I must be one lucky son of a gun. In 50+ years of hunting, and putting more than a few animals on the ground I have had the " when things go wrong " scenario happen to me once. That was because of my youthful stupidity. I have heard the old saw about the animal taking a step just as a shot was let off,etc. Again, never happened to me to the extent that the shot placement was bad. I pick and wait for my shots,my freezer has been filled with elk and deer for many many years every year,and the only premium bullet,if you can call it that, I ever used was a few years I shot a 7 mag with partitions. Maybe three hunting seasons in all. Mostly I shot Sierra GK through it and except for a 45-70, 44 mag and a muzzle loader, all my loads are with Sierra C&C in a .308, .06 and 6.5. Back in 69 or so,I did shoot an elk with .308 remington bronze point.
Last year, one of the biggest bulls I have shot and one that took me twenty years to get the tag,I still waited for the shot and put a 30-06, 180 gr GK at the base of the neck. DRT.
Pick the bullet design to do the job for the animal you are hunting, use it at the impact velcities it was designed for and put it where it should go and you will have a dead animal on the ground every time.
Pick a high frag bullet driven at +3000fps and shoulder hit and animal,or even rib shoot it and you will probably have cripple to track.Pick a solid mono bullets and zip straight through an animal too far back in the lungs,gut shoot it or too high to just nick the lungs or spine and you will have the same tracking scenario.
Too many guys and some gals have never grown up where they had to make a box of twenty centerfire rounds last many seasons, and were let go hunting with only 6 rounds for the shot gun and had darn well better come home with at least 5 kills.
You need adequate penetration to get to the boiler room,but also adequate fragmentation to cause sufficientt tissue damage. Bullets on both end of the spectrum will not work in all circumstances,but a middle of the road selection most generally will work in a large majority of the time as long as it is put where it is suppose to go.
Dunno about both bullets not working... I've not lost an animal I fired an X at since I've used them. And they don't generally fragment at all. AND I"m not a bone shooter either.... ribcage is my choice unless its teh noggin. Unless my X is a middle of the road projectile which I kinda think of it as.. its not a mono solid forever penetration and its not a fragile HP.
As to folks not making a box of bullets last... I dunno, but the only times I've shot more than once in the last 15 or 20 years have been too long of a noggin shot attempt twice..(followed by a thump in the lungs at the same distance at some 350 ish yards, and last year when I borrowed my buddies rifle(dumb... but wanted to test his bullets for him... and I had shot it earlier in the year...) and find the rifle was off... missed one noggin shot.. connected a neck shot aiming at the noggin.
Of course you may have hit instant reply like I do, instead of directing the post at me..... I"m a one shot type of guy... I just go prepared enough that if I desire to take the only shot offered, and that shot takes a bit of umph... I want that reserve.
