What is a "miss"

The other evening I took a new hunter out for a shot on a farm. Right on dark we came across three deer out in a paddock, we were able to get within 140 metres and he had a post to use as a rest. He was using a 308, with my reloads, a 165 gn speer at 2580 fps.

He lined up on a big spiker, with a clear instruction to aim right above its front leg. At his shot I heard the clear sound of the "hit" but the spiker didn't even flinch, and started towards us. Being a bit worried about losing so much nice venison I shot it again and it went down so I swung onto another one and dropped it too. Yahoo two deer for the freezer.

The truck was a long way away and it was by now dark, so I sent my mate off to get it and proceeded to rip the guts out of the deer. The big spiker was in super condition, and my shot had gone through the top of the lungs, missing the shoulder and the backsteaks - yahoo indeed. All the gutbag was intact.

My mate was a bit peed off as there was no apparent second bullet hole, and he thought he might have missed. However the sound of a hit is pretty clear so even though I had doubts I reminded him he'd hit it.

A few days later we skun them out, and bugger me, here is a bullet hole high on the neck of the spiker, in the meaty part just in front of the shoulder - how the hell did that not drop it, and where is the exit?? The neck was a bit bloody and bruised where I'd cut its throat - maybe I didn't notice the exit in tyhe dark and cut through it.

So last night we boned out. My mate was doing a hind leg and reckoned there was a bullet hole in it - bugger off I said, can't be. Well who looked a mug when he pulled out the remains of a slug - yup, a 30 cal flat base just like a speer. I just weighed it, 105 gns.

So somehow, the deer was shot more or less front on, "right above his front leg". the bullet traversed the whole body, missing all bone (there was some bruising in one shoulder, and a little bit to the fillets) missing all organs and the gut, and finished up deep in its hind leg. I guess you can't fault the bullet for weight retention and penetration . . . . but what a "miss". I don't know that it would have gone a long way if it hadn't been plugged again but who would know, certainly didn't seem to have any major organ damage.

All the above, maybe some of those misses are not misses at all !!

Yeah, seen that sort of thing a few times. They are theoretically dead but show no effects. They run into the bush and you think you have missed, little or no blood trail to follow up, then you find them dead a couple of days later when they start to smell. I have also seen kills that should not have happened through hits in the wrong place (both on animals and people) where tiny shards of bullet or bone traverse the body cavity and nick a vital organ.

Yep strange shit happens sometimes. including the bullet somehow turning almost 90 degrees inside the animal.

cant fault a projectile that travels that far and holds together. good old reliable speers. bet the young fella feels better about his shooting.

The spiker has super powers and cannot feel any pain.

Nar tell him it went in at the back leg and out at the neck:XD:;)

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Originally Posted by veitnamcam

Yep strange shit happens sometimes. including the bullet somehow turning almost 90 degrees inside the animal.

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I shot a hare with my 223 62grn soft point ammo. It was sitting up on a fence line as they do and i was around 250yards from it. Smacked it centre of chest and bullet entered then headed 90 drgree south and blew its tail off.

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I had a deer that I shot with a 150 grain .30/06 on the shoulder. The deer was facing nearly side on. Solid hit, but it didn't move. It just looked at me. I was nonplussed to be sure. I shot it again and it dropped. When I got to it I had two bullet holes within a couple of inches of each other. One had gone directly through and wrecked the engine room, but the first shot had hit the animal, turned to the right, traversed the body and ended up in the rear haunch muscle under the hide.

That was the end of the theory of foot pounds of energy being any kind of measurement of killing power as far as I was concerned.

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Originally Posted by Carlsen Highway

I had a deer that I shot with a 150 grain .30/06 on the shoulder. The deer was facing nearly side on. Solid hit, but it didn't move. It just looked at me. I was nonplussed to be sure. I shot it again and it dropped. When I got to it I had two bullet holes within a couple of inches of each other. One had gone directly through and wrecked the engine room, but the first shot had hit the animal, turned to the right, traversed the body and ended up in the rear haunch muscle under the hide.

That was the end of the theory of foot pounds of energy being any kind of measurement of killing power as far as I was concerned.

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Out of curiousity, have you done the math on the retained foot lb at the shooting distance involved. Just curious.

Around 1750 ft pounds retained at 200 metres. Nearly two tons of power! as they like to say in articles about it. Totally absorbed the entire lot and just stood there. I think it flicked one ear, probably at the noise of the shot.

Considering I can shoot lengthwise through a deer with a 44-40 and kill it as dead as a .270 would, with only 400 ft pounds at the muzzle, I feel it is safe to say the energy theory is totally imaginary. Yet the UK and some US states base minimum legal cartridges on the concept. You might as well measure how much noise the shot makes for all the good it is worth.

I have also seen a stag shot four times with a .300 Win Mag that never flinched or showed any reaction to any of the shots either, he kept trotting along and roaring as he did so. Until I dropped it with a .30-30.

