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JJ's Wa. cult must have a chapter here in the midsection of the country. I was in a large sporting goods store last week, looking over the selection of component bullets, when a guy walks up and starts going on about the weights offered in 7mm. He loudly went on and on about "all they had was heavy bullets". He said he used the 110's in his magnum because "they stop those deer in their tracks". According to him the 150 and larger bullets "just zip on through and the deer run off". I'd hate to have to butcher one of his trophys!
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Jacobite,
I respect your feelings on the subject. There is no one way is right here.
I hope I did not give the impression that rear-end shots are my forte or perverse specialty. They are not my first choice and only are used as last resort since they do destroy some fine hip/loin and hindquarter cuts. I rather shoot the back of the neck if I have time. However in a snap I will use the rear-end shot indeed.
yes I am familiar with some of the European modes of hunting and the ethical views asociated as I hunted a bit in Germany. As an example I watched a dutch hunter in Canada pass a 48" Moose @ 20 yards, yes indeed, twenty yards walking straight away from him on a cut line ( he was astonished later to hear that you can kill with a texas heart shot or simply break the pelvis and then finish it off...........or simply shoot it in the back of the neck). His only hunting had been in Germany at night from the hochsitz 50 yards from the feeding trough for pigs and the sugar beets for deer. The land-owner trying to sell his shot game to the restaurant-trade does not like lots of bone fragments mixed with bloodshot hams and backstraps.
Most of those piggies, roe deer are not all that large. Here the credo was shoot cleanly into the lungs or do not get invited again. Understandable. Unfortunately that was all the dutch hunter had been exposed to in his life.
Anyway, regarding the ethics...........................in human terms to shoot up the fanny is not very dignified. However does it make a difference to the animal whether his aorta/lungs gets shredded from the rear or same from the side? Does it make any difference to the animal whether his pelvis/hip gets busted from the rear or his shoulder from the side? I do not think so as long as we give it a mercifull quick coup de grace.
Again ethics can be rather subjective. Some may question the ethics of shooting over bait, while others vigorously will defend it. Lets not visit there.
.
Last edited by shrike; 11/09/05.
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Herewith, one of those rare real life cases where maybe a bigger caliber and stouter bullet made up for less than ideal placement. No ethics problem for me but to each his own...
A young acquaintance of mine last week put a 180 grain .30 Swift A-Frame into the ham of a big subalpine buck as it hustled into brush steep uphill between rock ribs and strips of scrub timber. 75 yards or less and take that shot or leave it and likely not see that buck again. Not many deer in that country and this one had the largest antler frame of any we�ve seen in ten seasons in that area. I�d not disadmire anyone for not shooting if that were his scruples.
The bullet shattered about 8 inches of leg bone up to the ball joint, missed damaging the paunch somehow, went through liver, lung and heart and stopped against the front wall of the chest. Stern to stem. The buck whirled downhill in a fold of ground that prevented a follow-up shot. He was dead about 160 yards downhill from the hit, in a thicket so steep he�d slide if you breathed on him. He was an unusually tough deer I�d say, because he ran all or nearly all of the way down there rather than rolled, and from his tracks he bedded, then got up and moved deeper into the thicket when his tracker got close.
I think a hit in the same place with a stout .22 bullet would have collected him albeit maybe a good bit farther down in the canyon to pack back up to the trail, and he might have been harder to find, maybe a lot harder. It would almost certainly have required a follow-up shot since I wouldn�t expect the .22 to penetrate from ham into chest vitals, though he might have bled out from damage in the ham. That day, on that shot, it was good to have a stout bullet in the big .30. That�s not great shot placement but there�s no deer going to absorb that one.
Size of the buck: 102 lbs of boneless meat packed out, plus nearly 6 lbs of antler and cleaned skull plate. We left a good 15 lbs or more of bloodshot ham splintered through with bone fragments. That�s a lot bigger than most blacktails. This one was a Cascade or �bench-leg� mule deer/blacktail cross, west side of the Cascades.
