Bullets for deer

[longcruise]

A PRB leaving the barrel at 1998 is bleow 1100 at about 110 yards. It all depends on the load.

This is true, but most game shot with prb is at lesser ranges. They do seem to kill just fine at longer ranges without expanding as well. Longest shot I've personally witnessed was 180 yards on a large mulie doe with a .54 prb and 80 grains of goex ff. Double lung and dropped on the spot!

The problem with this statement is "pure lead"

Must agree with you there, although most of my castings for ball and conical have come from some pretty pure stock.

One might compare with "expanding" pistol bullets for comparison. Many of them do not expand at all at 800 to 900 fps which is there typical impact velocity.

 

[Davemuzz]

If you used an 80 grain load of FFg and a PRB in your fifty, and didn't find a blood trail, then you missed the deer. That load will drive a ball completely through a deer's chest, shot broadside, at any range under 100 yards.

That first statement is a fallacy. I've shot many a deer with a PRB. Some have left great blood trails, and some have left tiny little specs of blood every 20 feet. I have found those deer 100 yards away, and upon field dressing, all of the blood has poured out of the cavity.

Last year I had switched from the PRB (50 cal, shooting from a Green Mt. 1-70 twist barrel) to shooting the Hornady Pa. conicals. 90 Grains of FF, T\C bore patch and then the conical. Easy to load and exceptionally accurate at 100 yards. The conical is a 240 grain chunk of lead.

I can't comment on the blood trail at this point as the two doe I've shot with this load have both dropped like a sack of hammers.

So, at this point, i'm preferring the conicals over the PRB. But time will tell.

Dave

 

[paulvallandigham]

Dave: I hope you read the rest of my post. I think I make it clear why, in my personal experience, I believe I am correct. I have tracked deer wounded, or killed by other hunters, using everything from a .45 to a 12 gauge with shotgun slugs, and bows and arrows. The B&A kills leave the least blood, IMHO. High hits with any rifle, if there is no exit are the next most likely to leave little or no blood. This occurs because the hunter was up high in a tree stand when he fired the shot, usually. Those are the deer we find with the entire chest cavity filled with blood. and a bit of blood coming out the entrance wound, only to be soaked up by all the fur between the wound, and the belly of the deer.

A half inch caliber wound leaves a lot or room for blood to come out, and for air to go in. The exit would will always be larger, using a PRB, where I can not always say that when a true conical is used. When you have an exit wound that is .60-or larger caliber, you let out even more blood and let in more air.

The last few times I have hunted deer, I have purposely tried to pick my shot so that my ball breaks a foreleg going in or on the way out of the deer. Breaking a shoulder or leg makes it difficult for a scared wounded deer to go very far, because they don't understand why that leg no long works, and keep testing it, only to fall again. That leaves blood on the ground, and bushes, too!

I am sure there are a few deer shot each year with just about any caliber that leave no blood. That is why I learned to read foot impressions, and use blood only as "confirmation" evidence, that also gave me a clue where the projectile hit, and what organs have been damaged.

 

[Jamie from Alberta]

Does anyone have any experience with the cast
LEE Improved Minie? I have this mould as well as a rb mould. These will be shot and hunted with from my CVA St Louis Hawken.

 

[longcruise]

Does anyone have any experience with the cast
LEE Improved Minie?

Only shooting, not hunting. I had the improved minie in .50 cal. I liked it but accuracy fell off badly at over 60 grains of ff. Maybe due to skirt flare? I threw it on a prize blanket many years ago

My wife liked the .58 caliber modern minie over 60 grains of ff for deer hunting. It was quite devastating on deer, and no wonder with that broad flat nose :shocked2: . The Modern minie is pretty broad and flat too and should work out well as a hunting bullet but if you have accuracy problems with heavier charges you might want to go to a solid base like the Lyman great plains slug.

 

[Rat Trapper]

Over the years I have been able to shoot a large number of deer with both modern ML and sabots but also with conicals. During this time I have also seen a few deer shot with PRB. The deer my buddy shot with his 54 cal & PRB were as dead as dead gets. I have another friend who's brothers is using a 45 TC Hawken with PRB and keeps telling me it's doing the job real impressively. The reason I went to the Hornady great plains bullets in my 50 & 54's was: they are short bullets which will shoot well in a 1-48, the nose is like a semi wad cutter, the hollow point aids expansion and the hollow base helps seal the bore. The 385 gr bullets shoot extremely well out of my 50 cal and the 390 grainer does very well out of the 54. I have shot deer with both bullets and was more than happy with the results. I never got the maxi ball or maxi hunter to shoot as well as the great plains bullets. In truth most hunters would be happy with the groups, but I just wanted the smallest groups possible and 2-3 inches at 50 yd wasn't as good as less than an inch. My buddy likes to shoot the deer right between the running lights. When shot like this, it doesn't matter what you are shooting, they go no where! I just got a TC Hawken 45, and I just may have to try a PRB between the running lights.

