.45 cal. for deer hunting

[smo]

Yes they did, I never tried it but my hunting Buddy could stack two balls an inch or so apart at 50 yards with his .50 cal TC.

Great guns for the money back then, still great guns now if you own a good used one.

I think I’m down to a .50 & .45 cal TC Hawken and a .50 & .54 cal TC Renegade in percussion and only one .50 cal Flintlock TC Renegade .

 

[Loyalist Dave]

I just mentioned it 'cause even in some parts of the black powder manufacturing world back then, they didn't think the .440 patched round ball would slay deer. :wink: OR perhaps they were pandering to the thought process of the buying public back then ???

LD

 

[rich pierce]

I agree on the 100 yard limit. It can be hard to judge range in a field or over snow. I shot a big doe at about 130 yards over snow with a .45 low in the chest, quartering toward me, and required a follow up shot. A bigger bore might have anchored her. Other deer shot up to 80 yards cooperated but I did not get pass-through which is typical for a .50 or bigger caliber.

 

[coloradoclyde]

I just mentioned it 'cause even in some parts of the black powder manufacturing world back then, they didn't think the .440 patched round ball would slay deer. :wink: OR perhaps they were pandering to the thought process of the buying public back then ???

LD

And this was at a time when the 30-30 was the most popular deer hunting round and the .22lr was the most popular poaching round.....

I wouldn't attempt a 150 yard shot with a .45 rifle nor would I attempt a 150 yard shot with a .75 cal smoothbore....

Caliber is irrelevant....any gun will kill a deer in the hands of someone who knows what they're doing. And, no caliber is idiot proof. A friend of mine use to shoot all his deer in the head, despite my objections.....Then one day he sent a deer over the hill with it's lower jaw hanging.....Never did find it. :shake:

 

[excess650]

.45s may be adequate, but the user needs to be aware that a patched roundball loses nearly half its muzzle velocity by the time its gone 100 yards. I prefer a larger diameter, heavier PRB for deer.

 

[Loyalist Dave]

So do I. :wink:

It's also interesting to note that at a time when conicals were readily available, a well known big game (and dangerous game) hunter, James Forsyth normally shot his big game at 100 yards or less, and at a minimum preferred a (iirc) .69 caliber rifle with a patched round ball.

About 50 years later a well known American deer hunter and author, and hunting guide to presidents, Theodore S. Van Dyke, advocated the 1873 Winchester rifle (with open sights) using the .44 Winchester in black powder (today it's the .44-40 cartridge) for deer out to 200 yards. :shocked2: It's not legal for hunting deer in Maryland these days, but Van Dyke killed a bunch of mule deer with it in California.

So the ideas of adequate have varied over time to be sure..., and although Van Dyke in The Still Hunter spoke of long shots and shooting at running game with his rifle, his lessons on getting close to deer lead me to think that he was MUCH closer than 100 yards with his rifle most of the time. His lessons in his book are what taught me how to get close and get a shot with my flintlock.

Quite frankly, over open sights, and I have better than 20/20 distance vision, I don't like going beyond 100 yards. I did it in the service out to 600 yards but one wasn't going for hunting accuracy on the KD course at Quantico or Camp Lejeune, and that was with an iron peep sight. I have taken one and only one deer at 110 yards, a very large doe, and I under estimated the range. :shake: I did get a pass-through hit though, and recovered her within sight of where she stood when hit.

LD

 

[BrownBear]

It's also interesting to note that at a time when conicals were readily available, a well known big game (and dangerous game) hunter, James Forsyth normally shot his big game at 100 yards or less, and at a minimum preferred a (iirc) .69 caliber rifle with a patched round ball.

Weren't those alloyed balls?

 

[Loyalist Dave]

Weren't those alloyed balls?

From what he writes, I think only with the very large, dangerous game, did he advocate an alloy ball....

"We have thus the power of adjusting the nature of the work to be done by the amount of vis viva at our command, so as to suit the purpose we wish to attain. The object in firing at an animal is generally to drive the ball through him in any direction it may strike, and no more. If, then, the animal is comparatively small, we shall gain if we use a soft ball, which will go straight through, but in doing so will get flattened out, and so make a wider hole. If, again, we are firing at large animals, and require the utmost possible penetration, we must use a hard ball, which will not lose its shape, and be content with a somewhat smaller hole. By thus using harder or softer projectiles, we can attain any amount of penetration while retaining the use -so essential to good shooting - of the same charge of powder."

Since I've many times driven a soft ball through a white-tailed deer using a moderate charge, and even out to just slightly more than 100 yards, I take it that when he writes of needing "utmost possible penetration" he's talking of harvesting much larger critters such as rhino, elephant, gaur, and buntang. I also note that he advocates tailoring the projectile to the game, not the powder charge..., as his alloy is thought to be pretty close or perhaps "heavier" than pure lead.

His alloy btw was,
"Lead 89 parts by weight.
Tin, 1 part by weight.
Mercury, 10 parts by weight." :shocked2:
And one had to add the mercury to the melted lead/tin mixture at less that 660 degrees so that the mercury doesn't boil off. He doesn't mention ill effects from exposure to mercury..., maybe some poor, local chap did the casting ???

