Second day of our WI. deer season and an acquaintance of mine had a 70 yard shot at a mature 10 point buck. Trouble was the deer was heading directly away from him so he aimed for the butt hole and shot. .308 bolt action shooting a 150 grain Hornady SST. Lots of blood in 3" of snow. He has 40 acres to hunt on before it goes into another property. He and his brother try to track the deer, but the deer stops bleeding and after two hours they have given up finding it. What should he have done differently?

First mistake was shooting it in the butt! Wait for a good shot angle and pass until you get it. If the buck wasn't spooked it probably would have moved around some and given a shot at the chest. The intention of the shot should be a quick kill and shooting it in the butt is not a quick kill shot. Either the hunter is inexperienced or he is an idiot.

Uh, not try to run an SST up the mud pipe?

They usually can't go far with a legit texas heart shot.

Yeah, we don't really know it was hit.

I'm not second guessing the guy but this is for me.

1. No way I'd do the THS. Not my thing
2. I would have waited for a better shot, something into the chest.
3. Absent that and if, for whatever reason, I believed I MUST shoot this deer and I must shoot it RIGHT NOW - if I think I can poke the cheerio, I'd think I could poke the spine in the neck. Drop right there.
4. 2 hours looking is hardly anything. Snow on the ground? Track without blood.

Yeah, I've told him that an SST is a fast expanding bullet. Would a shot at the root of the tail drop a deer from spinal damage? Not a good shot we know, but it is WI. in brush country where we don't get many shot opportunities, especially at big bucks and I'm sure that he got excited seeing that one leaving.

I agree Teal, two hours is nothing! The only one that I've ever lost I looked for for two days and didn't have snow.

Probably skinned along the top of the back but missed the neck.

Or went wide-ish and clipped the hams/gams/rear quarter area. Chunk gave blood but obviously nothing arterial.

pretty much sums it up right here.

Have I done it? Yep. Will I do it again? Nope.

From the picture he sent, it looks like it bedded and bled enough to have melted out lots of the snow. Then there is maybe a couple of feet without much blood then more higher up. That says to me that there might have been an exit higher up on the deer. There are lots of big blood vessels in those hams and I remember reading once where Chuck Adams, a noted archery guy, said that he will get a deer hit in the ham with an arrow. When I've tracked a wounded deer, if they quit bleeding after they had been, that deer is running on borrowed time and is near out of blood and likely down pretty close by.

I don't know when/where and how it looks now - but I'd be in the snow looking some more.

I used the sst in a 3006 180 grain. Very frangeble bullet.

A 150 grain 308 caliber bullet in cup and core ain’t renound 4 it’s penetrating abilities.

My guess is the bullet never got through the abdomen and you were dealing with a gut shot deer.

They need time to expire from peritonitis.if you bump em before death the adrenaline rush they expierience can get them a long way from where they jumped.

Why the butt? It's dead but maybe a long way off. If he'd hit the base of the tail, he'd have broken the pelvis and dropped it like a rock.

If an SST went up the poop chute it seems to me blood loss would bring on death long before an abdominal infection would amount to much.

I took a butthole shot on a running blacktail and caught him on the up bounce. Shot his nuts off and opened his belly up. LOL Everything spilled out.

Not the best but it worked. Good blacktails come hard I wasn't letting him run w/o a shot fired.

You are assuming the sst bullet hit vascular tissue.

They can at best run 60 mph IMO. So in 10 seconds they can go about 300 yards

Better recalibrate your speedo...no whitetail is hitting 60mph, anywhere. Ever.

There are lots of deer where this guy hunts and he did get an 8 point the second weekend, so I don't think that he was as motivated as lots of us would have been. I do think that he probably hit it where he thought, but the bullet went through the pelvic arch and didn't break the pelvis. He went after it too soon and jumped it up I suspect. By having both he and his brother looking for it, they mucked up the track, made more noise and couldn't sort it out from the other deer tracks in the area.

I would have used a stronger bullet, probably a 165 grain or at least a Ballistic Tip, Interlock or Core-Lokt.
Shot it higher up on the back to break it down, if I couldn't get the neck.
Gone after it alone slowly after at least an hour or two and marked every blood with toilet paper hanging in a branch to get the direction.
Tracked it to the property line, then did what I could to snow track it further.
Watched for crows or jays, looked for coyote tracks if I hadn't found it that day.

20/20 hindsight, I know, but someone (me) should learn this guy better. I've recovered deer that lots of guys didn't or wouldn't have.

