Home Forums Hunting & Shooting General Big Game The neck shot?

I don't like stuff to run off after I squeeze the trigger."

+1

I've used it pretty often but only a game standing completely still and 100 yards or less. It is very effective if done right. I can't remember ever losing an animal with it.

My dad knew a guy in PENN who neck shot a couple of black bears with a 35 REM, range wasnt very long and they were standing still.....which isnt very common when hunting black bears in PENN. He said both of them dropped and twitched a little.

How far have you found that they run usually when lung shot vs shoulder shot? Personally I have seen next to no difference unless both shoulder bones are completely broke. That is, compared to being shot in the forward lung area right behind the shoulder as opposed to lungs back near the liver. Those lung shot further back can run a ways.

Here is a shoulder shot by one of my nephews with a .260 and Barnes TTSX 100 grain. Pretty typical result.



Most of the places we hunt are narrow roads cut into thorn brush. So, shoulder shots to drop them where they stand is important to avoid having to crawl in the thorn brush with the Texas earth worms. A young nephew got excited and shot a buck in the lungs last year. It took four experienced men an hour and a half to find it laying only 50 yards into the brush.

Here is my wife with a .308 and 130 grain Barnes TTSX to the shoulder. The distance is just a bit beyond 200 yards. As can be seen, the brush line is a matter of feet away. She does a nice job shooting with her GAP .308.

Those looked like high shoulder shots to me, or basically hitting the spine right at the base of the neck. It is a good way to put them down ASAP but not what I generally refer to as "shoulder shot" and is also a smaller target. Breaking both humorous is the only way I consistently see deer go straight down other than CNS/high shoulder shots. Breaking only one humorous regardless if scapulas are hit produces short runners for me, just like lung shots do.

Where did the bullets strike on those deer?

T.I.

I have them come down 1/3 of the way from the top of the back into the shoulder. Also, I have found waiting for the animal to put its head down improves the result.

The bullet goes through the lower part of the shoulder blade and usually is just under the spine or occasionally clips the bottom of the spine.

The thoracic spine between the shoulder blades is like the master switch to a breaker box. That area between the shoulder blades is about the size of an orange. Impacts in that area put them down instantly.

My favorite placement is quartering towards the hunter, the forward point of the shoulder at the base of the neck with an exit behind the off side shoulder.

So running a bullet diagonally through the same area just under the thoracic spine. That placement also consistently drops them where they stand.

I shot the last 3 does in the head, 2 over 300yds away from the blind and this one thru the eye at 140ish.

I will continue to do this with does, bucks will get them in the high shoulder.

I don't have a nice steady bench in my tree. And with wind sometimes, maybe even some adrenaline, etc...I just dont see it as ethical as a chest/shoulder/lung shot, you literally have an area the size of a basketball that will get the job done. I've done a couple head shots, but I was on the ground, gun resting on my knee. One was at 10ft. Had to put a grocery bag over her head when I dropped it off at processor, it was gnarly.

Experienced shooters, go for it, but even then there is still a margin for error in the field. I've just seen my share of deer that survived poor neck shots walk in front of me from the club shooters from next door.


I had this line hunter less than 200 yards from me. Bought blew me out of the stand one morning, that afternoon a doe walks in front of me with a big gaping hole in her neck. Seen them with part of bottom jaw blowed off too

Even that is a gamble, i had a video on my old phone of a buck my son shot, broadside, that joker almost turned completely away with one step as he pulled the trigger, caught it low behind the leg, passed through front of chest. There is some wiggle room with a broadside shoulder/lung shot if something like that happens. Animals dont stand as still as paper targets stapled to cardboard.

I've had bucks run - push 20-30 yds. There's a lot bone - bullet fragments causing serious damage in shoulder shot deer. The high shoulder shot wrecks the nervous system but there's not much room for error.

There are lots of variables on just how fast an animal will drop when shot. Spine, brain shots anchor them consistently everywhere else can be at least a short trailing job. With deer I’ve had almost every version of a lung shot kill them & anchor them quickly including 30-30, 30-06, many with a 7mm RM & a few with a 300 Weatherby.

Elk have been much harder to stop immediately for me except with neck shots. I had a large cow run 120 yards shot with a 150 grain TTSX from the 7mm at 11 yards.
Switching to the 300 Wby from 7mm has made a difference for me on lung shot elk deciding they are done traveling. That recoil level isn’t for everyone but on elk in my small sample I like the results. So I’ll take lung shots broadside shots & necks if that is what I’ve got or from behind within 300 yards.

I don't strive to take them, but at 66 y/o they are in my bag of tricks. I've taken more than a few animals with a neck shot, at various angles...all with good results. In the NE woods, you learn to take what you're given, or go hungry.

I can only remember taking a neck (throat) shot once. It was pouring down rain and I'd had aout enough fun for the day when a small 5 pointer stood up about 50 yards away facing me. I aimed for the white patch on his throat and fired. The 165 grain SST frm my 30-06 blew up upon hitting the spine and just about decapitated him. No tracking was necessary.