Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Deer Hunting Which calibers have wounded in your camps?

I lethally wounded one this year at fifteen paces with a 7mm-08.

Most wounding is because guys can't shoot. Only one I recall off the top of my head was 308. I wounded one with an arrow and 100 grain G5 Montec this year as well.

I have yet to lose a big game animal (lost 1 coyote and a butt load of gophers ), which isn't to say that I've never missed, only that I've never missed and wounded.

I have only been around 1 person who has lost an animal in my presence, a deer, to be exact, and he was shooting a .243 at the time. I watched the deer hump up at the shot, and my friend just couldn't get another shot into him. Gut shot. That was definitely the indian's fault, though, not the arrow's.

Helped a guy out that had gut shot a whitetail at less than 75yds with 165gr core lokt 30-06. Load and caliber made no difference, gut shooting that deer did, and his inability to listen to us cost that animal its life. We told him to wait for 30-45mins to let that deer lie down and hopefully bleed out. He insisted on pushing it, thinking it 'force it to bleed out faster'. We followed a blood/gutmix trail for about a mile through hills and hollows until the trail just ended. We found three spots where that deer had lied down, and then got spooked and got back up taking off again.

That's probably a pretty low estimate. I venture to say that any modern day cartridge, with exceptions possibly to the 17's, is more than capable of taking out bambi. To blame the rifle, caliber, or the postion of the stars, is just lame.

It's the shooter!

I've had 2 different ocasions where a branch that I did not see between myself & the animal caused a botched shot. one time I got lucky with the shot & the branch (a green popple the size of a mans wrist) deflected my behind the shoulder shot turning it into an accidental neck shot. (.300 wby) it worked bang flop. Got really lucky on that one.

Another time a dead jackpine branch deflected my shot resulting in a miss, the way I see it I got even luckier with that experience.

Over the years I have seen more elk wounded with a .243 Win than I can recall from all other cartridges put together.

There are several reasons for this, one being the popularity of the .243 Win as a cartridge for young elk hunters - a mistake IMHO. As a result, I consider the .243 Win a better choice for experts than novices when it comes to elk.

OK, elk are not deer and this is a dder forum, but the thread title was not specific regarding game animals, just wounding.

I have wounded and lost 1 deer. A doe, shot with the 30-06. I was 17yrs old. 60yd shot, lots of blood for about 150-200 yds, and then nothing. No tracks, no blood, no deer.

I have taken a lot more careful shots on them after that.

My family hardly ever loses a deer. We have lost a few over the years but it was shot placement, not the caliber. If you hit a deer in the heart or lungs, I can guarantee you that the deer will be dead most likely within 50 yards and no further than about 150 yards. If it makes it over that, then more than likely you hit the guts or the legs. Most of the time, if we find blood but no deer in the first 50 yards, we back off for a couple hours then resume our search. From what I've have saw, most of the time, a lost deer is the result of either a shot that was really far therefore it is easier to pull a shot into the guts or the shot was not too far but the hunter rushed his shot instead of taking his time to make a good shot.

I've taken around 60-70 white tails and the only one I've lost was when I just started hunting and hit a small buck less than 20 yards away with a 12 gauge slug.

Hit him low in the front chest as I recall, but it must have just missed everything. Didn't help that the guys I were with didn't help at all to trail it.

There's been a handful I've trailed a 1/2 mile or more, but have always been able to recover them.

I've witnessed on way to many occasions deer shot and lost with .22 center fires and I've scene two elk lost shot with .243's

Way to many idiots around here who use .223's and shoot at deer with the same ammo they shoot at gophers with.

I love deer camp. It has been the house I live in now since before I was born. In my memory we have lost a few through the years and it has been pretty much the same family of hunters that come each year. They are not familiar with their guns and have high self-esteem in their abilities. I have always "enjoyed" an interesting blood trail and would submit that almost everyone I have seen through the years could try alot harder in following a blood trail. I help neighbors and even the local bear "outfitter" who won't follow a bear's blood trail if he has to get off his 4-wheeler. They are always in a hurry to get back to hunting and start talking themselves out of the shot being a killing one. Sometimes a critter shot around the "edges" is not found but alot of body shots are. A three-legged deer can go fast and far.