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Shrike,
No disrespect intended or taken. By the way, from your handle, do you or have you been involved with explosives? A "shrike" was part and parcel of my kit as an Officer in the Royal Engineers. But, I digress...
I, too, have shot extensively in Germany and Poland, but cannot stand the "Hochsitz" methodology - it is so remote from the hunt. I do, however, like the training each hunter must undertake to obtain the "Jagdschein", which invokes a sense of professionalism and pride, I guess. In the UK, we have a similar system in place, managed by a national body and is called the Deer Management Qualification. Typically, we use the glass and stalk method, which akin to your earlier post, requires solid fieldcraft. Get it right and you might well approach a deer to within a few metres. Get it wrong and all you may see is a flash of white erectile hair, as they pronk off into the distance. In this area, we have some fine animals, mainly roe, fallow and sika, with the occasional red thrown in.
Due to the codes of conduct we have to abide by and more recently, an edict from the Food Standards Agency (FSA), the preferred target area is the classic high heart / lung area. A larger deer may run off, but will not go very far. However, there are other options, such as high and low neck or a frontal shot into the "stick hole" at the junction between chest and neck. It will floor any beast, but the gralloch is very messy, as it ruptures the diaphragm, rumen and bowels (see FSA above). I would imagine that hot copper up the chuff would have a similar effect. I have tried all of the above over the years, but the classic "broadside" is my preferred entry point, as it offers a clean dispatch and very little spoiling of the carcass - it is known as the "Butcher's shot". Distance wise, we try to get as close as possible, but 50-150 metres tends to be the norm. As we mostly shoot off cross-sticks or from around a tree trunk, that is a fair distance to ensure the required precision.
Calibre tends to be a personal affair, but with the police and government's attitude to firearms ownership, "less is more". However, the 1991 Deer Act states a minimum calibre of .240", i.e. the .243 is king. That said, I have been doing it for a good while and like to be awkward. As I guide occasionally for continental hunters, I shoot a metric (6.5 mm Swedish), which drops deer like Thor's hammer with a homeloaded 160gr Hornady. For the Yanks, I have a .30-06 and a .30-30 underlever, just to make them feel at home. I cherish them all, but have to admit that my hand falls to the 6.5 every time, unless there are pigs in my area, which was the case a few months ago.
As with most things, it's horses for courses. But, most animals are not bullet proof, so I find a little patience and confidence in the rifle wins every time. If an arrow will bleed out a deer, so will a bullet of reasonable calibre and weight, if well placed in the engine room.
Greetings from these shores.
Jacobite
Where men are men, as are the women and the sheep are nervous...
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Jacobite,
I indeed did a stint in the military, but my shrike handle stems more from my admiration for the plucky little bird.
Yes indeed, the hunter training program in Europe is very thorough. A profound knowledge is required of not only wildlife but also plants and the different wildlife management techniques. Last but not least the high shooting standards required in order to get your license.
And................. shooting tests have to be repeated on a yearly basis I believe. Such requirements weed out a lot of incompetence of which we see so much in the field over here.
Getting your jagdschein is indeed something to be proud of.
Upon graduation you are a lot more then just a "harvester" of wildlife.
Your choice of the 6.5x55 with 160 grainers is a fine one.
Your glass and stalk method is the most exciting method to me too.
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I don't get it JJ...............heheheheheheheheheh
"It's sad that governments are chiefed by the double tongues." Ten Bears
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Since we have such a wide geographic spread of posters and hunting situations, I�ll add more explanation regarding the hunting conditions for the rump shot buck whose end I posted above. Hope this doesn�t come over as defensive because it isn�t. When you live comfortably within your ethics, what others think on a place like the internet doesn�t count for much. This context to explain why somebody might be comfortable taking such a shot, when he knows the bullet is up to the job required. And since I learn from hearing how others hunt in their conditions, I thought this might be of interest to some.
