Shot Placement These two words carry a lot of weight with deer hunters, for good reason. If you read much about hunting deer, including whitetail deer and other big game, shot placement is something you will see stressed again and again. Theres a very good reason for this: shot placement is very important. It is not always everything to a deer hunter, but its mighty close. The bottom line is, youd better hit a deer in the right spot if you want it to go down and stay there. The Spot So where is that spot? Well, the right spot is a flexible concept. It depends on the angle of the deer as viewed by the hunter, how far the deer is from the hunter, whether or not the deer is calm, how solid a gun rest the hunter has available, and many other variables. The traditional kill zone is still the hunters best bet. This zone includes the shoulder area, and behind it the heart and lungs. Viewed broadside, it is roughly centered on the rear of the shoulder. This gives the hunter the best chance at hitting vital organs and/or the shoulder. Depending on the size of the critter, youre shooting at a zone thats approximately the size of a supper plate. Its important to remember that the kill zone is not two-dimensional, like a flat paper target. If a deer is broadside, a shoulder or right-behind-the-shoulder shot is great. But if its quartering towards or away from you very much, you should adjust your aim. Picture your bullets destination in the center of the animal, and aim for that. Doing so may require the bullet to impact far back in the ribcage or in the neck/brisket area in order to penetrate to the heart/lung zone and effectively kill the deer. In other words, the spot is not anywhere on the deers skin, but is inside the critter. Remember that, and aim accordingly. Hit the lungs, and the deer will run a ways and die. Hit the heart and you will likely also hit the lungs, and the deer usually wont go far. Hit the shoulder bones, and you break the deer down as well as probably hitting vitals - it usually falls on the spot and if it keeps kicking its just where you want it, and you can easily deliver a finishing shot. Some Folks Disagree Not all hunters agree that its best place to aim for the boilerworks, but those with long experience and whom respect the game agree that this shot gives the greatest margin of error - and errors are easy to make. Yet some hunters go out of their way to try to place the bullet through the ribcage on a broadside deer for a lung-only shot (avoiding the shoulder), to minimize meat damage. Still others shoot for the neck. Some others aim for the head. Any of these are killing shots if everything comes together, but they dont offer the room to miss - while still making a solid hit - that the heart/lung/shoulder shot does. Knock em Down I like to see my deer fall dead. Where I place the shot - or try to place the shot - depends on many factors. If I have a nice calm deer standing not too far from me and I have a nice solid rest, a neck shot is a good one to take. On a moving deer and/or one thats far away, its a low-percentage shot and I dont like it. When I say low-percentage, I mean theres a much smaller chance of hitting vitals in those conditions, vs. taking a shot at the sweet spot. During one hunting trip, a friend of mine shot a doe. She was standing broadside at 40 yards. He aimed for the center of the shoulder from a rock-solid rest, and thats right where he hit. It put her down ASAP, which was his intention. Totally ruined the meat in that shoulder, though. That situation falls in the category of: Id rather lose a pound or two of meat than to lose the entire deer because of a marginally-placed shot. Making the Call - Which Shot to Take? The following morning, I was sitting in a stand with a good shooting rest when a deer stepped out, way up the ridge. I got the rifle up and scoped the deer - a nice, legal, doe. I spoke to the deer to get it to stop - it did. The deer stood broadside at well over 100 yards - not the time to make a low-percentage shot. I aimed for the traditional kill zone, and pulled the trigger. The 150-grain bullet hit just behind the shoulder, took out both lungs and the top of the heart (it cut the heart loose from all arteries), punched through the off-side shoulder blade and put an exit hole in the hide. Presumably, part of the bullet kept on going, but I recovered most of it (about 100 grains worth) lodged in the hide at the exit wound. And she still ran 30+ yards before dying. I was prepared to take a shoulder shot and lose some meat, in order to give myself a better chance of hitting the vitals. It worked. Any other shot would have been too risky for that situation. I hit within a couple inches of where Id aimed, but if I had been a bit farther off, it still would have been a killing shot. Use Your Head, and Avoid Head Shots Head shots are to be avoided. Think about it - the head is the most animated portion of a deers anatomy. When a deer moves, its head is the first thing to do so - and even when standing still, a deer will often move its head without warning. Since writing this article, I have taken a couple head shots on whitetail does - at very close range, with a very solid rest and a very accurate scoped rifle, and each time the deer was standing perfectly still and un-spooked and I was calm enough to take a deliberate, steady shot. I still dont recommend taking a head shot, and Im not sure Ill do it again. Some folks say that if they miss a head shot then theyve missed the deer entirely and it will live, but thats not necessarily true. Years ago, a friend shot a buck in the head - thats all he had to shoot at - and he hit it in the jaw. He severed a major blood vessel and the deer lost a lot of blood - but it also kept going for a long, long way. They tracked that deer for more than a mile before finally recovering it. Play the Odds So choose your shots with care, and go for high-percentage shots. Its a method that works, and you will be a much happier hunter. When you have to shoot quickly, remember Dads words: Take your time, but hurry up. Too often, we forget the first part of that, and only hurry up. Ive been guilty of it myself. Like us ~~~~ I Love Bow Hunting
Posted on: Sun, 03 Nov 2013 22:17:49 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015