Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Hunting Rifles Biggest thing you've used for deer

375H&H through the front shoulders. Deer tipped over like a steel sillouhette target hit with same.

How ya want to measure it? Biggest hole? Most footpounds?

Biggest hole, total ... .58 round ball. Biggest hole, centerfire, .44 magnum. Most footpounds, .338 ... hmm, or maybe .300 win mag.

Surprised nobody has piped up with a report of a 12 gauge slug.

Now that's cool . . . .

BMT

Winner, is right... No worries about tracking a wounded animal..

+1 - it was the perfect visual.

Sounds like how I intentionally try to position them when guttin' them out. Never shot a doe or cow......wouldn't know how to position them in that instance. 'Suppose that's what buddies are for.....

** But to answer the original question - a 300RUM this last Nov. in the Bob Marshall using 200gr. NP's. Not necessary for deer as I've always used either a 25-06 or 270WSM, but I'm also not very often in Grizz country nor able to take any bull at the same time either.

Better safe than sorry and that mulie was DRT, so all worked out just fine.

guy..,

For me it was a 9.3X62 Mauser. It worked quite well. An old hunting buddy used a .458 Win Mag just because he could. It worked well,too.

O

a 308 win.. I like .257 100gr the best.. not very exciting, I know..

When I approached him to see for sure if he was "done" I laughed out loud, coolest bang flop ever. Tines were stuck hard in the ground too, I used 2 hands on his snout for leverage to lift & dislodge his antlers from the dirt.

Here's a picture of that dude after I got him home & before I strung him up in the garage. wish I had a camera on me to take a pic of how I found him.

Even with the recoil of the 300 wby there was so much white belly showing when he flipped that I got to see the backflip after the shot.

Gotta bud that still uses a .375H&H on deer. Amazing lack of meat damage.

That's a nice buck ND!

375 works pretty good even on fawns, with no particular damage except for badly placed shots.

Bullet hitting big bone before exiting the critter's body can make a big hole but it can be much worst with lighter quicker caliber.




Hole is not as big as it seems: that critter is small (about 39 lbs yearling)

[Biggest thing you've used for deer]

My scoped .72 caliber centerfire rifle - aka, the Remington 11-87 rifled slug-gun !

375 H&H is my go to gun for everything including deer. This one (below) my first muley with a 1969 Browning FN Safari Grade 375 H&H

You guessed it! 338WM

12 ga with Brenneke Gold Magnum slugs

Have killed a few with a 50 cal muzzleloader, but as far as centerfires, 45/70 300 gr handloads for largest diameter, 338 Ultramag 225 gr Accubond at 3050 fps for most fpe. Both performed wonderfully, very little meat damage, deer didn't like being shot with either one at all!
That 340 Wby will work great. Remember, you can't kill 'em too dead!

thanks High Brass.

he's a euro mount on the deer camp wall now, he still had some velvet at the bases.

They call me Mr 8 pointer because I just can't seem to do any better than 8!!

I keep trying though.

every year same thing, how'd you do dave? I dunno, shot a decent 8, nothing special, how bout you?

Like a broken record!!

LOL!!

Finally someone chimed in with the slug gun, hard to get much "bigger" than that.

Dave

375 H&H; 9.3x62, but a 12 gauge is bigger than either...

Saw a +/- 100lb doe shot last year with a .340 WBY and a 200 gr Ballistic Tip handload. Near shoulder was about gone as was near ribcage. Exit was saucer size. Deer still went 20 to 30 yds according to shooter. Deer amaze me. Personally I've used nothing larger than a .270 WBY with both 130 and 150 gr Hornadys but plan on breaking our a .458 Whitworth Express whenever I trade into some dies. I bet the 405 gr Remington 45/70 bullets at 2300 to 2400 fps will work.

I'm currently using a 338wm for most everything. Not because I feel I should, rather because I'm trying to get very familiar with it.

I double lunged a meat buck last year with very little meat damage. The bullet went right through the ribs leaving a hole about the size of a golf ball on the exit side. The unusual part was the lungs - they were gone. There was just a puddle of goo with chunks in the area where the lungs would have been.