I've seen the up-the-ass shot work, and I've seen it fail. The fails are 3:1 v successes. I've tried it before, but won't do it again, and I openly ridicule guys who try it. Too much can go wrong. Not a high percentage shot. The one success I have seen was with a Nosler Partition. Two of the failures I've seen were with Nosler Partitions.

And guys want to bitch about 223 for deer being unethical...

I wouldn't want a 150 SST for that shot although it seems like I read somewhere that the SST has been improved since they first came out. Still not the weight or bullet I'd want for other than a broadside shot.

For plain cup and core a 165 or 180 bullet is better insurance for penetration IMO, but he might have just muffed the shot.

Sometimes a distraction noise like a bleat or whistle works to get a deer to pause and turn around for a better presentation. I've kicked myself more than once for not having the presence of mind to do that.

He didn't have roundoak as his photographer.

How fast are white tail?

Thanks

Faster than a speeding bullet. More powerful than a locomotive.

Able to lead tall buildings in a single bound.

I looked it up on wikipedia and sadly, whitetails are now endangered by climate change. So not very fast.

Just because shot opportunities are limited is not a reason take a questionable shot. Maybe on one already wounded as last ditch effort to put it down.Even at that,you go for the base of the tail, not the hole.

Amen ^^^^^^


What I believe is if they are able to run 50 to 60 miles an hour.

And if you hit them in a spot that causes bleed out.

They should only be able to make 2 to 3 hundred yards max. They usually die in under 5 seconds ( especially arrows through the center of lung field).

If u are tracking one past that distance and haven’t accounted for time for them to expire ( at least an hour). U might wanna back out and allow ample time.

When in doubt

Back out

Gut shots can take several hours before they expire

biggest horned whitetail buck i ever shot was with a Texas heart shot at 30 feet running with my 257 Weatherby mag. and a 100 gr. Nosler Partition went right down that was the only shot i had . Partitions are very good bullets and at 3800 FPS never have had any problems killing whitetail bucks always bang flops as it seems with these Hammer bullets so far too ? if i only have a Texas heart shot on a big buck with my rifle i use and good bullets with my handloads i will take shot within 200 yards. the guy made two mistakes the bullets he was using and not waiting long enough for this buck to bleed out and die , i also prefer a bigger cartridge rifle when i buck hunt whitetails these bigger bucks are tough to kill sometimes , i prefer to knock a buck down.

If he was hunting the private property I hunt(CWMU in Utah) he would have been done. Our long-standing gentleman's agreement is that if you draw blood you are done even if the animal is not recovered. Period. I think it's a good rule.

When I was young, I put a 12 gauge slug straight into the tailpipe of a big buck that was running away full speed at nearly 100 yards distant. The buck dropped instantly. All luck, no skill involved.
So, hypocritically, I will say that shooting a deer in the rear is a poor decision and no buck is big enough to repeat my mistake. Also, I wouldn’t do it with an SST.

Simply wait for a better shot or another day.

What he did wrong was take a poor shot at best. Wait for a better shot or pass. Not trying to be a smart-azz.

I found a still alive, rump shot buck, a couple years ago when out Christmas tree hunting. Looked like it happened a day or so before. Rump was a mess and the buck could hardly go anymore, but wasn't actively bleeding. No way it was going to survive. I walked back and got a rifle and finished it off.

I did it once with a .45 cal 300gr SST muzzleloader bullet @40 yards...dumped him. Found the bullet in his white patch skin of the neck.(3’ penetration) I’ll never do that again however use enough gun and it works well.

I’ve made some piss poor shots in my time I will admit and lost a few to good shots the older I get the more I wait.

The thing with butthole shots is you better hit it. Low & you clip the nuts & high it’s likely a miss. Might have castrated the poor fella - calves quit bleeding after a while, imagine deer are similar. Who knows - just tossing my .02.

yeah. The older you get, the more we have to wait on you, too.....

Me thinks frank zappa

Ram it

Ram it up the poop chute

Might be fitting here

Or not.

White-tailed deer will generally top out in the 35-40 mph range. Some might go a bit fast under stress, but they aren't going to hit 60 mph. Ever. The American Pronghorn is the second fastest land animal in the world, second only to the cheetah. Pronghorns top out at 60 mph. When I was a kid in the middle of South Dakota some of the guys we hunted with ran what was known as "the iron pony show" - chasing deer with pickups. I remember they could catch a whitetail. The same guys tried to cut off a band of antelope from crossing the county line into safety because it was out of the hunting zone. We didn't gain an inch on those goats flying across the prairie of Hyde County, SD in a pickup.

