We've heard it all before, but picture three scenarios, one recent and another two new AND IMAGINE LOTS OF small BRUSH IN THE WAY:

What cartridge would you use? It would probably have to be a non-lead bullet too to achieve greater penetration and less lead contamination. I'm thinking that a standard 375 H&H with 270 TSX would be ideal for any elk or moose hunt. Maybe some other brush-busting cartridge?

Imagine that it's the last day of the hunt...with little light left...and you've waited 26 years to draw. Imagine that this may also be your last hunt.

Imagine that if you're successful, your moose and elk will also make "BOOK" and feed your family and help the local homeless shelter.



or

I would let them walk. At that point I think that they have won.

In the 2001 edition of Gun Digest, Rob Lucas wrote an article entitled "Brush-Bucking Bullets That Didn't." Maybe you can find a copy of the 2001 edition at a used book store, as Lucas' article is excellent. In it, he conducted extensive field tests of various calibers, from a .22 rimfile to a .45-70, to ascertain their "brush-busting" capabilities. Based on his tests, the .404 Jeffrey (perhaps not surprisingly, given its 400 grain bullet)performed best. Everything else, including the .375 was so-so, and some where downright awful. Lucas' article is very informative, if you can find a copy of it.

For 30 some years, my favorite elk and moose rifle was my .30 Gibbs shooting 180 gr Nosler Partitions at 2990 fps. That's about the same as a .300 Win mag. It has worked great for a couple dozen elk and 2 Shiras bulls.

This past winter I just finished putting together a .300 Wby Vanguard that shoots 180 gr TSX's sub-moa at 3200+ fps. That's more than enough accuracy and power for any elk or moose in the woods, and it will be my new favorite rifle for that size game.

As for shooting through the brush, I won't do it. I've always been able to find an opening, or waited for an opening for a clean shot.

In my closet it's either a 45-70 with 405 grain pills or a 45-90 that's tossing out 530 grain slugs. I'd not worry about a few twigs with either of those.

Edited: Guys: That photo does no exhibit a shot I'd take, and no, I do not make it a habit of shooting through timber. That said, if there were pencil size twigs 2 feet in front of an elk, I'd definitely pass with my 257 Weatherby that's clocking 3,700 fps. A 45-70 with 405 gr slugs at 1,700 fps though would probably get launched. One seldom sees folks bowling with a ping pong ball, but a 16 lb sphere does a pretty good job on the pins.

That's a tough call as I don't believe "brush cutting" and rifle cartridges really should be used in the same sentence.
Last year I had a chance at a group of cow elk at about 250-300 yards. They were moving at a fast walk and moving though some reprod, into the open, reprod, then into some timber. Never could get lined up for a decent shot without some brush in the way so I passed.

However, in Africa my one and only chance at a nice Kudu was in some really heavy brush. As we were walking following a track of a nice Kudu we had seen, the PH looked up and the Kudu had gotten behind us and was peeking at us from behind some heavy brush about 50 yards away. The PH was yelling "shoot, shoot", but all I could see was the head facing me. I couldn't tell which way the body was from the head, left or right. Just then, the Kudu decided to run and I could determine where the body was. I picked a spot from the location of the head and shot through the bush as this would be my last opportunity, being the next to last day. The Kudu only went about 50 yards and was down, bullet right through the heart. May have been luck, but I have a lot of faith in my .338 and the .225 Aframes I was shooting that day and they haven't let me down yet.

I doubt I would take that shot on an elk though, but time will tell....

Bob

Out here where things are so remote and lightly populated, we have many opportunities to shoot just about anywhere. And since our "trees" are usually mostly willow and alder brush, I took the opportunity one winter to try different cartridges and bullets through the brush, using the same aiming point on the front side, with a frozen, pristine snow covered lake as the "bullet box". Not surprisingly, my results mirrored what many different testers have found and published. No bullet can reliably get through brush and stay on target. One of the worst, in fact, was a traditional "brush buster": the 45-70. I couldn't even find the tracks of some of those big bullets, not even the hard cast ones.

