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gut shot with a round ball
- Thread starter jrbaker90
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What would lead you to believe that the roundball would stay in the deer? Also, regardless of the damage done to the intestines by a roundball or any projectile for that matter, a gutshot deer is going to live for quite awhile. Gut shot with a muzzleloader is the same as gut shot with anything else. It is something every hunter should strive very hard to avoid!
Jeff
Jeff
jrbaker90 said:
For your sake, I hope all you ever have to do is wonder about this topic.
A gut shot deer is problems...plain and simple.
As for a roundball staying in the deer and tearing up more...a round ball does nothing beneficial to the hunter once its energy is gone. Just my $.02
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I hope my previous post did not sound condescending. It's just that a gut shot animal is a very bad thing to have on your hands. I shot a deer a few years ago with a centerfire rifle, a .308 win. The deer was quartering somewhat toward me and the bullet hit a rib and deflected going straight down the center of the deer into the intestines. I was lucky in that the deer died pretty quickly but the mess was terrible. The tenderloins were unedible, at least by me. The cavity of the deer was filled with filled with stomach matter and maybe even some urine and manure. It is not something that I want to have happen. Now granted, things sometimes don't go as planned but I have no reason to believe that a roundball in the guts is going to do something magical. It will still be a gutshot deer.
Jeff
Jeff
A shot in the stomach w/o any damage to other parts of the animal irrespective of the gun will cause a lingering death. Possibly peronitis will set in and cause a "rotting" of tissue.
Years ago when on a deer drive, one of the standers took a shot w/ a .348 Winchester and after the drive and seeing there was snow, we trailed the deer. Soon saw it lying under a pine and as we were approaching to get a clear shot, it took off. Luckily my little 7MM put it down.
Upon cutting the belly skin open, we saw that the bullet had really messed up the gut. Chet the .348 guy was told to finish up the field dressing...he argued a bit but was soon up to his elbows in pretty smelly "stuff".
He and the deer washed up in a nearby creek and he tagged it. Later on he said the meat tasted "good".....no reason to not believe him?......Fred
Years ago when on a deer drive, one of the standers took a shot w/ a .348 Winchester and after the drive and seeing there was snow, we trailed the deer. Soon saw it lying under a pine and as we were approaching to get a clear shot, it took off. Luckily my little 7MM put it down.
Upon cutting the belly skin open, we saw that the bullet had really messed up the gut. Chet the .348 guy was told to finish up the field dressing...he argued a bit but was soon up to his elbows in pretty smelly "stuff".
He and the deer washed up in a nearby creek and he tagged it. Later on he said the meat tasted "good".....no reason to not believe him?......Fred
Back in my teen years it was still legal to hunt with dogs here in tx, we hunted mostly thick areas where you couldn't see far and we hunted with buckshot only, a deer running full stride is a hard target so I saw a few gut shot deer that had to be tracked, by dogs, for many miles before they finally died from a badly placed shot, I don't think the balls did any more damage after the fact, had the unpleasure of trying to dress a couple too, not fun, since then I have learned better and will never take a shot im not sure of and have passed on some nice deer because of it, I have yet to take a deer this year but when I do ill do my best to make the best shot I can to make a quick kill, I cant stand the thought of making an animal suffer.
It smells bad but if you wipe or rinse out the carcass after dressing it (even with the pooled blood in the cavity will work) it doesn't taint the meat. You don't want to leave it lay or hang with the contents in as they will eventually leach into the meat. But only the ribs and loins. Won't effect the shanks and steaks. The deer's circulatory system is all kaput.
Hey, some of the best tasting cheeses in the world smell awful until you peel them or cook them.
Different story if the deer has been wounded and the bloodstream gets septic with the mix of infection and peritonitis. But that takes many days.
Quite often a good hit angles back and opens the stomach - even blowing rumen onto the hair around the exit wound. You can blood-trail that type of hit by smell alone. It smells terrible but is no danger to the meat at all from what I can tell. With rifled sluge (what most hunters in this part of NY use) it is common as the slugs can do so much damage and often take odd turns inside.
As Fred said: not the most pleasant to field dress.