Thanks

This in fact makes me believe that if they go more than 200 yards…….

Back out

Give them time to expire

LOL, I'd go with "or not."

What did he do wrong? He took an unethical shot with a bullet that wasn't going to do the job even had it been placed in the right spot for a THS. 150 gr. SST is for happy broadside shots. If you're going to try a THS, better be flinging something more stout than an SST. I've performed the shot on a couple of deer that our party had wounded. A 140 gr. 6.5mm Nosler Partition will run a deer from one end to the other out of my .260 Rem without too much collateral damage to the hindquarters. Similar placement even with a 165 gr. Ballistic Tip out of a .30-06 put the deer on the ground, but it was UGLY. Put it into the pelvis at 100 yards and it was like I'd pulled the pin on a small grenade. The 8 point whitetail hangs on my wall as a European mount and a reminder that not everyone should be allowed to shoot at running deer, as the guy who drew first blood first shot the jaw and then hit it in the shin of a front leg. If you don't have a good shot, don't take the shot. The THS is a last resort on a wounded deer in my book. Not a "I can't let this one get away" shot.

Well, I would say he started off going wrong shooting a deer in the ass, then it all went downhill from there 😂🤣🤣

Inexperience sounds like the main issue on all accounts. Patience, better shooting, and better bullets are factors along with lack of tracking ability. If you have a dog.... or know someone with one (even if untrained) may get lucky and find deer? Ethically he shouldn't have taken the shot no matter how big the horns.

One of the things I've grown used to using good bullets in rounds like the 9.3x62, .375 H&H, .444 or even a properly loaded '06 is that shots like this are a no-brainer. I do alot of still-hunting in brown bear country so it's smart to hunt with a bear rifle but it's also very nice to hunt with a rifle that will reliably kill a deer at any angle a shot is presented at. While I won't rake a doe, I will absolutely rake a big buck, because as another poster alluded to, in this type of hunting you have to take the shot you get. I've killed a pile of deer at odd angles. I might wreck some meat on a ham, or have gut juice to deal with, but I'll still have more meat at the end of day than I had at the beginning.

I can't speak to the shooter's experience and don't want to second-guess him, but but equipment choices and mindset really matter. I don't care to use splashy bullets and I like to keep shooting at things that don't react appropriately considering the angle they presented at and how I called the shot. For instance, alarm bells go off if I attempt a raking shot and the deer remains ambulatory. More shooting! Continuity of fire is a foreign concept to alot of hunters. Don't look for or admire your shot. Call it from the trigger break, keep your face on the stock, run the action, and keep shooting as needed.

Good chance the angle of entrance may not have been straight away or into a large part of the ham. Place most any BG bullet directly up the hole or into the spine and they will be down quickly. There also are some large arteries there.

Most likely he only hit him around the edges.
It can be a mess, but is a deadly shot placement if you come even close to center punch.

He lacked location more so than bullet.

Wrong bullet for the job, IMO. Didn't hit where it wanted either, IMO.

Lots of missing info. Was the buck spooked? Was the shot taken from a resting position or offhand? Makes a big difference on where the bullet may have landed. If the deer was not spooked, he should have tried to stop the deer by barking or bleating at it. Have done this situation several times, but stopping him usually gives a neck shot, as the deer will lift his head to see what made the noise. Having a rest eases the shot.
I also drove a 215grn Rem RNSP out of my 7.65 Argie 91 on that shot that exited the chest, dropping the buck right there. Used the right bullet that day.
But not being in his shoes, or boots, is second quessing.

I don’t believe this question ever needed to be asked. Edk

Those who are guessing should have spent 20 plus years participating in Deer drives. Seen them hit most everywhere while trotting or on a full out run. If given a choice for quick recovery....guts or a solid hit in the hams...or rear shoulders as one became famous for.....A solid ass hit will overwhelmingly win. Most likely this guy didn't hit anywhere near solid. Happens sometimes on the front end also.

Why??? It is part of killing game animals. How many Pheasants, Ducks or Grouse get a wing ripped off?

You obviously have grown up on thinking TV stand hunting is "The Way." Those who still hunt or participate in drives are not always given the chance to grunt at them, have them stop and then pick out a particular hair to shoot at. I know there is that quick kill thing..We all try for it, but killing BG is never not ugly when your goal is to wreck body parts.

