AmericanLongRifles Forums
General discussion => Black Powder Shooting => Topic started by: t.caster on November 19, 2011, 03:38:21 AM
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...are OK for squirrels and bunnies.....but not for DEER! :'(
Buoyed by a real good score on our woodswalk last week, I went to sleep on the eve of gun season Monday, with visions of head shots on a deer. Well, when this lone doe walks right up to my blind (15yds.) at noon on Tues. and turned to cross the river next to my spot, I instinctively hurried up a head shot to keep her from crossing over. She dropped her head, I lined up on her eyes and squeezed the set trigger on my Jaeger. Then things went into slow motion as the hammer fell...the pan flashed...the barrel went B O O M...just as she lowered her head a couple more inches...and mud on the riverbank exploded! And with one leap she landed on the other side (20 ft.!) totally unharmed but looking around and wondering, WhatTheHELL was all that??? I almost got reloaded before she walked casually out of sight.
I knew what I was doing....but what was I thinking? I had such an easy side shot!
I hope you all have better luck! And be Safe!
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My sentinents exactly, Tom.
Years ago, I-to thought - head shots - perfectly instant kills! I did it a couple times on moose, was lucky but decided I liked my moose, elk or deer completely bled out which happened much better with a hole thoght both lungs. Holing both lungs gaurantees a kill - the animal cannot live with a decent sized hole through both lungs. After that, if you want or have the time to break it down with other shots, go or it. The Double lung makes it a kill.
TNow, I do now like brain shots. The brain is small enough in most ungulates, it's too easy to miss at normal ranges, let alone longer shots. There's lots of bone in there to deflect a ball or bullet. Nerve shock form a 'close miss', if that's all that happened, can be quickly overcome with the animal making good it's initial escape. With no snow to track, it will perhaps suffer a starvation death, or worse maybe - being eaten alive by coyotes or wolves. I do not like head shots. The broadside lung shot, which also includes the liver, provides the largest kill area there is on an ungulate. My opinion is quite strong on this topic.
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Well, I was lucky today and took a little button-buck with a neck shot. He wandered past my blind just after sunset and stopped in tall grass with only head and neck showing and like I said I was lucky and placed the .440 ball just below his skull and dropped him where he stood. I have to agree, the lung shot is the safest and I'd never have taken the shot if it had been much more than the 25 or so yards that it was!
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I too do not do head shots. I did it once on a deer. It was the most horrible death I could imagine. Of course death from tramatic brains injuries usually are.
Brian
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OK I am glad others feel the same about head shots. Why take the risk at a head and small area the size of a grown mans fist when you have a target the size of an 8 inch pie plate on both sides of the big game animal.
In all 50 states the Hunter Education Courses teach our students proper shot placement. and the head is not a primary location; broadside in the chest area to hit both lungs, heart and lungs, heart lungs and liver. Thats a kill shot and yes the animal may drop in its tracks or run a couple of yards, Thats why we call it hunting.
Thank You
Glenn
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Totally with you guys on this. I teach a seminar on black powder hunting shooting and cleaning for Chuck Dixon and I use a life size cut out of a deer to show this same thing.Very surprising how many folks are not aware of the anatomy of deer,this thread is so useful and at the right time of year
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I'll be honest- backed up by what I see at the club, when it's "sighting in " weekend; most just don't shoot well enough . It is a difficult shot. If absolutely necessary, ie. wounded deer, I'd prefer a neck shot.
A friend shot a buck in the forehead with a 12 gauge slug. He fell down,but while walking over to dress him, he got up and ran off. I often hear talk of guys "ear holing" deer. Optimistic for most IMO. :(
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Forgot to add this to my last post. If you want to drop deer faster, shoot a bigger ball. Works for me.
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I agree with lung shots as the safest sure killing shot. It offers the largest kill target.
Need to mention the controversial Texas heart shot (smile) sure anchors them in a hurry! Can be a bit tough on the straps though.