LD

 

[excess650]

I have taken (2) whitetails within 3 weeks using the same .62 over 100gr fffg, and "hardened balls". It just so happens that my "soft lead" age hardens to 9-10bhn, so it is what I shoot. .605" 326gr from my Lee mold, anyway, the first deer was taken in Virginia and shot through the shoulders as it walked past (25 yards). The ball flattened to 7/8" x 15/16" and lost less than 1gr and was found under the off side hide. Girth charts suggest 300# live weight (deer in my avatar) and it had a head like a horse. The 2nd was taken during Pennylvania's regular rifle season. I was perched in a stand on the spine of a ridge and had the buck cross below me. He dropped into the bottom of the hollow and stopped while going up the other side. It was ridiculously steep, so I reasoned that there wouldn't be as much drop considering the distance (rangefinder later suggested 125 yards+). I held where the neck met the back and the ball struck there just nicking the spine. The ball rolled out onto the floor when I pulled the hide down over the brisket. It had some striations from bone, but was round enough to load and shoot again. That deer might have weighed 135# live, but the ball didn't expand or exit due to velocity loss from distance.

My preference would be holes in and out, but the .62 hits like Thor's hammer even if it doesn't exit. Another heavy Virginia buck was taken with the .62 at about 60 yards but quartering towards me. It struck where the neck and shoulder meet and did not exit. I didn't find the ball, but the buck barely twitched. A 3rd Virginia buck was taken with a .58 (.565") over 100gr fffg, double lung at 25 yards. The ball did exit, but it didn't go 25 yards before collapsing. I didn't see blood until I found the spot where I had last seen him standing in the laurel, and that was where he was found.

I wouldn't be comfortable using my .45 for deer unless it was open and/or snow. Ball weight increases by about half by moving up to .50, and almost doubles when going to .54.

 

[tenngun]

I’ve shot more then one deer with a .62 but I wouldn’t trust my fusils beyond 50 yards. I don’t own a .54 now but would have no qualms about any of mine out to a hundred yards and a bit. I shoot 60/70 grains in my 7/8 . .50 and wouldn’t push it to far. I don’t think it’s the caliber I think it’s hunting in your guns practical range.

 

[nhmoose]

Not to tengun.
Deer don't die immediately from any shot IMHO following them up and finding most under 100 yards tells me those who want DRT have no tracking skills at all.

F&G stories allowing tracking dogs now a days when very illegal 20 years ago seems to prove it.

 

[smoothshooter]

Sometimes I wonder if the larger caliber's popularity back east early on was because of the advantages of having a larger ramrod as much as any advantage in larger bore diameter for hunting.

 

[coloradoclyde]

Sometimes I wonder if the larger caliber's popularity back east early on was because of the advantages of having a larger ramrod as much as any advantage in larger bore diameter for hunting.

Interesting... :hmm: The larger diameter also allows for lighter, thinner barrels and lower barrel pressures. Which would make manufacturing easier and cheaper.

 

[smoothshooter]

The difficulty of fabricating a replacement for a broken ramrod under field conditions with the only tools available being a knife and perhaps a small belt ax of some sort increases as the diameter the rod needs to be decreases.

 

[excess650]

:yakyak: Property lines, access, and other hunters nearby are reasons enough to want DRT.

 

[excess650]

Early on, back east or not, the majority of barrels were either imported from Europe, or made like those from Europe as that is where the makers came from. Moving towards smaller calibers was a function of the scarcity of lead and good powder.

 

[tenngun]

I don’t know if that’s true. Large fusil bores continued to be imported in to the Canadas and the Louisiana, then bore size went up with the purchase of the Louisiana while going medium sized in the old north west and becoming smaller in the trans Appalachian area. I think it was a matter of practicality a hundred .40-.49 would do in near a hundred deer or black bear and be a lot easier to transport then a hundred .54 shots. I don’t know that a .45 fusil would work as well.

 

[Darkhorse]

Thanks Eric for a realistic post about roundball hunting. Too many times I've read the claims of DRT with a .40 or .45 out to 100 yards, everytime.
I've hunted with a .54 prb since 1976 and most years I harvest at least one deer, usually several due to our liberal limits. And some years many hogs also including some big boars. In all that time I've only had 3 to fall DRT and that was because I broke the back or spine. A round ball doesn't kill from shock, it kills from tissue destruction, and the bigger ball destroys more tissue.
I expect my deer to run after a shot to the vitals, the closer to the heart the shorter the run, the further from the heart the longer the run.
I love my .40 flintlock but I'll never take it deer hunting. And I don't feel comfortable with a .45 either. The smallest I personally consider is the .50 caliber.
So for the original poster I suggest either a .50 or .54, both can be very accurate at the range and also effective on deer.
As for tracking a wounded deer I want at least a .54, the bigger the ball the bigger the hole. The bigger the hole the more blood comes out.

 

[Rifleman1776]

I don't feel comfortable with a .45 either.

Too bad. But this is a do yer own thang game.
The deer I have killed with a ml rifle have only been with a .45 prb. Except for the first, my charge was 65 gr. real bp. None went far when hit, a couple leaps then down. BTW, my first was with a 95 gr. charge and caused me way more bloodshot meat loss than I was happy with. The lower charge kilt them just as ded.