Deer are scarce and the season fairly short where the hunter was hunting. On our worst hunt up there we went three days without seeing a single deer. On my best day, mid rut in a snow storm when snow had concentrated the deer lower down, I saw ten deer between first light and night, three of them small bucks. That many deer is a slow morning for some of you guys. It is over seven miles on foot and 4400 vertical feet to where we start hunting, another motivation to make use of limited opportunities.
All of this to say that if you want some venison rather than a mere nature hike, you�d best take any shot that you know will kill rather than hold out for a broadside. There is no place on that mountain to spot and stalk. The terrain, timber and contours don�t provide glassability. So it is mainly still hunt, in timber mixed with steep bits of meadow. Most of our bucks have been shot broadside at pretty close ranges. The hunter is patient and good at spot and stalk, superb at still hunting. This last one surprised him near camp as he walked along a trail to where he planned to begin still hunting. It was a buck in the rut in an unexpected place, spooked and diving into cover straight away, big rack� You may opt to wait till you find one standing for a broadside. I�d take him. I would wait if I were hunting in a place with lots of deer, especially if I was packing a .22 or .24.
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Shrike,
You are most welcome to come and see our wonderful countryside, with just your rifle as baggage. I extend that offer to Okanagan too. For your information, we have very long season, specific to the six primary species. In practice, it means we can stalk throughout the year for one or the other, although Chinese Water Deer and muntjac would require some travel. Locally, however, we have fallow bucks, sika and red stags from August through to the end of April, roebucks from April through to the end of October and the does and hinds from November through to the end of February. In fact, we have already started on the girls and took five last week alone. Basically, March is the only slack month, whereupon the population surveys are conducted and the gamebook audited to confirm the cull for the next period.
I hope this helps whet your appetite!
Jacobite
Where men are men, as are the women and the sheep are nervous...
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�
I sit here shaking my head that anyone would choose to use ballistic tips out of a 7mm mag and shoot an elk in the close range of the cascades! I�m with you, JJ. My first centerfire was the 7mm Mag I bought back in 1982. Took my first elk with a 162g Hornady BTSP through the lungs. The bullet was recovered from under the hide on the off side. It had retained less than 50% of its original weight even though the challenge to its integrity was minimal (one rib on the near side). The following year I switched to the Speer 160g Grand Slams and have been killing elk reliably ever since. After 20 years I finally recovered one of the Grand Slams but only after it had taken out both shoulder joints of a 6x5 bull. Its weight retention was still over 70%. These days I stoke the 7mm Mag with 160g North Fork bullets, the.300 Win Mag gets 180g North Forks amd Barnes TSX�s and the .45-70 gets 350g North Forks. The North Forks are not available in .257 so the Roberts gets 120g Swift A-Frames and 115g Barnes TSX�s for its +P loads. My hunting buddy switched from the 160g Grand Slams to 160g Speer Trophy Bonded for his 7mm Mag. Obviously, I put a premium on bullet integrity after contact. But placement is still the key. When I read stories like the one you posted I feel sorry for the game animals.
Coyote Hunter - NRA Patriot Life, NRA Whittington Center Life, GOA, DAD - and I VOTE!
No, I'm not a Ruger bigot - just an unabashed fan of their revolvers, M77's and #1's.
A good .30-06 is a 99% solution.
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JJ,
Your theory only has a couple of holes in it. You suggest that all hunters should be armed with 30 cal or larger rifles to hunt the big game of N Am. You seem to dismiss the 243 or 257 Roberts or 25-06 as inadequate on deer. But your suggestion allows millions to hunt with their beloved 30-30's, or 44 mags, or 444's, or 38-55's etc, etc.
Not only do the common high velocity cartridges in 24 to 28 caliber do more extensive damage to the vitals of targeted game than the 30-30. They greatly increase the chance of proper bullet placement.