And using a cardboard box about the size of a white-tail's chest as a target with only a light screen of brush 3-5 yards in front, most bullets struck "okay" but about half cut clear side profiles as they passed through.

I have watched some nice animals walk in the last few minutes of the "last day". I can't think of a better way to cap my "last hunt" - (hopefully I won't know that it is)- than to see a nice animal, and let it walk. Perhaps I'm showing my age.

No such thing as a "brush busting" cartridge.

I have always passed up "brush shots" based on articles such as those cited above.

This was reinforced four years ago hunting elk in Colorado. I was able to take a solid rest on a fence post for a shot at a large bull elk about 150 yards away uphill. At the shot, the bull gave a large jump and scrambled away through the aspens. I thought sure that he was hit soid through the lungs. After trailing him over two miles to boundary of the ranch (there was a few inches of fresh snow on the ground), I had to give up. I could find no sign of blood and nor hair.

I went back to my fence post and looked up the hill to see if something could have caused my bullet to go astray. About ten yards in front of me on the line with my shot was a twig about the size of a thick pencil hanging by a thread of bark. It was about the last ten inches of the trunk clipped off of a a small sapling. It was invisible in my scope. I don't know where the 180 grain Scirocco went, but it sure didn't hit the elk...

Fast forward to the next September in Namibia. My PH, our tracker and I were following a group of kudu that contained one bull that looked pretty good. At some point, he left the group and ended up about 80 yards away, about 90 degrees from our line of travel. He stopped right behind a rather dense shrub, with his head and the front of his neck clear and only a bit of his rear end visible. The shrub was a little taller than his back line.

The PH set up the sticks and said, "Shoot where you think his shoulder will be". I shook my head. He said urgently, "Go on, it's the only shot you'll get". So, I shrugged and lined up on what I thought would be his shoulder and fired. As the rifle came down out of recoil, I saw the bull vanish in the brush. I was crestfallen, but the PH and the tracker assured me that he was hit hard.

Sure enough, we found him about 45-50 yards away, dead as a hammer. The 260 grain AccuBond smashed through his near shoulder and blew the heart to bits. It exited just behind the far shoulder, so we didn't recover it. I attribute our success to luck. I figure that this incident used up all of mine when it comes to "brush shooting"!

88mm howitzer

444 or the 450 marlin that is my choice atleast

I had a PH once who said he had a domestic cow to kill. It was behind a small tree faceing him. He said he took a head shot with a solid from a 375 H&H Magnum right through the tree dropping the beast.

For me, if I knew I was going to be shooting through brush, I would be carrying a 458 Lott. If the moose was fairly close to said obstruction and there wasn't too much of it, I suspect a 500 grain Woodleigh would get through just fine.

When it comes to brush it's more about a short barrel than the bullet.

why not just whistle and shoot him in the neck when he turns?

Thanks for saying EXACTLY what I was going to say.

It's time that myth was buried - once and for all.

No matter the reason,there is no excuse to take a marginal shot. If you don't think you can make a clean quick kill,let the animal walk,

I've taken a few "raking" shots, but there was always an offside shoulder in my sights. Funny thing is I've never lost much meat to that shot. Onthe other hand it's not always easy to clean up either.
The only reason to take the straight on THS is to anchor an already wounded animal. If I get that shot opportunity and he doesn't have a bullet in him---HE WON! He gets a PASS.

First thing I thought of when I looked at those pictures is that there was still plenty of time for them to turn and give you something.

The only thing worse than going home without is going home and having to live with the fact that you shot one of those magnificant animals in the arse and lost it.

I am going to have to mirror a lot of you good folks. I have never shot a moose nor an elk and most probably never will. I have shot, make that tried, to shoot through a lot of brush.

There ain't no such animal as a "brush busting" bullet in any shoulder fired gun.