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I generally take a chest shot low near the heart during the day so if I have to track them I have plenty of time. In the evening I'll go for the neck if possible you can get bone, wind pipe or juggler,drops them in their tracks. I took a shot at the neck of a deer once at 100 yards off hand with the cold wind blowing directly in my face, well the short of it is the ball went through the ears a fluke shot in one ear out the other never cut skin. It took awhile to find the bullet hole .It dropped like a sack of rocks
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I was once in a tree alongside a creek when a nice 4 pointer appeared walking directly toward me. I figured I'd put that .50 cal ball right in the brain. I let him get to 20 yards and fired. He almost did a back flip and hit the ground dead as a doornail. Or so I thought. I climbed down from my perch congratulating myself for a perfect shot. Instant death and no damaged meat. I didn't bother to reload. After all, I figured I was done for the day. Then the deer jumped up and trotted away. A little shaky maybe but he was moving fine after a few steps. I was dumbfounded. When I got to where he had been laying I couldn't find any blood or anything else to indicate that I'd hit him. Then, about six feet away, I saw something light colored in the trail. It was a sizeable chip of deer antler. My perfect instant death headshot was actually an antler shot that rendered the deer temporarily unconscious but otherwise unharmed. On thinking back on the shot it should have been obvious that I hadn't hit his head because I could see it in plain sight and there wasn't a hole in it. I was too busy patting myself on the back to notice, I guess. That was my first and last headshot on a deer.
Storm
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If you know your capabilities and know your rifle like your twin brother,why not? Head shots are not my shot of preference, I pick the biggest killshot zone that is presented. That's with ALL guns. My hunting success with muzzleloaders is bleak to put it truthfully. With the "other" guns, I've shot nine big game animals in the head area(behind the ear,ear,cheek,upper neck).That's not because I like to shoot them there, it was all that was presented. Boiler room shots are by far the best place to get'um. Still waiting to break the ice on a moose or elk with the black powder beasty!
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Head shots should be a no-no; too much risk of a miss or a maim. I feel the same way about neck shots. I've killed several deer with neck shots but guess what? Only one, my very first deer was killed with a neck shot on PURPOSE! All the others were caused by over-leading running deer or having them "twitch" just as I pulled the trigger. Accidents, imagine that. I'm a heart/lung shooter; bigger target, quickly fatal, good blood trail and if your shot strays a bit it will still hit something vital. Oh, and I should include spine shots in the very risky category. Again I've killed a few with spine shots and again only one on purpose - He was walking toward me down a slope and that's what was available.
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HA! - that's interesting - hanshi - your post reminds me of an article written many years ago in "Gun Digest", wherein the author stated quite emphatically, that "All neck shooters are liers".
He went on to tell about every animal that he'd shot in the neck, he'd actually aimed for the lungs. It was quite a funny read.
That was around the time the big game guide in Montana took a fairly well known archer out goat hunting, and the fellow shot a goat at 20 yards after a long arduous stock, not with an arrow, but with a .357, then pushed an arrow into the hole and said "Take my picture". That article was called "Game Fakery"- sometime in the 60's or perhaps 70's, but 1968 rings a bell for some reason- red cover I think.
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Gentlemen,
In my experience head shots are difficult to do cleanly for two reasons. One, the target is small requiring the distance to be less than 50 yards. Two, the head may be moved so quickly by the animal. Watch a deer when it is in normal behavior...the head moves constantly and in many unpredictable ways. It is easy to mess up a head shot.
Steve
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For every successful head shot there are probably at least an equal number of broken jaw shots or face shots which result in long slow lingering death. I have found them frequently in that condition laying in the woods. No thanks, I don't need a deer bad enough to want to take such a risk with an animal I respect. Be patient, you will get your opportunity at the heart/lungs vital zone or maybe you will have to extend your hunt a little longer - which isn't bad either.
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I just wish we had game(deer) as plentiful as some fella's describe on here.Locally,most sightings are on the edge of gigantic clear cuts.Hard enough to place a roundball shot at 200yards in the boiler room, never mind the head!
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I just wish we had game(deer) as plentiful as some fella's describe on here.Locally,most sightings are on the edge of gigantic clear cuts.Hard enough to place a roundball shot at 200yards in the boiler room, never mind the head!
You should move to Texas. The whitetail are so numerous that we have citizens complaining that the deer invade the subdivisions and eat their flowers. Wild hogs are becoming almost as great a problem.
Storm
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Daryl, I've got that Gun Digest issue and remember the article very well. And it's really a mind bender when you aim at a deer's boiler room and go up and find a hole in the neck.
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If you aim for the heart and miss by a little, good chance the miss can still be a killing shot. Aim for the head and miss the brain, you have a wounded deer.
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An interesting side note. My wife's Grandfather was from the Ottawa valley, and his " deer rifle " was a Stevens .32 Long RF. If I remember correctly,that round carried an 80 gr bullet. My point here is, even with that diminutive round, he lung shot deer. And he regularly brought deer home ! That doesn't mean that I advocate .32 or .36 squirrel rifles for deer, but I think it does say a lot about the effectiveness of a good broadside lung shot.
