Home Forums Hunting & Shooting General Big Game wasted meat or animals sufering??

So is it more important that an animal feel minimal pain when harvested by a rifle or that a minimum amount of the meat be wasted? I have processed 15 moose over the last week and approximately ten deer so far and there is no doubt that a large 30 cal or bigger gun is wasting a much larger amount of meat than necessary. Some would argue that it is important to take the animal out as fast as possible so use a larger than necessary caliber. Personally if i was a deer i know that with all the adrenaline i probably wouldnt even feel it and a little pain is good for you so ill put up with it so that my meat doesnt go to waste.

keep shooting till it lay's down and stops moving!

I really think it depends on the situation. If I was on a guided hunt, I'd probably pack a little more "gun" than I would walking out the back door of the cabin to shoot a doe for the freezer. I have no doubt that I don't need my '06 to kill a deer. A .243 or smaller will do the job too. I've just gotten used to my '06, and it's like a well worn baseball glove-it just feels right.

If you are worried about animals suffering, you better join PETA or take up golf.

Wasted meat happens.

thats an idiotic statement, respect for animals is what being pro hunting is all about

Yep, nothing shows your respect for something more than killing it.

I respect you, not let me put a bullet through your lungs, TFF.

In the end stuff is killed, period.

You are shooting them with a high powered rifle with a bullet that is designed to expand and cause massive internal damage. You still worried about suffering?

i was never worried about suffering. i say let them suffer more but eat them all

Calvin- you are just plain wrong. The painless, shock value thing notwithstanding - assuming it's even true. Who's to know?.

The ideal is instant or near instant death with minimal wasted meat - but this isn't a perfect world.

I go for the surest, quickest death possible under the circumstances. The animal deserves it, and if I lose a little meat, so be it. It is, admittedly, a sliding scale, depending on existing situation/placement opportunity offered.... sometimes it is a CNS shot, sometimes it's the old boiler room shot.

I favor CNS shots when acceptable, and "boiler room" shots as secondary at close range or primary at longer ranges in more open country. Or on fast moving animals at any range.

I lost most of my respect for Jack O'Conner after reading "Sheep, and Sheep Hunting" in which he relates how he - not once, but twice, deliberately shot animals in the ass to "slow them down to where I could come up on them" - once on a big horn, once on a mule deer. A "Texas Heart Shot" with a premium bullet is one thing- deliberately shooting an animal through the hams as he did to "slow him down until I could come up on him" is another thing altogether. Besides, with a single sheep hunt under my belt, the only use I got out of the book was the technical stuff on sheep species, ranges, and distribution- he had nothing to teach me I hadn't learned for myself on my very first hunt, and I wasn't agreement then, or now, 40 years later, on a couple of his hunting pointers.

There may be a lot of folks here who may disagree with part or all of what I subscribe to, but they ain't me.

Kill them as quick as possible, and with the most certain recovery, and discount necessary meat loss. But don't discount unnecessary meat loss either.

I say this as a meat hunter, who generally shoots the first available legal animal which offers me a killing shot- any killing/securing shot, but I'll take the best certain compromise offered with minimal suffering- assuming I have two or more options. Gut, ham, etc. shots are simply not acceptable, whether or not one is certain of eventual recovery.

Well, count me as a hunter who is concerned with animal suffering, also. IMO, we owe our quarry as quick and painless a death as possible. Our goal is to kill, not torture.

I am quick to take another shot to put an animal "out of its misery".

Only way I know how to shoot something without hurting it is using one of these.



Kinda funny putting something out of it's misery when you are the very one that put it in its misery.

My goal is to kill an animal as quickly as possible, but the story doesn't always go as you planned....that's hunting. Meat damage is a concern (punch ribs not shoulder), but it plays second fiddle to efficiency. If you're worried about filling the freezer, just buy more tags and have more fun. Even the bloodshot doesn't go to waste at my house, it gets ground up for the dog, and he aint picky.

That's funny.

I try to never waste my meat.

In my measly experience with moose, it isn't big bullets which cause the most damage (although they do, on average, drive a good hole deeper than do their smaller brethren), but it's rather the faster bullets (which are often the speedier ones). Of course if you go with larger calibers which are also speedier, then you've compounded the problem. I would much rather use a 30 caliber or larger bullet -on the big animals- which lets me know I've done the deed well, than to use two, three, or four smaller caliber bullets to ensure the job is done thoroughly and humanely. In about two dozen moose, I have yet to see one which was badly shot up. The worst was probably one which died largely by arterial bleeding far from the heart. That guy bled in the muscle layers creating a lot of jelly to contend with. And that was with "hard" bullet which created very little tissue damage. (On another animal, one Grand Slam and three BTs out of a Weatherby cartridge - all which stayed in the animal, hardly spoiled a handful of meat.)

In nature, dying hurts.

Compare a bullet of whatever size you want, and the pain of starvation, a mountain lion clamping on a windpipe, or wolves eating your guts out while you're still alive.

When I pull the trigger I figure its my choice. My goal is a quick death with as little suffering for the animal as possible. Wasted meat is a distant concern.

That said, I try to take broadside shots and tuck the bullet behind the front leg. I also subscribe to the "shoot them until they are down and stay that way" philosophy. I figure a little wasted meat is better than a lost animal where the coyotes get all the meat.

don't you leave a little for the birds and coyotes, very little in nature is wasted, just because you don't eat it doesn't mean its wasted.

Sounds 'bout right to me. The least amount of damage from heart/lung shots I have take taken were from a 30/30. Both of those shots ended with an animal laying less than 5 feet from where they were shot.

The worst offender for me is the 280 with ballistic tips. The wasted meat was much higher and the game ran much further (although always less than 100 yards.)

Neck shots are wonderful for dropping game in there tracks without wasting much meat.

I don't like to waste meat either; recovering the animal always takes precedence.

I'm still trying to figure out where/when it went from killing critters to "harvesting" them....I "harvest" vegetables from the garden and "kill" critters with a rifle. Maybe it's just me

Oh, I shoot them 'til they stop. Can't eat any of it if you don't get your hands on 'em. YMMV.