The reduced recoil of these cartridges, when compared to high velocity thirties or larger, is a boon to practice and marksmanship. And the flatter trajectory of fast subcaliber cartridges makes for more accurate bullet placement than does the low velocity 30 cal or larger cartridges.
Big Stick makes some very valid points concerning bullet placement. Perhaps, if one wants to prevent the loss of marginally wounded game, we should adopt the licensing practices of some European nations. We would be far better off to insist that the hunter be capable of making an accurate shot with whatever weapon he is carrying than to insist he carry a weapon which punishes him (or her) to the point of causing inaccuracy.
I have heard many times of the moving moose target employed as a test in some countries for marksmanship testing. I would cheerfully recognize that as a prerequisite for a game license.
And as for the idiots that decided to outlaw large 22 cal centerfires for deer hunting, but to allow the use of the thirty carbine, ............well.....nuff said.
People who choose to brew up their own storms bitch loudest about the rain.
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Perhaps you missed the bold red print on the bottom of all my posts?
In any case you wrote this as well
"But your suggestion allows millions to hunt with their beloved 30-30's, or 44 mags, or 444's, or 38-55's etc, etc."
Did you notice why I think 30 caliber is a logical minimum and should be more strongly considered by people hunting big game? It's a diameter issue! If you look at the calibers your questioning me about, all exceed that .308 diameter!
www.huntingadventures.netAre you living your life, or just paying bills until you die? When you hit the pearly gates I want to be there just to see the massive pile of dead 5hit at your feet. ( John Peyton)
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'Stick, you are "en fuego". Going to look for a drop tine in the morning. If'n I don't find him I'll be comforted by the memory of this thread <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/grin.gif" alt="" /> ......Good luck, Troy
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You'll all be relieved to know that I just went out to the garage and pulled my BB gun to replace it with my .375. H&H that is <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/smirk.gif" alt="" /> . These forums have helped me avoid so many mistakes <img src="/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/blush.gif" alt="" /> . Good luck, Froggy
P.S. I still feel a BB gun is appropriate for smaller deer if you use zinc plated BB's. They'll slide through to the vitals easier.....
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Perhaps you missed the bold red print on the bottom of all my posts?
In any case you wrote this as well
"But your suggestion allows millions to hunt with their beloved 30-30's, or 44 mags, or 444's, or 38-55's etc, etc."
Did you notice why I think 30 caliber is a logical minimum and should be more strongly considered by people hunting big game? It's a diameter issue! If you look at the calibers your questioning me about, all exceed that .308 diameter!
Actually I did miss that part, because I always quit reading when I get to the part that looks like advertizing. Did I really read this posting correctly? Do you actually feel that a 44 mag will anchor any big game animal faster than a high velocity bullet from a sub thirty cal? A 30-30 is a more viable elk cartridge than a 270? How about a 30 carbine, deadlier than a 7mmSTW? The selection of a big game cartridge requires the use of a bit of common sense. One needs to take into account his personal level of marksmanship, as well as recoil tolerance. One should also consider the weight of the target animal and it's tenacity of life. While I would certainly not reccomend a novice to pursue Elk or moose with a 223 or a 25-20, nor could I in good consience send him out with a Win 94 or Marlin chambered for any pistol cartridge. The choice of bullet and energy delivered on target are far more critical to stopping any large game in the world than is simply the size of the hole in the barrel. Both of which are of secondary importance compared to proper bullet placement of course.
People who choose to brew up their own storms bitch loudest about the rain.
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Jacobite,
That's a gracious offer and I thank you. Though I would enjoy it, I'm not likely to take you up on it, at least not the hunting, though there's a chance I might look you up if my wife and I visit the UK within a year as we are considering. I've enjoyed seeing deer in the UK countryside, some within view of Stonehenge. My son and I saw many deer on a bus tour we took from London to Stonehenge, Salisbury(?) and Bath. I asked the tour guide about the deer, what kind they were etc. and he hadn't seen any. He asked us to point some out. We were used to looking for game, and notice such things even when we didn't consiously start out looking. We were surprised to see them. We also saw some foxes from the train window near Reading, not far north of London.