BCR

I, too, would pass on these shots in hopes that they might stop and give a better target.

I grew up with the notion that big slow bullets would buck brush well. My eyes were opened when I read an article in a gun mag one time (probably in the 70's or 80's) where a guy set up targets beyond some brush and tried to quantify the amount of deflection of various bullets/cartridges. NONE of the cartridges fared well. There is NO SUCH THING as a "brush bucking" cartridge. The ones that did the best were long, cylindrical bullets. Can't recall for sure now but I think a 220 grain 30 cal or a 250 grain 338 bullet won the competition.

If I am not sure I can kill the animal, I do not shoot. It's that simple. I think the animal deserves that from us hunters.

Joseph

Another thing to think about is that a bullet is going to be deflected only a little off its path if the target is right behind the brush, and the brush is teeny little stuff, as opposed to a target that is a longer distance behind the deflected bullet. Deflection means it changes direction, and the farther it travels, the more the bullet gets off its intended path.
I wouldn't hesitate to shoot at an animal standing right behind ferns, say, but I'd hold off if it was a long ways behind the ferns. I also would hold off shooting if the brush had any size at all to it.
So in my case, a 35 Whelen is the best brush-busting cartridge for elk and moose, because that's what I'd be shooting...unless I had my 340 or my 270.

An open space in the brush has always worked well for me.

Caliber/bullet weight just don't matter that much. You hit brush, it will deflect, regardless. You put a decent bullet into the right spot, it still doesn't matter that much... Beyond that, there are so many variables here that there is no good predicting. It's like pissing into the wind and trying to predict the blow-back drops that will hit you.

The closer to the animal that the deflection occurs, the better for you, as the extent of the deflection whatever the situation/caliber/bullet weight will likely be less. Probably. Maybe.

I don't shoot through screening brush with .22's or .338 250 grains, or anything else I might use..

Now, what caliber/bullet weight to thread that hole in the brush- that is a legitimately debatable question...

Alright, a test I referenced earlier...

This is how one set-up looked for my 30-30:


The 170 Core-Lokts on target:



I will admit to having fun hunting bunnies with a little M94 Trapper in 45 Colt. If a hare-y target chose to "hide" behind the trunk of a frozen 3-4" alder, so what. 300 stately grains of metal are still very lethal coming out the back side. (And besides, a cloud of fur is helpful in marking the well camo-ed quarry when they've tipped over. )

Point taken.

I was thinking more of that quarter inch unseen-through-the-scope-branch 15 yards this side of that moose.... found the branch.... but no blood or hair, or hit-indication behavior-wise, other than a flat out bolt moose-wise..

Them 250 gr. .338 rounds are hell on twigs....

On the original pics, I'd take the moose at the base of the hump, slightly to the left of central, breaking his spine.

Pass on the elk. (again, slightly to the left of central would likely take him, but that's not a shot I'd take in this perspective)
)

Pretty obvious that your crappy bullet failed to expand while travelling sideways. Must have been a Barnes......

as long as gun writers write nonsense that enthusiasts want to believe as truth the myth of the brush buster will live on...the next article I now expect to see is "Hoots rates the best brush busters"...

I use a 61 cc Husqvarna for busting brush. That way you have some nice shooting lanes that are clear for bullet flight path.

If it will help feed the local homeless shelter I would think any cartridge worthy of a hail Mary through the brush shot. Thy bait is strong(grin)

I have several rifles that I use for elk and Moose these days..The .338 Win with 300 gr. Woodleighs, 375 H&H with 350 gr. Woodleighs, and the 9.3x62 with 320 gr. Woodleighs..All for use in the thick black timber of Idaho where I hunt elk and all shots are fairly close and almost always jump shots that are going away..

These calibers and bullets will stick their nose in the dirt before they go to the bottom of the divide, mostly they just buckle and go down at the shot..

In the sage brush hills I opt for lighter bullets but not much lighter as I will take whatever shot is offered within reason..