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I have taken only one head shot. I was still hunting to my chosen spot to hunt for the evening with the wind in my face. I was almost to my stand when i noticed a bedded doe about 20 yards, she was facing dead away from me with no clue that i was there. Her vitals were blocked by a small log she was bedded against. I put the front sight between the ears and when the smoke cleared she was stone dead,never even moved an inch after the shot.
Would I take a head shot on an alert deer? NO! Would I take That shot again? In a heart beat!
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The most sickening thing I've ever seen hunting was the finding of teeth at the site of a head shot deer. The shot was taken by an excellent shot with lots of experience at more than resonable range. We finally found the deer after the yotes had eaten most of it!!!!!!!
I don't understand the idea that a person will lose meat with a lung shot. With a lung shot your shooting thru ribs with virtually no meat on them. Very very little lost meat. A neck shot on the other hand may very well destroy a whole roast. I hunt and shoot with a longbow almost all the time and I found it disturbing how many of the members of my archery club had no idea of where kill shots were on the different animals that we hunt in the N.W. Frank
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The best small bore hunter I ever knew used a .36 on deer but he double balled his rifle. He said at 50 yards the balls were about 1'' apart and it brought them down fast.
Just for what it's worth, I ran across a statement from an American Revolution soldier that stated that when possible the rifle men would shoot double and triple balls when shooting into enemy ranks at a distance. Maybe that's what the hunters were doing back in the day with the small calibers.
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Quite! It's better to lose a few ounces of meat with a proper shot than a 150lb deer with a risky one.
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In my opinion, yeah, I know what it's worth:
If you don't have a decent shot at the heart/lungs, don't take the shot. You probably won't starve to death if you don't make meat and the chance of a terrible wound on the critter is not worth it. To you or the animal.
rudyc
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If already wounded, and the only shot available to follow up is head or neck, which is better ?
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If he is down and wounded when you approach him I would suggest a quick dispatch, another more direct shot to the boiler room or neck area would end the suffering, in my opinion. I don't have an answer for a running deer, but I would not push a wounded running deer, let him bed and die peacefully even if it means going back the next day to claim your harvest.
Glenn
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I have a brother who I consider to be the reincarnation of Nimrod himself! He is the most ultimate game getter I have ever known. A sportsman of all the shooting disciplines. Just this past week after opening day firearms deer season here in Michigan he put down a nice 8 point buck and the next morning he completed his license with a fine 10 pointer. Now he awaits December for a trip to S. Dakota for another white tail hunt. He does this every year as far back as I can remember. A few years back he was hunting the black powder season when he spotted a nice buck laying down across a big field. He took aim and waited for the animal to raise it's head. I saw the deer later, a 54 cal hole between it's eyes clean through to the other side. Nothing he does surprises me.
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Joel, he sounds like my older brother. A crack shot with anything! Incredible eyesight!
I remember him getting two pheasants on one outing back in the early 60s...with the longbow we grew up with. Fishing was the same way. we could stand ise by side on the riverbank or farm pond using the same bait and delivery....he would haul em in, and I wouldn't get a bite!
Glad this post caused a lot of thought on shooting game responsibly!
Tom
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The most sickening thing I've ever seen hunting was the finding of teeth at the site of a head shot deer. The shot was taken by an excellent shot with lots of experience at more than resonable range. We finally found the deer after the yotes had eaten most of it!!!!!!!
I don't understand the idea that a person will lose meat with a lung shot. With a lung shot your shooting thru ribs with virtually no meat on them. Very very little lost meat. A neck shot on the other hand may very well destroy a whole roast. I hunt and shoot with a longbow almost all the time and I found it disturbing how many of the members of my archery club had no idea of where kill shots were on the different animals that we hunt in the N.W. Frank
I agree there is no significant meat loss with a lung shot that does not involve the shoulders
A shot low through the brisket can result in the same result as a failed headshot. Or a shot off front leg. There are less than desirable possibilities with any shot taken at game.
The lung shot high will spine the deer.
But the shot low is not good.
The shot placement choice is entirely situational. The heart/lung is usually the best choice.
If the range is short head shots are OK but with a flint gun they can duck the shot at 40 yards or so if the hunter is "made" by the deer before the shot.
I can't recall making more than 4-5 head/neck shots over the years on unwounded game. Its a great shot if the situation is right.
Dan
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Watch a deer when it is in normal behavior...the head moves constantly and in many unpredictable ways. It is easy to mess up a head shot.
Amen.
AND.....if you have a deer that's already on alert, worst case possibly looking your way, I'm not convinced that some of them don't start a reaction at the hammer falling / pan flash...similar to a deer's reaction to the sound of a bow/arrow release when they can recoil several inches down getting ready to leap away.