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How is it that these things get to this level of complication?
This thread clearly involves centerfire rifles and not handguns. If you choose to shoot a handgun bullet from a rifle then you open pandoras box with another whole series of issues.
It's the diameter my friend ****DIAMETER***** is the key here when an animal runs away in thick bush from a double lung hit or even a centered heart shot they will run a hella long way. Sub 30 caliber bullets allow zip for blood trails nearly every time. Even the .308 diameter is marginal but will at least offer some insight to the direction and damage done.
Without blood finding game becomes a "challange". Many things start to happen mentally to the shooter. Like; did I miss? was it just superficial? ........" I guess if he went this far he must be OK" All the second guessing within the first several minutes of looking tends to morally release you from the contract you just signed when you pulled the trigger. Sorry but that is a binding agreement. You pull the trigger you find the game.
What a great law it would be (if enforcement was possible) to allow a single shot each season at big game. One shot done! You don't notch your tag with a dead animal but rather with the pull of the trigger. ........Now what gun are you gonna use? Imagine the reduction in dead game that goes missing.
Copious amounts of blood dripping, spraying on bush or pooling up where he lays is a darn good idea when you go looking for game that has been shot. If your well hit animal runs 150 yards in a half circle(very common) will you make that sweeping turn without blood or just begin to wander aimlessly hoping you stumble across the body? While wandering will you then step on the only tiny specs that are there? When tracking with the fall colors will you easily see the blood mixed with the red fall leaves? Will those puny little specs soak into the sand and vanish?
Your mileage may vary I guess.
www.huntingadventures.netAre you living your life, or just paying bills until you die? When you hit the pearly gates I want to be there just to see the massive pile of dead 5hit at your feet. ( John Peyton)
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JJ,
I don't think you've swayed anyone into giving up their sub 30s or 7RMs........give the sermon a rest dude!
MtnHtr
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Gotta agree with Hack on this one from personal experience this hunting season. I nailed a Muley buck twice with my just built .257 Roberts (I love that Bob, btw) and watched the bunch of them disappear over the saddle. I knew the buck was dead just by the way he did the classic hunch-over when hit in the boiler room. As I trailed them over the saddle I'll be darned if I couldn't find a single drop of blood anywhere. 15 minutes into tracking I still haven't seen a drop anywhere and I'm beginning to think "No way did I miss that buck!" I finally went back to where I first shot him and tracked not for blood, but carefully for where one deer peeled off from the rest. 10-15 minutes later I found him. Turns out I put 2 shots through both heart and lungs not 3 inches apart and then exited, but he bled out "inside". Weird. I actually enjoyed the tracking effort, but I was getting more than a little nervous about what I'd actually done vs. what I thought I'd done.
Gotta tell ya, my "'ol reliable" .30-06/180 Partition combo would have left me blood to see - always has. Like I said, I love that Bob, so while the 100 grain Speer load is super accurate in my Bob, I'm busy right now working up a 120 grain Partition load.
YMMV,
pud
It's you and the bullet, and all the rest is secondary.
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How is it that these things get to this level of complication?____________________________________________________________________
Perhaps, because the original premise was far too simplistic. It failed to take into account varying skill levels and shooting ranges. As well as bullet construction, energy levels, and hunting terrain.
_____________________________________________________________________
This thread clearly involves centerfire rifles and not handguns. If you choose to shoot a handgun bullet from a rifle then you open pandoras box with another whole series of issues.
It's the diameter my friend ****DIAMETER***** is the key here when an animal runs away in thick bush from a double lung hit or even a centered heart shot they will run a hella long way. Sub 30 caliber bullets allow zip for blood trails nearly every time. Even the .308 diameter is marginal but will at least offer some insight to the direction and damage done.