Even if you think that a shot might have only caused a superficial wound, with snow you should still be able to get them if you stay on them. I grazed the left ham on a buck once with a 180 grain round nose Core-Lokt one afternoon. Snow and hands and knees looking and all I found were flecks of blood and a piece of meat about the size of the end of my finger. I lost the track among some others. That night I said to myself, if I’d have lost a piece of meat that size, I’d bleed. Next morning at first light I was back and discovered I’d taken the wrong track. Back on the right track those flecks of blood were there and that deer was dead in his bed 200 yards farther on. The bullet had never hit a bone, just the outside of that left ham. I’m kind of miffed at this guy for not being more determined and wasting that animal.

We're hunters, we all understand knowledge is dynamic, and choices are fluid and change over time. The killing of game is not one thing to all people. It is convoluted with emotional trappings, need, nostalgia, desire (to use a different gun, different scope, bullet, try a new area, etc). Sometimes it works out, sometimes it doesn't. If you try a new area and it doesn't work out, no deer was caught in the learning curve and the experience is rather two-dimensional.

If it goes beyond that and a tried "first" culminates in a bullets contact with game, then a new set of circumstances must be interpreted, hopefully objectively, but often it will be over-ridden with an adrenaline dump making it hard to remain objective in your assessment of what's happening. And of course mistakes are made, it's not a scientifically controlled petri dish after all.

But hopefully with the passage of time, accumulation of knowledge, and an open, non-judgemental exchange of ideas and experiences received with an open mind, we can all become better at what we do, more effective and considerate and therefore more ethical.

We're not one of us perfect right out of the piss hole and all of us need tutelage, so let's be patient with one another and always be level-headed and forward moving with each others knowledge and maturity level as it pertains to hunting.

You could argue, in this contentious day and age, our pastime depends on it. If we don't do our best it feeds our opposition fuel for the fire. We've got to do our best. I've fallen short of that myself at times.

"Texas heart shots" definitely have their place. Maybe not if you're a meat hunter shooting at does or little dink bucks, but how many here would pass on a shot at a B&C buck if they already had a freezer full of meat?


Or a big bull/buck/ram that you paid big bucks for a guided hunt?

And even if you wouldn't take that shot, should your personal ethic dictate the choice for others?

Honestly, shooting a deer up the butt, then losing it in 3” of snow, doesn’t sound like this guy should be shooting at deer butts…

I once shot a pretty nice Whitetail right up the hoop at 20ft....30-06...150gr hornady sp.
4-5 " of snow, the only blood was when he would stop and lay down, then when he was moving there was nothing.
The high volume of tracks made it impossible to track him...he wouldn't leave the area, rather continued to circle around a 5 acre area. I found him, only because I heard him breathing his last breath up a small knoll.
Recovered the bullet near the front quarters....hard to track a deer with no blood trail.
SST is a poor hunting bullet imo.

I don't know that he did anything "wrong." I'd most likely have spent more than 2 hours looking for it.

I have never taken a 'Texas-heart-shot' but have shot a number of running deer, and under the right circumstances wouldn't hesitate to take a going away shot.

It worked out for ol' Milo Hanson, eh.

Once, years ago, I did help a fella' track one he shot in the ass with a bow. It went, I dunno, maybe 150 yards, and I couldn't believe the amount of blood it left.

A 150gr SST with a direct hit to the starfish would destroy the pelvic girdle, likely rupture both femoral arteries, and damage the spinal cord. That buck wouldn’t have gone anywhere.

Hmmm, I tend to agree with this.

This and what many of the others have said - if anywhere close to the aiming point the deer would have likely went down and if not wouldn’t have went far. A glancing hit, unless the bullet or fragment hit a major artery, would have been consistent with what seems to have happened here?

PennDog

I know for a fact a 130 gr interlock out of a 270 will blow a hole out as big as your fist if you hit the hip joint been there done that

The guy used the wrong bullet for that shot, and then didn't look nearly hard enough to recover that animal. With 3" of snow on the ground one of those sets of tracks is that bucks. Just my .02
Not passing judgement. I've lost a deer myself. It happens.


THS, guilty as charged. The only time I've ever done it was back a long time ago. The shot was about 40 yards on a nice fork horn. Bullet
started its journey on the bung and finished its journey in his neck.