But whether they do that or not, their heads are almost in constant motion and the movements are quick snaps, jerks and twitches of course.
Neck shots are a LITTLE more predictable, if you use the location where the neck joins the body, it almost can't move without the chest wall moving...I've only shot one that way...right at dusk and light almost gone a Buck was walking across through thick trees in front of me only 25-30yds away, I whistled and he stopped with his head/neck/brisket sticking out past a big tree...in that case it was a chip shot on a relaxed deer at close range, and he dropped in his tracks.
But other than the rare situation, its heart/lungs for me...and the good news about using large calibers, it almost doesn't matter what angle you need to take to get there...a big .58/.62cal ball will plough right on through
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2 cousins and i sat around the campfire discussing this subject one hunting season. one cousin swore by head shots. "drops em in their tracks, no waste of meat". next night they were late coming in. when they did, the one that swore by headshots was saying " me and my g** da** head shots. i shot the face off of a nice buck and we couldnt find it, looked for hours". sure felt sorry for him and the buck, but sometimes life just sucks. mark
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Well, after all this discussion....I, with .62 cal Jaeger in hand, scored a big DOE with a lung shot on Thanksgiving morning!
Good luck to you all!
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It was a Happy Thanksgiving for you Tom!!
rudyc
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Way to go Tom!
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I've been wondering how many 'head-shots' are accidents, present company not included. About 10 yrs ago I was at a local check-in station when a huge 16 pointer was brought in. It had been spotted and shot at many times, and was becoming legendary that season. Should have been 16 points (eastern count) but one tine was gone completely, one tine had a huge chip out of it, and each main beam had a nice round hole in it, each a different caliber. This deer had been shot at many times, and it seemed like most shots were at the rack. I've never had a shot at such a big deer, so can't guarantee I wouldn't get a bad case of buck-fever too!
I'm trying to find out if the rumored 22-pt, taken just 300yds from my house on Friday, has holes in the antlers too.
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I was guiding a guy once and he gut shot a MD buck with his 7MM mag.
In approaching for a finish the deer ran out about 80 yards or so and stopped broadside. He neck shot it. But thats not where he was holding since he was complaining bitterly about lost meat as we walked to the now dead deer.
Accidental neck shot. ;)
Dan
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The worst wasted meat shots are the ones that run away to die a very probable painful and slow, wasted death. I would rather lose some meat and not lose the animal. Boiler room shots are my choice. YMMV.
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I wasn't going to bring this up, but - I neck shot a deer once, dropping it on the spot with a .45 round ball from my deep groove Bauska. The deer was facing us, Tracy and I as we walked along a trail.
Immediately upon hitting the ground, it started thrashing around to get up. I could see the hole, just off to the left side of centre. I'd missed the spine and there was hardly any blood, just a spot. I dropped my rifle and attempted to use Tracy's .36, (loaded with a 228gr.maxiball) to head shoot it in order to finish it off. I rushed up within 20' of the deer and snapped off the shot at it's head, just as it swung it's head to one side. The bullet entered the neck, hit the spine then ran down alongside the spine to stop between the shoulders - about 11" or 12" penetration. It had no effect, except to hasten it's attempts to gain it's feet. She handed me my rifle wherein I dumped in a 'bunch'/'some'/'enough' powder straight out of the horn into the muzzle, set a ball on top and pushed it down bare with the rod, capped and then finished it off with a side head shot from point blank. As the ball was .009" larger than the bore, there was no chance it would roll out. This whole disaster took about 1 minute, maybe. At least the deer wasn't lost.
For those who think you never need a second shot, I don't believe it. All you need to do is make a poor shot, as I did and a second or third is needed. If it goes bad, it sometimes goes very badly.
Yeah - mistakes were made - I should have reloaded my own rifle and shot the deer in the body, or I should have shot it in the body with Tracy's rifle. Not wanting to "spoil" the shoulder, is false economy.
Of course, had I shot a bit lower on the chest, not the neck and centred for the lungs, I'd have probably dumped that little buck right there as well and hurt no amount of meat and guaranteed the kill with the first shot.
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I've had to deliver the coup de grace shot on a few deer that were down for the count but still breathing, including one that was neck shot (accidentally). Once I shot a nice doe in the boiler room and she went down in her footie prints. She kept throwing her head up and could rise just a bit but her legs weren't working. I reloaded as quickly as I could but fired at the lungs as usual as I don't do head shots. When I went up to her the two shots were almost in the same hole and exited only a couple inches apart.
Normally if they are still breathing I go up to them and put a handgun ball into the base of the brain from 6" away.