As for a round ball doing any damage afterwards? None at all. Lead poisoning may make it ill in five or six years but it's usually not fatal of itself. It's not like a broadhead that can continue cutting with muscle movement. Even a flattened lead ball is still just soft lead and makes a poor cutting edge.
Hey, some of the best tasting cheeses in the world smell awful until you peel them or cook them.
Different story if the deer has been wounded and the bloodstream gets septic with the mix of infection and peritonitis. But that takes many days.
Quite often a good hit angles back and opens the stomach - even blowing rumen onto the hair around the exit wound. You can blood-trail that type of hit by smell alone. It smells terrible but is no danger to the meat at all from what I can tell. With rifled sluge (what most hunters in this part of NY use) it is common as the slugs can do so much damage and often take odd turns inside.
As Fred said: not the most pleasant to field dress.
As for a round ball doing any damage afterwards? None at all. Lead poisoning may make it ill in five or six years but it's usually not fatal of itself. It's not like a broadhead that can continue cutting with muscle movement. Even a flattened lead ball is still just soft lead and makes a poor cutting edge.
Patocazador
54 Cal.
As Stumpkiller said, gut shot deer don't have to taste bad if you clean them effectively. Any time you quickly recover a gut shot deer, count your blessings. A lost one is a very bad feeling.
If you can't stomach cleaning a gut shot deer, you had better quit hunting because even well placed shots can continue on through the guts.
I was very lucky once when I made an extremely bad shot with an arrow and hit the gut cavity. I got down and found a trail of stomach and intestinal contents but no blood. The farther I trailed it, the more little blood specks appeared until I saw the dead deer's white belly ahead. The arrow had cut an artery in her mammary gland and nicked the femoral artery upon exiting.
Don't count on that happening because it's usually a much different outcome.
If you can't stomach cleaning a gut shot deer, you had better quit hunting because even well placed shots can continue on through the guts.
I was very lucky once when I made an extremely bad shot with an arrow and hit the gut cavity. I got down and found a trail of stomach and intestinal contents but no blood. The farther I trailed it, the more little blood specks appeared until I saw the dead deer's white belly ahead. The arrow had cut an artery in her mammary gland and nicked the femoral artery upon exiting.
Don't count on that happening because it's usually a much different outcome.
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jrbaker90 said:
ya asumpted that did ya? Well,don't go doing no more asumptin! Sorry at 24 you might be too young to get the reference ....But Us old guys are all :rotf:
Gut shot deer are so hard on the hunters hart it is difficult to talk about.
I would say a round ball would be near to the LAST thing you would want to gut shoot a deer with. A High Power center fire rifle would maybe throw enough shock in there to "sicken" the deer & get it to bed (a chance for a 2nd shot) An arrow if still in there might move about & cut something important.jrbaker90 said:
Far to many gut shots, be it arrow, bullet or ball, lead to lost game that the hunter knows in his hart will die a bad death.
I have been deer hunting for the last 40 years, gut shot 3 or 4 deer over that time, most quartering to shots where I would get lung, liver and then the paunch, some straight gut shot.
I chased one all day with my bow before I could finish him off. Shot one in the evening and found him still alive the next day, finished him off with my knife.
Every deer was dressed, cooled and washed out over and over, all made fine table fare.
A side note; I knew my late wife was a winner early on in our marrage when she held the flashlight for me while I field dressed a badly gutshot buck, she never even said "yuck".
I chased one all day with my bow before I could finish him off. Shot one in the evening and found him still alive the next day, finished him off with my knife.
Every deer was dressed, cooled and washed out over and over, all made fine table fare.
A side note; I knew my late wife was a winner early on in our marrage when she held the flashlight for me while I field dressed a badly gutshot buck, she never even said "yuck".
Roguedog said:
That right there sums it up.
A gut shot that doesn't also hit the vitals is going to lead to a slow and painful death for the animal, a tough tracking job, and a nasty field dressing job IF the hunter is lucky enough to find the animal.
