Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Elk Hunting Minimum energy at impact for elk

I was listening to a few guys discuss and range seemed to be from 1600-2000 ft lbs energy at impact. Sound right to folks?

Not when Bows and Arrows kill 'em dead and sometime quicker than 2,000 pounds of energy..

Shot placement is everything..Put it through the heart/lungs and you have a dead animal regardless of energy...

Just my opinion!


Jayco

No, because energy isn't what kills, it is a hole through the vitals

I only had about 1410 FPE energy, yet the bullet penetrated completely through exiting the animal with blood pouring out of the entrance and exit. 1 shot was all it took

yeah that. it always cracks me up when folks talk abouit what bullets wont kill elk when a pointy stick and a string will. hit um in the lungs

Time for the popcorn.

I've only killed a couple of elk with a bow, back in the day when 220 fps with a 600-grain arrow was considered pretty hot stuff. That's 64.4 foot-pounds of energy at the "muzzle." Out at 40 yards or so the arrow has slowed down some, yet both did the job neatly. I even got the watch the first elk (an average 5-point bull) go down within 100 yards. But an arrow with a good broadhead (I used "primitive" Zwickeys) does a lot of damage to internal organs.

However, expanding bullets don't always penetrate as well as much lower-energy arrows. If a bullet does penetrate the vitals and do enough damage, even relatively little energy will do the job.

I used to know an old game warden here in Montana who whacked a lot of elk off haystacks in winter. His favorite rifle was a .220 Swift with 50-grain bullets. He shot from inside a pickup cab with the window mostly closed, so the elk didn't hear much report, usually from about 200 yards. He shot most right behind the shoulder and they either dropped or went 25 yards or so. Energy at impact was around 1000-1200 foot-pounds.

Sorry I couldn't answer your question.

An arrow kills differently than a bullet. It cuts its way through and sometimes just nicking a big artery can make a clean kill that a bullet will miss. I knew a guy who killed an elk with a hit in the foot. He kept it moving and it slowly bled out. He had a 5 mile pack job when it finally went down though. I don't recommend the practice.

For once I agree with ya.

You should feel blessed.

An arrow and a bullet kill by the same means a bullet through the lung causes blood loss and the animal dies. An arrow through the lungs causes blood loss and the animal dies. The bullets crushes tissue, the arrow cuts tissue being the only difference

This is the exit of a 180 grain bullet from a 300 win mag with about 2600 FPS impact velocity that calculates to 2700 FPE. The exit is the rib cage of a 6X7 bull Elk






This photo is the exit of a 440 flat point hard cast from a 500 JRH with a muzzle velocity of 950 FPS for 888 FPE. This is same bull Elk as above






The bullet with the most energy sure did not do the most damage

Forget FPE when it comes to killing.

45 Colt, 335 gr LBT WFN running 1150 fps only gets ya 960 FPE, or so, at the 15 yds I hit him.

Alan

Arrows and bullets may kill through the same means, but I still think the analogy is a difficult one, because no one yet has built a bullet with three razor-sharp blades, a one-inch (or more) cutting radius, and a shaft on the back to keep it tracking straight once it hits.

Having said that, I've killed a few with big, slow-moving muzzleloader bullets that were at or just below 1,000 ft/lbs., and they worked just fine.

I've read the experts on minimum energy requirements, IMHO, lots of that stuff stems from the requirement to write about something that people will think is important and buy/read.

Harrumph.

I understand the excitement that comes with one's first elk hunt - I've been there myself. I also understand wanting to be as prepared as possible. It would be neat, however, for gun writers to start proclaiming that preparation for elk hunts would include the following, in roughly this order:
1) Positive Attitude
2) Hunting skills (spotting, stalking, working the wind, etc.)
3) Shooting skills
4) Physical capability
...
3,784) Cartridge choice

FC

I sure love that comparison..I big wide Meplat on a slow moving bullet doing more damage than the 300 wizz bang that held together.It defies all we no or think.

Barnes/Nosler and some other bullets also have four or more cutting edges that simulate cutting like a good broad head.

Speaking of broadheads..My choice I hunt with..Slick Trick.



Put your bullet where it needs to go with enough momentum to penetrate the vitals and you will have a dead Elk regardless of what the energy numbers are.

Jayco

Minimum energy is whatever is needed to get into the elks' body to destroy the circulatory system. At some point blood pressure drops and the animal cannot walk or run. After that a continued loss of blood stops the heart and brain. A shot to the CNS disrupts the nervous system to the point that the animal cannot control its motor skills. Whether its a bullet or arrow, its got to get into the heart/lung area and sufficiently destroy the circulatory system.

There are reasonable minimums that most agree to inorder to be an ethical hunter. Flirting with the lowest of minimums raise the probability of failure which is unacceptable.

