5-7 ' high deadfall that it diverted me from entering into the circle of death. If I knew then, what I know now, about shot moose, I'd have climbed over and through that tangle and found him on the first, 2nd or 3rd pass across that hillside, and not wasted a whole day not finding him. Makes a guy sick, losing an animal like that..
The shot was bout 160 yards, standing, off-hand with the arm sling wrap. I was yards from any rest or better position. The shot looked good, but after a day of searching until dark , we concluded I had flat missed, with zero evidence of a hit. Th bull had traveled about 90 yards down a trail, where we lost the track when he did a 90 in tall grass to go the 40 yards or so to reach that spruce circle on a burned over hillside heavy with deadfall and second growth.
I shot the next one ( and as many after that that I could manage)at 40 yards just under the antler base. No looking for that one, cuz he went straight down, legs under him, between two 3' high hummocks about 4 ' apart. Hunting solo, he got dressed out from above.....
On one 42" bull, the only shot I had was at his back half, the front half being hidden by a spruce when he stopped about 100 yards away. He was about to continue his boogie. I put the 250 gr. .338WM slug into his spine just forward of the pelvis. I lost a couple meals of backstrap, but secured 500 lbs of other meat.
I was exactly one step away from him before I could see to finish him, as he was down in waist high grass. behind a couple waist-high deadfall logs. But Dammit Jim, I knew where he was! I like neck shots in such conditions.
Everything else - species, distance, etc. - gets double lunged by choice.