____________________________________________________________________
I would venture to say that my 7mm STW will exit with a larger frontal diameter than a 308 or probably even a 30-06, given like bullet construction. At the same time dumping more energy into the vitals, thus shortening or eliminating the need for tracking. And as the ranges reach 300 yds and beyond, as they often do in western elk hunting, the advantages weigh even more heavily with the 7STW.
Nobody could argue that the 45-70 is not a dynamite elk killer, or any other big game for that matter. But if one hunts elk in the open terrain that I am familiar with he would be well advised to leave the 45-70 at home and bring a 270, or 280, or 7 mag, or larger if he has one and can shoot it well.
Of course a 300 win, 300 wea, 8mm rem, or a 338 mag will all be better stoppers and more lethal than my STW. But for me anyway, the minimal gains available from these rounds are not worth the increased punishment from recoil. I am not nearly so likely to go to the bench and put 100 to 200 rounds through the bigger mags in a month's time as I am the STW. And I would be even less likely to shoot them well from the prone position, which is how 80% of the game is killed in the areas I hunt, and by the hunters I associate with.
_____________________________________________________________________________
Without blood finding game becomes a "challange". Many things start to happen mentally to the shooter. Like; did I miss? was it just superficial? ........" I guess if he went this far he must be OK" All the second guessing within the first several minutes of looking tends to morally release you from the contract you just signed when you pulled the trigger. Sorry but that is a binding agreement. You pull the trigger you find the game.
___________________________________________________________________________________
It sounds to me that you have been exposed to a far lesser caliber of hunter, than I am familiar with.
_________________________________________________________________________________
What a great law it would be (if enforcement was possible) to allow a single shot each season at big game. One shot done! You don't notch your tag with a dead animal but rather with the pull of the trigger. ........Now what gun are you gonna use? Imagine the reduction in dead game that goes missing.
_________________________________________________________________________________
Well if this were the case, I would be well served with my Ruger #1 7mmSTW with either 160 or 175 gr bullets of a bonded construction, launched at 3100 to 3200 fps.
But only a fool would suggest that any hunter stop putting lead into a trophy bull elk before all four feet pointed at the sky, or the animal was gone from sight, regardless of cartridge used.
___________________________________________________________________________________________
Copious amounts of blood dripping, spraying on bush or pooling up where he lays is a darn good idea when you go looking for game that has been shot. If your well hit animal runs 150 yards in a half circle(very common) will you make that sweeping turn without blood or just begin to wander aimlessly hoping you stumble across the body? While wandering will you then step on the only tiny specs that are there? When tracking with the fall colors will you easily see the blood mixed with the red fall leaves? Will those puny little specs soak into the sand and vanish? ___________________________________________________________________________________________
Perhaps, as well as a marksmanship test, we should administer an IQ test to prospctive hunters before issueing a license. This way we could insure they would be smart enough to practice a spiral search pattern for any downed game, for which they can find no blood trail.
_____________________________________________________________________________________________
Your mileage may vary I guess.
People who choose to brew up their own storms bitch loudest about the rain.
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Puddle,
What you have descibed with your deer is not uncommon, even when shooting the 30-06. I have seen this many times with deer I have hit with my 06.
When the heart is well hit, or the aorta is destroyed there is no blood pressure left in the animal's system to push blood out. The blood simply pools in the bottom of the thoracic cavity. If you have been lucky enough to punch a hole in the bottom of that cavity, you may see some blood that has dripped through the hole. This is another problem that can occur with the use of super premium bullets. They tend to leave fairly small exit wounds. Sometimes this allows the skin to move over and close off the exit, thus preventing any blood trail. Paying a dollar apiece for component bullets may ensure they exit the animal, but can not ensure a distinct blood trail.
People who choose to brew up their own storms bitch loudest about the rain.
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