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I personally will NEVER take a head or neck shot no matter how close how close the the deer is. it's the lung or double lung - heart shot for me. And don't EVEN start any talk talk about the " Texas heart shot " with me. >:(
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???Texas heart shot ??? dunno...I'm from the North!
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I read someplace (can't remember, exactly) that a deer is capable of moving, shifting, ducking, etc. at a documented 1,500 fps, if they hear something out of the ordinary, like an arrow being released. What's that comparable to... about 2X the speed of an arrow and nearly the same as a decent RB?? I think they had it on slow-motion photography too.
I've taken my share of bucks, still-hunting and on late afternoon to dusk ground stands, but I count myself fortunate that those bucks finally made a mistake and I was there when they did.
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The most sickening thing I've ever seen hunting was the finding of teeth at the site of a head shot deer. The shot was taken by an excellent shot with lots of experience at more than resonable range. We finally found the deer after the yotes had eaten most of it!!!!!!!
I don't understand the idea that a person will lose meat with a lung shot. With a lung shot your shooting thru ribs with virtually no meat on them. Very very little lost meat. A neck shot on the other hand may very well destroy a whole roast. I hunt and shoot with a longbow almost all the time and I found it disturbing how many of the members of my archery club had no idea of where kill shots were on the different animals that we hunt in the N.W. Frank
I agree there is no significant meat loss with a lung shot that does not involve the shoulders
A shot low through the brisket can result in the same result as a failed headshot. Or a shot off front leg. There are less than desirable possibilities with any shot taken at game.
The lung shot high will spine the deer.
But the shot low is not good.
The shot placement choice is entirely situational. The heart/lung is usually the best choice.
If the range is short head shots are OK but with a flint gun they can duck the shot at 40 yards or so if the hunter is "made" by the deer before the shot.I can't recall making more than 4-5 head/neck shots over the years on unwounded game. Its a great shot if the situation is right.
Dan
Quite easily, I'd think.
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I took my .577 Enfield two band rifle hunting once to see the difference between a Mini (shallow base) ball hole and a RB hole 60 gr ffg . I was sitting on the ground and in the early morning and had to lean out of the old truck cab stand I was in (no bottom in the cab) which was some awkward .The buck was quartering toward me and I went for a neck shot .The shot missed the neck instead traveled down the deer and struck it about half way down the spine piercing the back strap. The deer went down like a sack of rocks in high grass.I re loaded and waited a while and began my approach to the deer until I could see an ear, which was still moving. I waited again and started toward the deer now only a few yards away. As I approached he tried to get up his hind quarters not functioning.At which point I did a neck shot with my pistol.That ended it.
What's interesting is the mini ball went in mid way back hit the spine, the angle being slight
, and deflected back out the same side it had entered.
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Blunderbuss - that was common up here with maxiballs on moose- similar to the one I shot into that buck with the little .36 - in they go, turning, dodging, any-which-way they seem to desire - bounce along the spine then back out to the hide. You could not trust one to make a clean, straight hole. They always turned and went as the Surgeon General at the Corean War stated, "shirking the bones while coursing throught he soft parts of the body making neat wounds", whereas the "common round ball smashed the bones asunder, making such grevious wounds". He was talking about the minnies compared to the round ball loads. We found the same to happen with moose and maxi's vs. round balls. The shape and instability (twists too slow) of the bullets is what defeats them.
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Sounds like a hard wound to clean,I never tried a minnie again on deer.I was just supprised it went in and came out the same side. It was accurate I could hit a ram silhouette at 500 yards with it,maybe not every time but regularly.The Minnie was slow could almost have the rifle re- loaded before the ball got to the target. We shot out to 800 yards with it I figured I could land one in a company size element.
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I've never attempted a head shot on deer or antelope. I go for the lung / heart area myself. With this said, I have noticed in video's (no matter if they are muzzle loading or modern firearm) these "T.V." junky trophy hunters go for it looks like to me and the reaction of the game they are hunting when hit, - "gut shot's" - as it appears they simply do not want to risk hitting the rack on a trophy buck. This really irks me to no end. >:(
Years ago (at least 15) I bought a TC Hawken .54 Kit Rifle. This kit came with a hunting video promoting TC Muzzle Loading Firearms. In that video I don't believe there was one clean kill shot. All the deer taken appeard to be,,, yes you guessed it,,, gut shot. If you've ever seen this video you know what I'm talking about. My neighbor (who I hunt with) watched his TC video that came with his .54 Hawken kit and said the same exact thing I just relayed above.
I've just always preferred the heart / lung area myself on big game.