I use these calibers and bullets to kill the animal as he goes away from me as I can get complete penetration, but not to shoot through thick bush..I don't usually do that unless I can find a hole to shoot through at a standing animal. Shooting through the thick stuff is a low percentage shot and a recipe for wounding IMO, again within reason.

I shot a number of elk with the 25-35, 30-30 and 250 Savage in my youth, then the 30-06, 270 and such calibers..They perform best with broadside shots, the 30-06 with 180 and 200 gr. Noslers or 180 monolithics, may be the exception, but not by much, so I will call it a bare minimum for going away shots on elk....My personal opine only.

Start with a 460 WBY with a 500 grainer at about 2600. If that's too much for you, work your way down. Inane answer to another "best" thread.

Wayne

If you have any respect for the animal you whistle and shoot them when they turn around. Otherwise let them walk!
Elmer Keith liked a .338 with 300 grain slugs. I think he liked the 400 Whelen even better.
If you are the guy who practices all the time then you would take a head shot. Be advised your taxidermist may hate you for it!
I have some 275 gr Barnes originals for my 35 Whelen that might have a chance at nudging a few twigs aside.
It all depends on how much brush and how close it is to the animal. Let the homeless people eat salami!
whelennut

Somebody on here posted to the effect that it probably would be OK to shoot through light stuff just in front of the animal.

A decade ago I was hunting eland in Namibia with a .338 Winchester Magnum and 250-grain Nosler Partitions loaded to 2700+ fps. This might seem like a decent brush-busting load to some people. When I finally got the shot it was at 200 yards, with the bull standing broadside in the open--except for a little thorn-twig about the diameter of my little finger right in front of the shoulder pocket. I knew I couldn't hit that twig with a whole box of shells, so aimed for the top of the heart anyway.

At the shot all three of us (me, the PH and a friend) could see dust fly right where I aimed. The bull ran off behind some nearby brush before I could shoot again, but the PH was so certain of a dead eland he turned and shook my hand.

We waited a minute or two then followed up. When we got around the brush where the eland had run, we were quite surprised to find the bull 100 yards away, still standing. I gave him another through the lungs and he went down.

When we walked up on him there was a perfect silhouette of a 250-grain .338 Partition in the skin, right where I'd aimed. The thorn-twig was had been so close to the bull that we also found little swirls in the hair around the silhouette, where the thorns had whipped against his hide. So in a matter of inches a 250-grain bullet had been turned sideways by a twig.

I have run my own brush-busting tests and couldn't find anything that got through light (1/8" to 1/4") twigs consistently. Oddly enough the best caliber in my test was a .243 Winchester with 105-grain Speer spitzers handloaded to near 3000 fps--because the slim bullets would sometimes find their way through the brush without hitting any of it, unlike the fatter, heavier, blunter, slower bullets that in theory are real brush mowers, including a .358 Winchester with 250-grain roundnoses and a .45-70 with 405-grain flatnoses.

I have also had a variety of super-tough bullet deflected by brush, including 160-grain 7mm Fail Safe and Barnes TSX bullets, and a 168-grain .30 TSX from. They never even touched the animal they were aimed at. In those cases I thought I was shooting through brush thin enough that the bullet could be aimed into a hole, but it didn't work. My conclusion from those experiences, along with the eland, is that bullets often find brush on their own!

A long time ago I had a friend who's dad probably killed about a million deer and he said he considered the best brush gun to be a .270. That surprised me and I asked him why - he said a smaller bullet has a better chance of getting through brush without hitting it. Then he laughed at the notion that any bullet won't be thrown off course if it hits a twig. Kind of makes sense.

JB; Very enlightening! I never would have thought that would be the case, but I know of no instance where I shot through brush and could say conclusively that I had a different experience than what you say.
Were you able to determine what damage the keyholed 338/250 did? I would think it would have hit him pretty hard, even though sideways.