OK, I'll bite. What are they?

I used to think cartridges with high velocity and energy were the answer, now I,ve come to realize it bullet construction and shot placement that are the key factors,Ive used a 340 wby and 375 H&H for many years, with excellent results.
my late hunting partner used a 358 win BLR loaded with 250 grain speer bullets that left the muzzle at only 2300fps giving barely 30/06 energy levels,hunting the same area and same years, we both did rather well, and the difference in how far the elk traveled did tend to slightly favor the bigger cartridge energy levels very slightly, but the fact was that any elk hit correctly with that little 358 win dropped dead just like the ones I shot with the 340 and 375


obviously having a rifle with a flat trajectory becomes much more important if you can,t accurately judge ranges or tend to have most of your shouts at longer ranges.
but lets look at two fairly different cartridges
my late hunting partner thought the 358 win in his BLR was the ultimate ELK combo, he sighted in at 3.3" high at 100 yards, that gave this trajectory
Range Velocity Impact Drop ToF Energy Drift
0 2300 -1.5 0
50 2206 1.91 0
100 2118 3.53
150 2031 3.21
200 1947 0.76
250 1865 -3.98
300 1785 -11.24
350 1708 -21.23
400 1634 -34.2
450 1563 -50.42
500 1494 -70.21

IVE preferred to use my 340 wby resulting in this trajectory
Range Velocity Impact Drop ToF Energy Drift
0 2900 -1.5 0
50 2790 1.53
100 2688 3.46
150 2588 4.16
200 2491 3.57
250 2396 1.56
300 2303 -1.96
350 2213 -7.12
400 2124 -14.07
450 2037 -22.96
500 1953 -33.93

obviously the 340 shoots incredibly flat compared to the 358 win
but the advantage is almost non-existent in that neither of us over a period of almost 30 years of hunting almost every year had shots at elk over 250 yards

If an arrow doesn't pass through, stopping with the head inside, as the animal runs the arrow will keep moving around inside, cutting the innards to pieces.

There is a 'never ending quest' to distill everything down to a single figure, when can then be used for comparisons (e.g. A>B) as well as 'cut offs' (e.g. minimum of X for game animal Y). The problem with those efforts is that they end up leaving out critical considerations, and thereby fail in their purpose.

I wouldn't go quite so far as to suggest that energy is 'meaningless', as it is simply a function of mass and velocity and both of those are meaningful. However, excluding all else, they have relatively little 'meaning' in terms of the ultimate result. The other physical quantity that is often considered is momentum, which is also a function of mass and velocity (velocity is squared with energy, not with momentum, thus making it relatively more important with the former). If you look into the academic study of 'terminal ballistics' / 'wounding', there are reasonable arguments that momentum is more closely related to 'penetration' while energy is more closely related to 'damage' (i.e. wound channel). However, even then it is a lot more complicated.

One consideration, is that these figures are often calculated at the muzzle. Those do not mean much unless the rifle is in contact with the target! So now one must consider terminal velocity which brings into the equation range and external ballistics. That is where we start to see characteristics of the bullet take on their proper importance. Once you have the terminal velocity and mass, you can consider terminal ballistics. Here is where shot location and bullet performance are critical. It is not the entire bullet mass that is used to calculate penetration and would channel characteristics, unless the entire mass of the bullet is retained. If bullet mass is 'lost', then when and where is critical. The specific location of the wound channel is critical as well, obviously. While there may be 'marginal' hits where additional energy producing a larger wound channel might be more effective, the fact is a leg is a leg and the gut is the gut and no amount of 'additional energy' is going to make those poor shot locations much more effective.

The point of the exercise was to confirm from the theoretical side what every experienced hunter has been posting, which is you cannot simply base it on energy, or in fact on any one such figure. You need sufficient energy, and momentum, and bullet performance and most importantly shot location in order to produce the desired result. An excess of one is not going to make up for deficiency in the others.

You guys did not rear the entire original post- He was listening to some guys at the range discussing elk killing.
Theoretical elk, the ones killed in range discussions, are much different than, say, a Montana, Idaho or Wyoming elk that have been killed in droves by 25/25s, 30/30s, 223s, 22 Hi Powers, arrows and the like.
"Range elk" are nearly always killed in excess of 500 yards with "one shot", placed behind "the for'ard shoulder" resulting in an elk that "drops in it's tracks", DRT!
For these "range elk" aka theoretical elk, one needs 1192 foot pounds of energy and a sexual density of 0.33457, and a ballistic coefficient of .445231 or better from a rifle that groups into .6 inches or better at 300 yards.
A scope the size and weight of a piece of ductile iron sewer pipe is also a necessity.