.45 roundball for deer

[Black Jaque Janaviac]

Does anyone have a negative experience using a .45 roundball for deer?

I've been using .50s and .54s for 20 years and almost always have a tracking job to do (good hits are shorter and easy to follow).

My son has been using a .45 with a 120 grain roundball for 3 years and shot 4 or 5 deer with it. Every single one was a drop-right-there.

Yesterday he double-lunged a doe and the only reason she didn't stay put was because she rolled downhill.

Just curious why .45s aren't more popular.

 

[coloradoclyde]

I'm a huge fan of the 45......
50 caliber rifles have become invasive like weeds in a garden... since the popularity of modern inlines,

I also miss other hard to find calibers like 36 and 58.

 

[rfisher]

Interesting topic as I just shot a doe with a 45 round ball for the first time two days ago after hunting with a 54 exclusively for the past 8 or 9 years. The 54 gave me good results and how far the deer went depended on shot placement but I did and still do have alot of faith in that rifle as a meat maker. However I was astonished to see just how effective my 45 was on a nice doe at abut 40 yds the other day. I got a double lung thru and thru on her and she ran but only about 25 yrds and when I walked up to her she was laying in a great pool of blood. Maybe it was a coicidence that the shot was so effective but I am anxious to use that rifle again to see how it performs next time.

 

[swathdiver]

Just curious why .45s aren't more popular.

Because of the "bigger is better" thinkin'.

And probably also because so many put too much stock in paper ballistics which in no way compares to modern calibers and cartridges.

 

[Crewdawg445]

I'm a huge fan of the 45......
50 caliber rifles have become invasive like weeds in a garden... since the popularity of modern inlines,

I also miss other hard to find calibers like 36 and 58.

Me too! .45 is the ticket.

 

[Brokennock]

I love the .45, only reason I hunt more with larger is due to the versatility of a 20 gauge smoothie.

I agree that a large part of the reason it isn't more popular is the "bigger is better" mentality. I also think there are a lot more toys and gadgets (accessories?) readily available at big box sporting goods stores for the .50 that play to the desires of hunters with no real interest in black powder shooting beyond taking advantage of another week to 10 day deer season.

 

[Tracy A. Potter]

I have a Kentucky 45cal that has killed 4-5 deer 75g with PRB and none have gone farther then 20yds, Two dropped right there. Pretty impressed with them myself.

I also hunt with a 58cal Hawkin PRB too and have always had to track from 50-150yds. But great trails works either way but I haven't hunted with the 45 in years might get her out for doe season.

Tracy

 

[Katahdin]

No bad experiences with my 45's, you shoot them right and they lay down..double lung, best shot for me,,no air, they die.
Know your limits and the rifle you shoot and you will always have something to hang on the meat pole.
I have bigger rifles but I save them for the 700 lb, saber toothed deer with the 10" claws,,lots of them around deer camps !!!!!! :rotf: :wink:

 

[Eric Krewson]

I shoot a .445 ball pushed by 70gr of 3F out of a well broken in .44. I have killed 6 or 7 deer with the rifle, possibly more. I killed a big doe with the rifle two days ago.

Almost every deer I have shot with the rifle I double lunged, none fell on the spot, all ran a minimum of 50 yards, some 75 yards. Dead is dead but none of the deer I shot left a blood trail worth a hoot, just a small drop or two every 5 or 6 feet. Fortunately I heard most of them crash.

 

[tenngun]

I started this years ago thinking you had to have at least a .50 to hunt deer, and any thing else was compareable to a .22. Then I met a lot of folks hunting well with .45s and .40. No ml looks good on paper, but deer aint made of paper. Shot placement is far more important then size. smaller sizes were popular for hunting in the old days because they work. I've went mostly to smoothies now, but have been thinking about a .45 southern.

 

[Black Jaque Janaviac]

Eric,
Your description sounds a lot like my experiences with a .50 or .54.

To all: for the purposes of comparing ball performance we shall assume shot placements are in the vitals. So we don't need shot placement lectures.

That said, I am more curious about why some guns drop deer and others require tracking work (even if the deer were hit in the same place).

In the case of my own situation I know that lead softness can't be different since I cast the .54s and .45s from the same pot. So it can't be that one guy is hitting them with Wheel-Weights and the other guy is hitting them with Plumbers lead.

We've chronographed both loads and the .45 is steaming along at 2000 fps and the .54 is leaving the muzzle at 1900 and some change. Factor in the varying distances that we've been shooting deer I am certain that our impact velocities are overlapping.

 

[coloradoclyde]

To all: for the purposes of comparing ball performance we shall assume shot placements are in the vitals.

That still doesn't level the playing field.....
A deer shot through the heart can still run 100 yards.....
I've shot deer with high powdered rifles that completely obliterated the heart and lungs, and still they ran a ways.......

Every shot is unique...