There are two "twigs" hanging in our hunting cabin; both shot by the same fella.

The first is a dogwood about 1.5"-2" diameter, with a nice .30 caliber hole in one side, and a hell of an exit hole and splintered opening on the other.

A .30-30 bullet from 65 yards dead centered that sapling, punched through, and then did yeoman's work on the 8-point buck on the other side. The buck as about the same color as the sapling, and the sapling wasn't seen until after the deer was recovered, and yes, there were a few splinters in the hide of that deer; it was that close to the tree.

The second is a dead, half-rotten pine branch with a half-moon cut blasted through one side, and damned near blowing it in half. A load of #4 magnum 12 gauge shot hit that branch at 20 yards, and not a pellet made it to the gobbler just a few feet beyond.

The very first deer hunt I ever went on, I saw a .300 Savage 180 gr. SilverTip detonate the top of an alder, and get deflect JUST enough to hit a 2' DBH hickory instead of the very nice buck it was intended for; the deflection was only a matter of inches at 50 yards (hit the alder at 15 yards), but it was enough.

I personally missed a very nice gobbler this spring when a twig smaller than a pencil got the .221 Fireball bullet intended for that long beard, and the same turkey had an identical bullet deflected two weeks later (by another hunter) by a single strand of barbed wire. Damned lucky bird............

Brush does funky stuff to bullets, and your best bet is always to shoot AROUND the brush, not through it.

I missed two deer with a 45-70 because of brush.
I also missed a doe with a .54 muzzleloader, killed about a 2" tree trunk though.
That is probably why the 742 Remington is so popular up north.
So darn many trees in the way! They just pound away until a bullet gets through!
The same theory applies in the shotgun slug zone, Remington 1100 slug guns dominate, and the owners brag about how many boxes of shells they go through. We have lots of brush in Minnesota, the deer hide in it!
whelennut

First of all, there is no brush bucking bullet. Slow heavy bullets have been proven time and time again to deflect as much as lighter faster bullets. For me, I pick a ham and let her rip on the shots above. I don't shoot for the bung hole or try to get the bullet to the vitals by shooting through the paunch. That is a lot to ask of any bullet. But when you break the pelvic, upper leg bone, or the heavy ham muscles, there are TONS of arteries and what the bullet doesn't wreck, the shattering bone will.

Shooting through brush that is close to the animal isn't going to change the path of the bullet enough to matter. Is it unethical or a "stunt"? Not at all, as long as the cartridge, the shooter and the bullet are to the task. I wouldn't shoot a .22-250 through the brush at anything but a coyote.

I have put a lot of meat in the freezer shooting through light brush. I have also shot a lot going straight away, again, I pick a ham and break the pelvic. They go right down.

It doesn't matter if it is the last day or not. I hear the old saying, "I will never shoot an animal in the butt. It wastes too much meat." That statement is a real yawner. There is very little meat lost when you compare maybe 5 lbs. of blood shot meat to 250 lbs. of good meat on an elk. I say, "Whoopti do, better to get 245 lbs. of meat than no meat at all!" Shots are seldom perfect when hunting public land. The perfect broadside pasture shots of elk (or anything else) standing still feeding are so rare. It all boils down to knowing your weapon, being able to shoot it well and knowing the anatomy of the animal in the sights. I have heard it a million times from guys on here and at the range, "I would never take a walking shot, a shot facing away or of any animal in the pictures above." The first animal that pops out, they start throwing lead at, especially on a trophy hunt or on a long hunt where the animals have been tough to find. Each to his own, but I have no problem shooting through a bit of brush, within reason. You have to know you best. Each person knows their limits and they need to hunt/shoot within those limits. Flinch

30 WCF is good though not "best."

No such thing as "brush busting," but this one'll take 'em down at the ranges you run into in dense cover.