When I started this thread I was recalling an incident of a land owner telling me not to bring back my 25-06 because he didn't want anyone shooting at "his deer" with anything less than a .270.
It is this sort of opinion that I was wanting to feel out with the forum. I probably should have put it under general game, but I was really curious about the facts of wounding in general.

Too many smart folks on here to think a 25-06 won't work on deer of all flavors.

Look on some Canadian WT guide hunting sites...quite a few of them want you to bring a 300 mag, or have a 30-06 for a min. caliber to bring to camp.

I was thinking of getting a 25-06 for deer only. I like being able to see the shot reaction through the scope.

Most memorable are a couple jokers that hunted with Federal .308 match cartridges. I think they were 168 gr. bullets. I tracked wounded deer for those two until I convinced them to use hunting bullets instead of match bullets.

Another is a guy who used a .223 on whitetails. He lost a few deer before we prevailed on him to start using a deer rifle or turn in his gate key.

Yes, I have noticed this too. I have been in 4 different Alberta whitetail camps and many of the clients had big guns and big scopes, many with muzzle brakes. 300 win & wby mags.

One guy with a Lazzeroni had a native american guide and they didn't find his deer before it got dark. Next morning he offered $500 for and his guide with 4 indian friends if they could find it. They finally caught up to the buck in mid afternoon and finished it off. It had been shot in the hock area of his hind leg.

I bring several guests on my farm and the wounders are... 7.62 x 39 and 7mm rem mag.
The 7.62 guys shoot SKS's and the crude sights and poor balistics show. My friend with the 7mm mag just can't hit and then expects the deer to "fall over". I have been trying to convince him to shoot his 25-06 "varmit gun".
The one universal thing I notice is they don't follow up on their shots very well and are terrible trackers. My brother and I come and help and I would hope these guys would pick up on what we're doing after 10 years of hunting together.
243 is known as a 50/50 chance caliber for wounding in our area. 3006's are bad wounders too, but at least they have plenty of penetration to exit even on a poor shot where light bullets might not get through. Unfortunatley, I've had a few of my fast "center of mass shots" on game with my 3006 and tracked a ways and even had branches deflecting bullets when shooting through tree branchs while aiming at a staitionary buck 150 yards out in a pasture.
I don't care for 7mm mags for our 150 yard and under typical shot because they go through with out expanding or "shocking" the animal.
In the end, shot placement rules but I like a middle of the speed range gun that shoots a heavier bullet that will penetrate and exit on those less than perfect shots. Not everyone shoots on a food plot or in front of the game feeder like the hunting shows. I am thinking of going back to my 308 win and shooting 180 grn round nose because that was my first deer rifle and it really seemed to dump deer better than my current 3006 w/ pointy 165 grn bullets.

In the early 70's, hunted with a guy "DeadEye" they called him. Then I found out why. No matter what gun/shotgun, shells/shot he used, miss miss miss.. Try one gun on 2 pushes, then change. Aft noon, come back with another. 5 deer across a dirt road, he using a 12ga semi, buckshot, less than 70 ft, 5 times, missed! never found blood nor hair. Another time using a 30 carbine, 5-shot clip empty, 10 seconds later a birrage of 15 shots in 8 secs.(he hid that one on us) 20 shots, No Deer. I came to the tree the doe was standing beside and the bark was just chewed up. By '75 he practiced with a bow & got 2 in bow season. Gave up gun hunting for deer after that. He could stand in one spot a burn up $20. worth of ammo (aT 70's prices) it was said...

He had quite afew other instances too... ... 99 LL ...

all of them I have use have "wounded" the deer...right before he/she fell over dead!

Dave-

It's not the arrow..It's the indian...If a hunter puts a bullet of any caliber into the heart/lungs...it's a done deal...simple as that.

Gotta agree with Miner, any cartridge can cleanly kill deer.

You just gotta put the bullet in the right place.

How many deer do think have departed this world with a .22lr slug placed just behind eye?

Calibers don't wound deer, bad shooting and bad bullets wound deer.