No question - there are times in deer hunting that it becomes ugly and unpleasant. Eventually it will happen if it hasn't. THE WORST was one of the first deer I ever dressed out. My Dad and older brother didn't hunt so I teamed up with a friend's father and cousins. We had a very good policy that you did not dress out your first deer. This is a great idea for many reasons; not the least you're so pumped you're likely to slice yourself up more than the deer.
Anyway, my friend was walking as part of a slow drive and a buck stood up and he knocked it down with a slug to the chest. I heard the shot, heard him whistle, and before I got there I smelled what I normally associate with death. That smell worms get when you forget a can of nightcrawlers in you car trunk for a week after a fishing trip.
The buck had been gut-shot a month(?) earlier by a bowhunter. I'm a bow hunter - know a broadhead is deadly when placed properly. Same as a round ball. This one was not. I remember it was a Savora Wasp. Many of the worst concepts all in one head.
Gangrene had set in. I did what I could, being only the second deer I had ever been in, and it was awful. We dressed it knowing there was no hope of eating it; but the NY DEC has a policy that if you kill an unfit animal they re-issue the tag. So we took his deer to the local DEC office. And they were great about the whole thing and even took the carcass . . . far to the back of the property.
Poor Don, my friend, had the worst karma of any deer hunter I ever met. Tall and very thin - several times I observed him closing his eyes when firing a slug gun at the range before the gun went off. The ONLY person I have ever heard of that had a misfire with a shotgun slug! (Though he had probably carried that slug in a pocket for 10 years). But he was a tireless hunter and a good sport. It was six years until he finally connected with a second deer. Not surprisingly he gave up hunting not long thereafter.
Back to gut shots: ALWAYS follow them up but wait 90 minutes or more to follow the bloodtrail. There are nice arteries and veins from the liver to the stomach(s) in deer and if you catch one of those there is good hope.
Anyway, my friend was walking as part of a slow drive and a buck stood up and he knocked it down with a slug to the chest. I heard the shot, heard him whistle, and before I got there I smelled what I normally associate with death. That smell worms get when you forget a can of nightcrawlers in you car trunk for a week after a fishing trip.
The buck had been gut-shot a month(?) earlier by a bowhunter. I'm a bow hunter - know a broadhead is deadly when placed properly. Same as a round ball. This one was not. I remember it was a Savora Wasp. Many of the worst concepts all in one head.
Gangrene had set in. I did what I could, being only the second deer I had ever been in, and it was awful. We dressed it knowing there was no hope of eating it; but the NY DEC has a policy that if you kill an unfit animal they re-issue the tag. So we took his deer to the local DEC office. And they were great about the whole thing and even took the carcass . . . far to the back of the property.
Poor Don, my friend, had the worst karma of any deer hunter I ever met. Tall and very thin - several times I observed him closing his eyes when firing a slug gun at the range before the gun went off. The ONLY person I have ever heard of that had a misfire with a shotgun slug! (Though he had probably carried that slug in a pocket for 10 years). But he was a tireless hunter and a good sport. It was six years until he finally connected with a second deer. Not surprisingly he gave up hunting not long thereafter.
Back to gut shots: ALWAYS follow them up but wait 90 minutes or more to follow the bloodtrail. There are nice arteries and veins from the liver to the stomach(s) in deer and if you catch one of those there is good hope.
I will assume that by "gut shot" we're talking about a pure gut shot animal. In that case, with only soft tissue being hit, I cannot imagine a ball with any amount of power behind it not passing completely through.
This shot is going to lead to a long suffering for the animal. It's an unfortunate thing that is going to happen to most of us that spend enough time hunting, no matter how careful we are.
This year an acquaintance of mine arrowed a huge buck (270 lbs live weight) with a very large 3 blade broadhead clipping just the very back of the liver but mostly all stomach passing completely through. This was about an hour before sunset. We knew better than to trail that night.
He had done a good job of paying attention to very specific landmarks the buck passed as he walked away all hunched up after running a short distance. So he and two others searched for sign the next morning while I started a pure body search. At 11AM I found the buck bedded in a high-grassy area about 250 yards from the site of the hit still very alive but so sick he could not move. I was able to get the guy that shot it and he finished it.