Well, that moose wouldn't be a problem if you know what you're doing. Simply break the pelvic bone and he's down for good! Or shoot him in the hump. If you couldn't hit the hump from that close you'd better not be in the woods in the first place! I know a lot of moose hunters and I don't know one who'd pass on a shot like that!

As to shooting through brush... I've never shot through brush but I have clipped off a couple of unseen hardwood saplings at last light (one a 250 lb buck during the last 2 minutes of legal hunting light and really the last day)and both animals were hit, but not fatally and were not retrieved though a maximum effort was made to insure they were healthy enough to survive. Which they did. At least the 400 lb bruin did until the next season when he got shot again... that time he didn't survive. Some animals never learn... something like people

As to damaging a trophy? Again, that's the last consideration of 99.9% of the 100,000 moose hunters of Ontario.

Bob

www.bigbores.ca

I remember reading about this keyholed 338/250 in something you wrote, and wondering the same thing then. I can't imagine that it didn't do alot of damage...probably not a perfect mushroom, though!

There isn't any such thing as a brush busting cartridge. You may be able to get through to your target now and then with any given projectile flinging centerfire cartridge, but the odds are not in your favor. All bullets no matter how big and slow or sleek and fast will disrupt, deviate, partially expand or just plain disintegrate when they hit something in their path. Its what they are designed to do.

For the best performance regarding brush deflection, avoid using bullets that use the secant ogive. The ogive is the most important part in keeping a longer bullet stabilized, so if any brush contacts the ogive your in for trouble. So definitely stick to bullets that use the tangent ogive, a round nose bullet will give you optimum "brush busting" performance due to its short ogive.

Braxton

Best to not shoot any game - the risk of "contamination" is just too great with any bullet. Best case scenario would be to use a wooden club that would be composted immediatly after use. Neither of those shot presentations is desirable - give em' a second or two and you would have some ribcage to shoot at... IF you must shoot them however, make sure you use a Barnes bullet because the environmentalists have shown that any other bullet is a harmful pollutant.

My mega dittos to go with other voices who speak from experience. Herewith a few of my experiences busting brush with bullets:

-- Miss with 165 Hor. IB from 30-06. White tail buck standing broadside at 18 yards, bullet hit a two inch diameter pole 10 feet from the muzzle. Clean miss, aimed at front of buck's shoulder/base of neck.

--Miss with 165 Hor. IB. Looked like a hole through ragged brush and limbs at 30 yards at a large bodied whitetail buck standing broadside, aimed at center or ribs. No idea where that bullet went, and I'm not THAT bad of a shot to miss the whole deer.

--95 grain NP from 6mm Rem. deflected about 45 degrees when it hit soft green fir needles at the tip of a small branch 18-24 inches from a deer behind it. Aimed between eye and ear at a range of 30 feet or less, it hit at the back of a forkhorn whitetail buck's shoulder as it stood broadside.

-- Keyholed 180 gr. NP from 30-06. It hit brush within inches of an elk and hit the elk within 8 inches of point of aim.

--Keyholed 165 Hornady IB, 20 inches from point of aim at 130 yards from a steady hold with a rest. Not sure what made the bullet tip & deflect but most likely was fine diameter brush or grass within 3 feet of the caribou as he fed in willows. I say fine diameter because I looked for such brush and didn't see any before the shot.

--165 Horn. IB miss. Bullet hit the tip top of a fir Christmas tree 6 feet from muzzle. Missed a mule deer doe so far at 230 yards that she did not get up from her bed nor look toward the sound of any bullet passing.

-- Miss with 150 Sirrocco from 7mm magnum. Apparently hit a fine spray of almost invisible brush tips 40-50 yards from a cougar at 80 yards. Zero reaction of any kind from the cougar, which makes me think the bullet did not pass close enough for him to detect. (Cougar killed with second shot. Brush not detected till we were re-enacting the first shot to figure out what happened.)

--Black bear killed with 180 NP at 30 feet with a shot THROUGH leaves/twigs that were touching the side of the bear at the point of aim.

