Thread: best 308 projectile for shooting sika at close range

@Sid it would help to know specifically which 150gr soft points you’ve been using. Not all soft points are created equal…

Is there maybe another issue at play here? Where are you shooting the deer, when they run on? Where is the point of impact and where is the exit? I’ll take a guess it’s behind the shoulder, if that’s the case its more of a shot placement problem than a bullet problem.

Let us know because in my experience flip-flopping between bullets for close range work doesn’t make anywhere near as much difference as shooting them in the front of the chest. Also while I respect the comments above about using frangible bullets the downside is major damage as you can see in Ryan’s photo. The prevailing wisdom is that short range bush work requires a controlled expansion bullet that will not end up looking like the deer swallowed a grenade, and shoot them in the shoulder.

That said, I use a Speer 165 grain BTSP which is a renowned longer range bullet that is soft and very lethal. But recently I’ve been doing much more close range bush work with it, and have had zero problems poleaxing red deer, fallow and goats of all sizes. The bullet is that soft it makes a big flat raggedly mushroom that pulls up fast and rarely exits a red deer at close range, instant collapse and the innards are mush. The flipside is that on a small red yearling or a young fallow, if you hit it too far back you run the risk of literally disembowelling it, guts hanging out the side of the animal. Not nice!