I have been very fortunate to have only done this myself one time in my 42 years in the field, also with bow, and the situation with the large buck I shot unfolded almost identically to the one above.
A third one someone else shot, but for which I was in on recovery, was dead when we found it in the morning.
I think the key to recovery with a pure gut shot, no matter what the animal is shot with, is to get out of the area as quietly as possible and in the opposite direction the deer last traveled. Then do NOT trail until at least 12 hours and maybe even a few more, then do so very quietly. If not pushed, you will generally find these deer 100 to 300 yards away. Push them too soon and you may never recover them.
You certainly cannot rely on any help from a ball bouncing around inside doing more damage. I can't imagine that happening.
In all three cases these deer were cleaned and thoroughly washed out. With just a minimal amount of meat trimming, the rest was excellent table fare.
This shot is going to lead to a long suffering for the animal. It's an unfortunate thing that is going to happen to most of us that spend enough time hunting, no matter how careful we are.
This year an acquaintance of mine arrowed a huge buck (270 lbs live weight) with a very large 3 blade broadhead clipping just the very back of the liver but mostly all stomach passing completely through. This was about an hour before sunset. We knew better than to trail that night.
He had done a good job of paying attention to very specific landmarks the buck passed as he walked away all hunched up after running a short distance. So he and two others searched for sign the next morning while I started a pure body search. At 11AM I found the buck bedded in a high-grassy area about 250 yards from the site of the hit still very alive but so sick he could not move. I was able to get the guy that shot it and he finished it.
I have been very fortunate to have only done this myself one time in my 42 years in the field, also with bow, and the situation with the large buck I shot unfolded almost identically to the one above.
A third one someone else shot, but for which I was in on recovery, was dead when we found it in the morning.
I think the key to recovery with a pure gut shot, no matter what the animal is shot with, is to get out of the area as quietly as possible and in the opposite direction the deer last traveled. Then do NOT trail until at least 12 hours and maybe even a few more, then do so very quietly. If not pushed, you will generally find these deer 100 to 300 yards away. Push them too soon and you may never recover them.
You certainly cannot rely on any help from a ball bouncing around inside doing more damage. I can't imagine that happening.
In all three cases these deer were cleaned and thoroughly washed out. With just a minimal amount of meat trimming, the rest was excellent table fare.
I just been wondering I kill my second doe and only one so far with a prb and it stay in and when my uncle was cleaning it we found it it somewhere around the house somewhere back in 2007 I gut shot one with my 06 I dont think it was a true gut shot because it only run 50 to maybe 75 yard and was down ami just been wondering Thanks for comments
Stringbean
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Very good advice,Spikebuck said:
String
Tastes like haggis!
And some pretty pricey cheese is made inside the stomach of a goat (queso de cabra) or a sheep (Manchego).
Do you know where they get the rennin to make most cheeses? Animal (calf) stomachs.
And some pretty pricey cheese is made inside the stomach of a goat (queso de cabra) or a sheep (Manchego).
Do you know where they get the rennin to make most cheeses? Animal (calf) stomachs.
daniel collums
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nothing like the smell of a gut shot deer on a frosty morning. That reminds me of a guy that went hunting with us one time. He had this giant rambo looking bowie knife. He killed a barley legal doe with a slug, a dead center liver/gut hit. This was his first deer kill (and last), he looked at me and asked what do i do first. I said drag it over by the creek. I told him to just barley cut the hide open and work his fingers in and hold up on the skin and work his way down towards her back legs. That nut stuck that blade all the way to the back bone and ripped her open to her throat, after he got through puking he said whoever wants that deer can have it cause I'm not eating it. Folks always say that your first impression that you get about a person is usually right. I seen this guy years later, he was riding a bicycle and looked like a crack head then someone said he killed himself with a shotgun. Made me think maybe I should have gutted that little doe for him.
Fortunately, I don't like haggis but I do like a dram or two (or three) of good scotch. In regard to cheese, I'll stick with my pepper jack and maybe some sharp cheddar and possibly velveeta. I'm sure I'm missing out on some of the finer things in life but in my case, ignorance is bliss! :grin:
Jeff
Jeff
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