Brush busting bullets are a nine-lived myth that refuses to die.

Lucky shots through brush are anecdotes of the exceptions. Good luck!

'Tis true. But I will answer 45-70 anyway.

BMT

Bulletbutt,

I was curious about the damage done by the sideways 250 .338 Partition too. The skinners at the ranch never did find the bullet (I would have liked that too) but I did get to examine the lungs. Apparently the bullet only penetrated the near lung, the reason the bull was sick but not down when we came up on him the second time. It was hard to tell, though, since I shot him the second time through the lungs too--and with a Partition that went in the way it was supposed to!

Thanks for the reply. I couldn't imagine a 338/250 hitting any animal sideways and still not doing alot of damage. I am really surprized it tumbled that much from the size of the twig you described, but live and learn.

In preemptive defensiveness, my post above may give the impression that I routinely fling bullets through brush at game. It lists the results of 8 such shots. Those experiences were accumulated over many years. I was the shooter in 7 of the 8 mentioned, and could add a few more. All eight animals were killed, so I know whether and where bullets hit them.

--4 of the shots were first shots at an animal in a situation where the hunter did not see the brush.
--2 were in situations where I saw the brush and did not think it would influence the bullet enough to matter. (I was right on 50% of those.)
--2 were follow up shots, less than ideal due to brush but taken anyway in attempt to put down an animal already hit.

If you think a bullet will bust brush run a .308 FMJ tracer through a willow swamp at night. If you can't get a FMJ round through how can an expanding bullet do it? The tracer round is so unpredictable that you wonder is it going to come back and shoot you.

for brush busting it's hard to beat a good old claymore.

It will clear your brush and any critters that are hiding inside of it.

Hmmmm, that story sounds familiar...


And do you remember what happened to the first .338 fired at this guy? Hit a twig close to the gun...

You always liked those odd-horned buggers...second boolit didn't hit any twigs!
Ingwe

Ah, yes, I had forgotten about the springbok!

Ingwe was with me when I shot both of those animals. Hmm. Maybe there's some connection....

Now JB...you know things never go wrong when I'm around!
Ingwe

A few deer seasons ago, my best friend and hunting partner took a shot at doe in a thicket with his 338-06 and we were confident he had a good hit on this deer. We spent a while looking around for any sign of blood and then we found a big hole in a 3" sapling...

Trees have a funny way of jumping in front of your bullets sometimes. Subsequently, I always smile when another hunter tells me they bought this or that so they can "shoot through brush" and I wish them good luck.

CLB

The year was 1988, using my new M700 Classic 35 Whelen with factory 200 gr PSPCL bullets. I shot a big 11 pt WT deer at about 50 yds at the base of the neck as we walked away in the tag alders.
Upon recovery, I noticed a Poplar tree about 1 1/2" in diameter that I had hit. The buck was about 15 feet past that tree, dead from a shot to the base of the neck.

All I can say is that the Big Guy Upstairs wanted me to have that buck!

JD338

Whelen nut you could whistle Dixie at one of our Idaho elk in the black timber and he would not stop and turn around and give you a broadside shot! He is on his way to Montana the minute he comes out of his bed and won't stop until he gets there! I have been hunting there for 25 years and only had one broad side shot and someone else spooked him and he almost ran over me.

Sometimes I think some of us live on a different planet!

That's funny, because it rings true. To say the least, it's pretty brushy around here and I'd killed ten or so elk before I knew they could walk or stand still. I thought all they did was come out of their bed at full bore --- going the other way. A couple of times all I saw was part of a horn and an eyeball (big, scared-looking eyeball --- they have alot of white around their eyes when you're that close), heading for parts unknown, so you hit them in the eyeball. If they manage to hit the ground before you pull the trigger, that's a good time to shoot because they seem to hang there for a few hundredths of a second before they launch again. Usually after that second launch they're what we call "gone".

