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Ruger M77R "pre-warning" 7x57, 160 grain Speer Hot-Cor, 200 yards, DRT.

Winchester M70XTR featherweight 270 Win, 130 grain Nosler partition, 400 yards, blood trail 10 yards.

Remington 740 30-06, 150 grain Sierra Pro-Hunter, DRT.

Pro-Line Typhoon XT, Easton Gamegetter 2219, 125 grain Rocky Mountain Razor, DRT.

Darton Lightning, Easton XX75 Ultralight 2512, 75 grain Wasp Hi-Tech Ultralight, DRT.

Oneida Aero-Force X80, Easton XX75 Ultralight 2512, 85 grain Thunderhead, DRT.

Parker Buckhunter Pro, Easton Gamegetter 2117, 100 grain Rocket Steelhead, blood trail 40 yards.

Bear Montana longbow 50#, 23/64" cedar w/natural turkey fletch (from bird I killed), 125 grain Zwickey Eskimo, blood trail 30 yards.

"One in the chest or one in the head and even the Jolly Green Giant will fall down dead."

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4 deer 300Win 180gr Sierra Pro-Hunter DRT

[quote=chromeOddly enough the farthest I've had deer run after good hits where with the .358 Winchester and the .350 Rem Mag.

I'm a heart / lung shooting type guy so the big slower bullets may not open as fast on these small southern deer.... [/quote]

Shot a 75 pound doe once with the .350RemMag, 200gr PSPCL, double lung. She turned left in a 360 degree circle. When she was broadside to me I shot her again in the same spot. Third verse was the same, but she did fall down. Three shots at 100 yards you could cover with a 50 cent piece. Plenty of power, but wrong bullet for the game at hand.

Shot a water buffalo with the same rifle at 20 feet straight on right above the sternum. 250 PSPCL. Bang-flop. Good thing, since it was dark and I was still halfway in the sleeping bag. Enough power and right bullet for the game at hand.

The fastest "killing" bullet without a CNS hit, is the one that causes the most tissue damage. The more tissue a bullet damages the less it will penetrate, all else being equal, and vice versa. There is no free lunch.

Given the same impact velocity- what does more damage to a prairie dog, a 53gr Barnes or a 50gr V-MAX?

Shooting a couple of deer shows you very, very little about terminal performance. It takes at least 10 or so to even have an inkling of an idea about what a certain bullet and impact speed will do. Around twenty-five and you can have a general idea. 50 or so when one can start to have a real idea about a particular bullets terminal effects.


In my experience the bullet that causes the most tissue damage while having enough penetration for deer is the 178gr Hornady A-MAX. At 3,000+FPS it damages A LOT of tissue. Kind of like the 50grV-MAX and prairie dog deal. Out of around 70 deer shot with that bullet out of 300WinMags, only four have moved after being hit. The first was at 860yds that entered just behind the onside foreleg and exited through the offside foreleg, with the buck running on his face for about 40yds downhill.
The second a buddy shot broadside at 160yds (I believe) and landed mid body three inches behind the nearside front leg. It too traveled approximately 30yds downhill without the use of his front legs.
The third was 30yds head on and centered his right front leg at about elbow level. The bullet did not penetrate the chest cavity. There was also no evidence that any fragmentation penetrated the cheat cavity, never-the-less the deer only went about 40 yards before dropping. Below is a picture of the wound from that one-



Notice the entry on the right and the exit on the left.

The last is a buck my friend shot at 374 yards. The bullet entered mid body on the right and exited just in front of the left hip. The deer went about 70yds.


It's trade off. The more tissue that is destroyed the faster the animals go down, all else being equal. The more tissue that is destroyed the more meat loss there will be. There is no bullet that lets you "eat right up to the hole" and yet produces a huge wound cavity.

The head count for me is 40+ for the .300 Winny, 100+ for the 6MM & .17 Remington.

I've shot and seen a few deer shot before.

Moose hunting with a friend's father(who was not from Alaska) in Alaska. He's never shot a moose before and is hunting with a pre-64 Mod 70 .270. We came upon a nice bull standing chest deep in a small pond.

Me: "Don't shoot until he's out of the"
Him: Boom
Moose: SPLASH
Me: "water"
Me: "aw, crap"

That sounds like a lot of "fun"...if you're the Marquis de Sade

165gr Barnes TSX out of 30-06. Like electricity this past season for me. 4 shots.. 4 bang flops. Impressive!

For me .257 Roberts 100gr. Sierra GK
and 7mm Remington Magnum 150 gr. Nosler BT
these were used on whitetails though.

GreggH

On Caribou, antelope, bighorn sheep, WT deer, and mule deer I've had DRT kills quite consistently with the 160gr TSX out of my 7mm Rem Mag.

EDIT: Oh, and I forgot coyotes, badgers, and gophers

In this part of the world, I've taken a 260 up against everything from gophers to elk. In one season ('05 IIRC) I shot 3 antelope, 6 deer (5 B tags and a nice Muley), one elk (late season "game damage" cow) and a black bear in the spring. It killed schitt as well as my -06 always did. I had a lot of respect for the "pop gun" then. Ironically, the only critter that went more than 10 feet was a doe antelope. I double lunged her, and she took off on a dead sprint that lasted for 150 yards or so, with a 60 MPH pile up at the end of it. The goats were all shot with 125 grain Partitions, all the rest of the critters were shot with 140 Partitions.

I think that the Partition is still the best hunting bullet on the market today. You guys don't have to worry about me buying up all the fancy new crap that comes along... When that front core blows up inside a critter, its causing tissue damage where the critter lives. I don't really see the wisdom of using oober super bullets that retain 99% of their weight, not even in oober super wunder magnums.? Now I just wish Nosler would make a polymer tipped partition, that would be the greatest hunting bullet of all time

Hornady Interbond 150 grain Light Mag in 30.06 Awesome!
Hornady LeverEvolution 150 grain in 30.30 Awesome as well.
Deer don't like either one when hit just behing the shoulder. The most amazing of the two is the 30.30 LE. The difference between it and traditional soft points has been significant in my experience.

I have had the best success with 30-30 Leverolutions as well.
4 of the last 6 deer have DRT and the others did not go more than 25 yards. All shot distances under 75 yards. Just my .02 worth.

It sounds like shot placement and bullet construction are winning the race here with caliber size coming in 3rd.