I have shot more deer in the spine than anywhere else......Mostly because I was either shooting from above or they were running away.....and even a deer that has no use of it's back legs can drag them for quite a distance......I had one go 50 yards before I could catch him and finish the job.

 

[daniel collums]

it don't matter what size ball you put through a deer if hit in a major organ. the deer that hit the ground stone dead before the echo of the shot is over either have spine damage or the shock of having vitals ripped just makes them expire instantly. some deer unless hit in the head or spine just refuse to go down till their blood pressure drops or lack of oxygen to the brain makes them pass out and die. i started out with a .45 and never lost a deer or hog, then i got a .50 renegade and even though i killed many with it i also blooded some and lost them mostly to poor shot placement from not waiting for the perfect shot. for killing deer its not about which makes the biggest hole but which gun you can hit perfect with. with all that said, bigger the ball bigger the hole.

 

[Black Jaque Janaviac]

"it don't matter what size ball you put through a deer if hit in a major organ."

That doesn't seem to be true in the situation that my son and I are experiencing. True, if by "it doesn't matter" you simply mean "you will still get the deer". But what I am noticing is a difference in that deer hit with the .45 have been dropping right there.

So far of the people who have posted here only one has said they had to track a long way with a .44. Others have all reported excellent results with the .45.

 

[Danny Ross]

You are correct that every shot is unique. My buddy's boy shot a huge doe last year through the lungs big enough you could easily stick you thumb through it. The doe and the 8 deer herd she was with had been spooked by other hunters before being shot. When she was shot the other deer took off, she followed them for about 150 yds before dropping over. I think she ran that far only because she was trying to keep up with them and she already had adrenaline flowing from previously being spooked. This year he shoots one and it drops over in 30yds, it was by it's self and calm.

Something else to think about, seems a lot of people want to make a heart shot. There was a study done I believe back in the 50's where during a Firing Squad Execution a doctor attached a EEG to the prisoner to see how long there was brain function after being shot in the heart. He put a bullseye over the prisoner's heart for the marksman to aim at. He found there was brain function for 6 seconds after being shot in the heart with the existing oxygen in his blood. If you think about it a deer can go a long way in 6 seconds on a full run. So the heart is not necessarily the best place to aim. Through the middle of the lungs with the heart still pumping, with that amount of Vein and Artery damage you induce shock, severe and sudden drop in blood pressure (which you wouldn't get with a heart shot you would still get blood pressure drop not as fast), blood is not getting back to the heart very well to be pumped into the body, but it is coming from the body to the heart to be pumped into the lungs, you create a bilateral pneumothorax (both lungs colaspe) with a entrance and exit hole they can't breath, plus drowning in their own blood being held in the chest cavity.

Not that we can intentionally do this, but if you hit the deer's lungs on the exhale when there is the lease amount oxygen in the deer's lungs and you create that bilateral pneumothorax deer can't breath in and will die even faster. DANNY

 

[daniel collums]

being a good tracker is all part of being a good hunter. i got a bunch of deer that went a good ways after being hit in a lethal spot with .45 and a .50 but so far all hit with the .54 hit dirt quick. back when i used to deer hunt with #1 buckshot in my shotgun i killed lots that just got one pellet in the kill zone. some of them no tracking needed some made it over the hill. each kill is different in some way, some small deer can take a good hit and go forever while a big buck can get a liver hit an go straight down.

 

[coloradoclyde]

He found there was brain function for 6 seconds after being shot in the heart

:hmm: I think that's the same amount of time that was discovered with guillotine victims.... :shocked2:

I spent 20 years searching for a high powdered gun/ load that would stop deer in their tracks...regardless of shot placement.... I came very, very close.....but abandoned my pursuit.....Because it was just too devastating.

There's just always one that tries to get away....and tracking is just part of the hunt.

 

[PaulN/KS]

That doe I shot with the 62 ran away at the shot. She was broadside to and the ball went through both lungs just above the heart. But missed ribs on both sides so that likely lessened the shock of the hit. The two tufts of hair where she'd been when I shot told us it was a pass through shot but we didn't start finding blood till 25 yards from there. She ran a fair piece but was "running dead" as the saying goes.

 

[Spikebuck]

Every shot is unique...

That's the key. I've always said that hunting is a game of fractions of an inch. Hit that 1/4" artery or miss and it may mean many yards difference in tracking. I've shot deer with .50, .54, and .62 and arrows. Each of those projectiles had deer that traveled from virtually nowhere to (if the shot was solid vitals meaning BOTH lungs and/or heart, or the "shoulder" shot with gun), never further than 100 yards. I've also had large mature northern bucks fold faster than medium or even small does with "similar" hits.

 

[hanshi]

The .45 is my favorite for deer and has accounted for the majority of deer I've killed. The .45 has accounted for more DRTs than any other caliber I've used.

I'm also a believer in the exhale theory.