 

[boar]

This first year I used conicals for deer. I have the same gun as yours. I killed two does with one shot each. The first one went down on spot. She was looking at me,40yards,I hit her on left side and cut every rib,bullet ended in hip. The second deer same shot and I aimed small for the chest,shot and deer ran back way she came, when I went over where she was standing, I saw where I had hit a 2inch sapling dead center,thought no deer, when about 20ft and lots of blood, walked over to ravine and she was at the bottom dead. I was using 240gr TC Cheap shots 80grs 2ff. I recovered the bullet in her heart. Made a believer out of me. Dilly

 

[ricklandes]

I am of the belief it does not matter the size of the projectile as much as it does shot placement. Stories are documented of elephants killed with 22 LR's (careful shot placement behind the forleg as it swings forward to enter the heart w/o bone penetration...I am not advocating this...just sharing it as a point), so a deer with a .50 RB is "do-able".
I find that when I hunt with a Flinter I have to make an extra effort to not look over my sights and look at the animal, but to make sure I am aiming. I attribute that to training for years with scoped high power rifles. Maybe just poor performance on my part, whatever...

I often find that when an animal is very close to me my odds of watching the animal and not focusing on my sight picture increase. It may be just my personal doing or it may be something many do without knowing it.

I have shot enough "good" shots on animals with RB's (read that as proper shot placement)to see that what you are using is plenty of medicine for a whitetail.

The bigger is better can be discussed 'til we can ice skate on the bad place, but shot placement, blood yes or blood no is the key to a quick clean kill. A given animal will only absorb so much shock from given bullet. One through the upper shoulder/lower spine area will drop an animal. A brisket or gut shot will mean more often than not a long chase and often a lost animal.

As a side, when I first went hunting with my Dad, back in Michigan in the early '70's, my Mom pulled me aside and said "Make sure if your Dad shoots at a deer you tell him to aim...thats what I always used to do. Otherwise he misses!" HEY! Maybe my misses are genetic :rotf: :rotf: :rotf:

 

[BrownBear]

I find that when I hunt with a Flinter I have to make an extra effort to not look over my sights and look at the animal, but to make sure I am aiming. I attribute that to training for years with scoped high power rifles. Maybe just poor performance on my part, whatever...

I often find that when an animal is very close to me my odds of watching the animal and not focusing on my sight picture increase. It may be just my personal doing or it may be something many do without knowing it.

That's the bottom line with any gun, and sights make a bigger difference than most people realize. Those that are too fine and hard to see encourage people to look over them. Dark sights that don't allow enough light to pass either side of the blade for easy visibility encourage looking over them. Big bulky sights that obscure lots of the animal encourage looking over them. Shooting with one eye closed so the sights obscure more of a deer encourage folks to raise up for a better view. Radical buckhorn sights encourage people to raise the blade out of the notch and try using them more like peep sights when under stress.

And having nothing to do with the gun and sights, a great big rack and a dash of buck fever causes folks to look at the horns when shooting. Guess where they hit!!!

I've got several big sheds with bullet holes in them. A friend of mine has a trophy moose rack on his wall with two sets of bullet holes through the it. To his great embarrassment, he's the one who put them there. Fortunately he was shooting a 375, and each of his first two shots took the moose briefly off its feet. Only on the third shot did he settle down and aim where he shoodda.

In my youth I did it myself once while bow hunting deer. A few weeks later in gun season my pard got the same buck with my broadhead and a short bit of shaft still protruding from the right horn. Damned if I was going to tell him how it got there!!! :shake:

 

[buttonbuck]

Wow that would explain the deer skull I found this fall, a nice 9 point about a 20 inch spread. I found the skull and antlers while tracking a deer that had a broadhead and part of a carbon arrow inbeded in its skull the point was barely in the roof of its mouth. My Biologist Friend Tony, who used to work Illinois Deer Check told me that it probably lived quite a while Either way it was a healthy buck that was shot and not recovered. Great point on the aiming we can never have enough of those life lesson reminders. Aiming in the field is so wierd I had my 2 young kids out stump shooting last week with my wifes light recurve, my 5 year old shoots it, We are out back and we kick out 3 rabbits one stops I raise and shoot at 15 yards and the arrow enters through the liver exits the opposite shoulder it goes about 3 yards Now if I could only do that when I bowhunt deer.

 

[tg]

With all the deer I have seen taken and taken myself with PRB and seeing folks who needs something "better" I believe it is as much a matter of excpectation , thinking in centefire hunting terms and methods and shot placement, if you can't find the deer don't tell me "where" it was hit, this has come happened a few times in the woods with folks I have seen looking for deer and that is what I told them, on two occasions we found the deer and the hit was quite a bit different than they thought.