I've never whistled at one, but I've yelled things in the direction they went.

atkinson,
I was at a gun show and saw a guy sitting at a table with a picture of an elk he said he had shot at six hundred yards with his 338 magnum. I looked closer at the picture and noticed it was a cow with about half a dozen bullet wounds. Some in the guts, some in the back legs, etc.
I guess I am from a different planet because it failed to impress me at all. I would never have taken that picture, nor would I brag about piss poor shooting like that.
whelennut

And I've seen people not shoot at animals because they didn't have the experience under those circumstances to know what was going to happen if they did take that shot. I commend them for their restraint, but some of those shots were easy ones, and didn't have anything to do with gutshots or broken legs.

I am of the (light-hearted) opinion that one could probably "bust brush" quite successfully if they tried not to miss the brush. My reasoning is that when there is more - often much more- than 50% open space, the chances that one should get the bullet through undeflected should be quite high. It seems that it doesn't work that way however, and I think it's because of "Murphy's Rules." I think that by using Murphy to our advantage and hoping/trying to hit tinder, perhaps we will miss (cellulose) every time.

The best cartridge for elk is the .30-06. There's no such thing as a brush-busting cartridge.

John M. figured it out a long time ago. Don't see any brush left do you?

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No such thing really. To hunt those critters up close I would use my .338-06 or .45-70 Guide Gun.

I've never had any trouble harvesting brush without shooting it. A Cold Steel machete is the tool for that. Anyway, I doubt I'd be able to get that beast far enough up the mountain to find game, but a (GE XM214) 5.56 minigun might be a better firearm option?

Personally, my favorite close range elk/moose cartridge is the 35 Whelen.

A few years ago as I was walking into my bear bait in Idaho, a big, easily identifiable black bear came running out of the area at about a 45 degree angle towards me, going up a hill. I took my time and was very sure of the shot, as he was only about 40 yards away, although he was moving very quickly. At the shot I expected to see some sign of a hit, but didn't. Once we started looking, there was a nice big hole caused by my 300 Win Mag in a 6 inch tree right along the path that the bear had taken. My buddy killed that same bear 2 weeks later. He had no other holes in him.

The best brush-busting rifle/cartridge for moose/elk is whatever I have in my hands at the time.

If I could reach into a golf bag and pull out a rifle for the chore at the precise moment I needed it,it would likely be a 375H&H.

The first California Mule Deer I harvested was laying in about 1' high grass looking at me, when I shot at him, aiming at his adam's apple. The bullet was a 150 gr Nosler Ballistic Silvertip, launched out of a .308.

Some years ago I read an article (can't recall the author's name) who set up a "brush box" to test how various loads were deflected. He used 1" diameter wooden dowels, to simulate brush and also allow some degree of easy replacement, and repeatability. His findings were that fast moving, lightweight bullets actually stayed going in a straight line, but usually turned sideways. Heavy, slow moving slugs would retain their orientation, but would appreciably change direction. Surprise, surprise, the message was, don't shoot through brush!

In my case, the bullet hit exactly where aimed, and flattened the buck. As I walked up to him, though, it was clear he was still alive, so I put another into his chest. Checking the neck wound, I had expected to see a large exit hole in the back of his neck. Instead I found the side profile of a Ballistic Silvertip at entry, and no exit. I never did examine the inside of the neck, but I suspect the bullet hit him hard enough to incapacitate him, but not sever the spine. The grass was light and wispy, but almost enough to cause a miss. Good thing I wasn't trying for a shoulder shot!

I think we also have to keep in mind that it really depends on where around the circumference of the twig the bullet impacts. It's a difference of mere millimeters in POI with the brush, but can really change the outcome. If the bullet hits the tree or twig dead center, it will likely expand and carry on in a straight line. If the bullet glances off the side of the twig or tree, it will likely tumble and change direction. That is VERY hard to control, even for testing, because we're talking literally just a millimeter or two off to one side and the entire outcome can change.