Home Forums Reloading Big Game Rifles barnes 53 gr TSX meets doe shoulder

My cousins boy shot 2 deer this past season with factory ammo and never could recove one. no blood trails and deer that ran in exess of 100 yards. She asked me to load some ammo for him that i thought would work better.
No let me say that I havent advocated 223's for deer, but, my feelings were that its better to try than not.
so i got ahlod of some Barnes TSX bullets and pulled out some FC match brass. I loaded 26.5 grains of varget. I sent off a batch and she told me that they shot better than any ammo they had bought yet. that the groups were under a quarter. this is from a NEF youth .223 single shot.
So a couple weeks ago he got a shot on a big (110 pound) doe. shot was quartering towards at 75 yards or so.
deer ran 30 feet and fell down, twitched and expired. blood trail was awsome.
enter hide

enter tissue

exit hide

exit tissue

enter point

exit point

That's pretty cool. I've dropped a couple with my .223 before and it worked OK, but it was becasue it was either that or a 30-30 and I don't like hunting with open sights. Why did they skin it before gutting it? I've never seen it done that way.

thats how they roll...
hang it, skin it first to keep hair off the meat, drop the guts and put it in the cooler.

Fantastic! Thanks for posting the pictures. those 53 grain TSX are bad ass.

Yep, super clean doing it that way if you can.

So anyone know the reasoning behind the new 55gr TSX? 2grs what's the point?

i think it may have something to do with a 55 grain minimum legal requirement in some places...

Yep, skinning it first is the slickest way to go.