That gun /bullet combo was 30- 06 and a 165 grain "X" bullet. PMC Eldorado factory load.
That bullet pic I posted in the barnes recovered thread is the only one I've ever recovered. Still weighs 165 grains.

Just how much resistance do some think a bullet encounters going up the intestines while most likely severing some major arteries, and perhaps the liver and kidneys. While at the same time busting hip bones. If necessary stick your finger you know where, for a clue.


It wasn't the bullets fault

If it wasn’t a fully rutted anorexic buck .if it ended up in the lower 2/3 ( ventral) of the rumen, I doubt it left that area. It’s called the fiber Mat. Left side of a ruminate. About like 3 milk jugs full of wet lawn clippings.

But like was said earlier if it was hit sweet it should have dropped quickly.

Only thing I shoot in the butt are quail.

Do you think that makes you a more ethical hunter?

Only native Texans are qualified to take Texas Heart Shot’s.

Poor judgement, unethical and irresponsible. Deer aren't that scarce that one needs to take that kind of low percentage shot. Good likelihood of having produced a gut shot deer condemmed to die a slow painful death.

That's because they can spot an aśśhole a mile away. I only lived there 7 years and I can spot 'em at a half mile:

Poor bullet selection for that type of shot! “A man had got to know his limitations”……or in this case, the limitations of the bullet!

Assuming the proper bullet impact location…..a good bullet would’ve exited the sternum, and be searching for another deer! memtb

The only bullet that I’ve ever recovered was a 160 grain Nosler Partition from my 7mm RM on an 8 point whitetail that I was snow tracking that had a broken breast bone. That bullet was in the front chest after it went lengthwise through the deer. Not only that surprised me, but the buck didn’t drop at the shot either. It turned 90 degrees and needed a lung shot finisher.

Not really. Just less confident in hitting the right spot on a deer running directly away from me.
I’d probably aim for the neck if I did.

Another Texas heart shot blacktail

Nice FB.


There's a pic here of the product of a 280 yard TH shot, have to scroll down a few posts:

https://www.24hourcampfire.com/ubbt...showflat&Number=17864996&page=25

Rear end, front end, if it’s done right it’s lethal. The middle is where the problem lies….

^^^^^^^^^^

Truth

This. If he had hit square or busted bone that deer is down.

He had enough time to count points, sinks an ass shot, then takes two hours over snow to lose it. Hell of a day.

What did this guy do wrong? He went hunting with a lack of understanding of the sport, the anatomy of the game, or a thorough understanding of hunting ethics.

after reading all posts , it appears he was a rookie and rookie`s make mistakes its all part of learning we have all made mistakes . i was lucky when i started deer hunting i had a family helping me learn my young woods skills . i would now have found that deer with what i know now at 69 years of age but if i was young with little help i may have not found that deer ? > wisdom comes with age and people helping you learn those skills. better luck next time ,Pete53

I am curious as to how trespassing looking for game works out in Wisconsin?

I think in Montana it is a very tricky proposition?

Fireball


Did you lose much meat shooting them ?

In the taint?

Properly placed….minimal meat loss. A few inches off of center…..plays hell with the ham connected. However, much less meat loss than “NOT” getting the animal at all!

I think that the shot ethics is determined by the probability of ended the season without a kill! memtb

Sums it up nicely.

Hit the backbone at the hip junction and they go straight down.

A TTSX or a Hammer Hunter would have been a better bullet choice for the shot taken

It ain’t the bullet that failed here.

A Deer “running” straight away and aiming for the neck, is like trying to hit a bouncing up and down softball to stay close to staying off the edges. And often the ass is going to get in the way.

Not exactly ducks over decoys.

One of the best posts I have seen in recent memory.

I have taken one "Texas Heart Shot." It worked. A dead still morning in a holler. My bud was set up about 500 yards away. The doe was about 90 yards away. The 257 Roberts sent the 115 Grain Ballistic Tip lengthwise right into the heart. She hit the ground and let out a blood curdling, long duration, death bleat that reverberated though the silent forest. My bud laughter soon echoed its way back to me.

I won't do it again. Faced with the same situation as in the OP, I'd give a grunt and get the deer to stop. If I liked what I saw, I'd get some neck.

I passed on a Texas heart shot on Monday. I had a 30-30 with 150 Core-Lokt's and I didn't trust it on that shot

A THS is an easy shot to pass on …….

4 me.

I did it once with a 12 GA buckshot at 15 yards. It worked well.

Always passed on others hoping for a flank ….,broadside presentation.