Energy measurements make impressive figures, but this measurement is misleading. A foot pound is how much energy it takes to lift a pound, a foot off the ground. That is fine. It takes 2200 foot pounds to propel a 150 grain bullet at 2900 feet per second. That is also fine. But the energy figure is not a measurement of killing power or anything remotely like it; no more than the velocity figure is.

Some food for thought: My .243 and a 100 grain bullet will generate 1900 ft pounds. My .45-70 at black powder velocities with a 405 grain bullet will generate 1000 ftpounds. Yet one was used to destroy a million buffalo, and the other still has internet regular postings from people arguing about whether it's good enough to kill a deer with.

I’m a fan of the whole big bullet slow for deer as well,have gone to cast 280g flat nose in the .44 mag running quite a bit slower than the 240g hollow points I was using ,I fin penetration is the key,2 holes leave a better blood trail and seem to kill better I have found,same with the subsonics in my .22,they hit with a solid whack and seem to kill the rabbits dead on the spot where the hyper velocity ones seem to zip thru and the rabbit runs off to die.

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Originally Posted by 7mmwsm

Projectile construction plays a major part.
A FMJ will not transfer the same energy to an animal as the same weight and speed "constructed for the job" hunting projectile will. But on paper they both generate the same energy.

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The problem with the whole energy and bullet construction debate is that paper calcs do little to establish the level of energy 'transferred to the animal'. 5,000 f/lb of energy is a waste of space if only 800f/lb is transferred to the animal when it is hit and the rest remains with the projectile as it flys on through. That's why shot placement is so important.

I shot with a 44mag for the first part of my hunting life and to this day the killing power of the 240gr projectile traveling slow and barely carrying 1,000f/lb of energy dropped every animal on the spot. It's killing effectiveness was far superior to the paper stats.

Currently my bush gun is a 7.62x39 and it's the same. 9 out of 10 deer have the projectile sitting under the off side skin - no excess or wasted energy and DRT.

The arguement for and against high velocity small cal versus large bore low velocity has been around since 1900 or so.
The british always claimed that a large bullet is more deadly it is presumably an opinion based on shooting a variety of calibres at things intent on eating, trampling, or in some other way ruining your day. The small bore hv crowd who are good at maths point out that fast little things have more impact energy so are better.
Its really about transferring that energy. Hydraulic shock is believed to be a major factor with high velocity projectiles, the pressure wave set up disrupts the surrounding tissue and nerveshowever below a certain speed 2400 fpsI think this wont happen and the projectile makes a just a leaky hole. How often have you had animals go down instantly without movement only to start struggling to rise several seconds to a minute later,I assume this is as the shock wears off.
The big slow bullet makes a bigger wound channel and if bone is involved appears to cause much more damage.
I hunt with both cast lead projectiles and hv, my preference for close range and bush hunting up to 100 maybe 150 max is a big arse lead bullet. For anything longer hv is my go to.
A bit waffley but the knee is giving me grief today after yesterdays activity and Im bored

The only deer I've shot with my 416 dropped like a stone. no kicking nothing.
Didn't do much to it either-through the front chest on slight angle, hole through a lung, raked across couple of ribs and out. I can guarantee you that it didn't drop much of the nearly 4000ftlbs of energy in to the deer and probably didn't mushroom much, but was very indicative of the last few comments and why a lot of older American chaps liked the bigger bullets going slower. big hole in, big(ger) hole out with lots of space to let daylight and blood intermingle.

put a 180grn round nosed hornady fired out of my .308 yesterday into a 40lb sow,she was asleep in fern and my pooch led me right into spot,bullet entered above eye (all I could see was snout and half her head) destroyed neck bones completely,into chest just and can to rest under skin at her 2nd nipple weighing 102.5grns......did the job perfectly and any old deer side on isnt going to give me that much resistance
2nd pig about 55lb made mistake of giving me glimpse at 25 yards and he copped bullet too far back...but as it was an old school 150 grn silvertip it didnt matter as it did what they supposed to do and dumped nearly all its energy on way through...bit messy to be sure,dog grabbed wounded pig then stood back and bailed when it squeeled.....died before I had walked 25 yards over to it.....job done.we lost both flaps and about 2 cup fulls of meat of one rear leg and kidney area eye fillet/steak. first pig we can eat right up to bullet channel.
first 2 shots fired in anger from this rifle and the hornadies have got the big tick for a bush load...thanks C.H.

Sadly a lot out there think that a big boomer with a huge hunk of lead is the only way to go. And the second sad one is they intend to go for the big area somewhere between the front leg and the back leg.
I had it drilled into me from birth...''get close enough till yi can smell him and put one anywhere in the eye boy''.
I have been fortunate enough to have seen 100,s of animals fall over after missing them with the shot lol.

doinit....I can think of 3 occasions in my hunting lifetime Ive come across sleeping pigs....managing to shoot one in the head while it was asleep after getting within 10 yards of it made me feel rather chuffed with my dog...the 2nd one didnt get hit right as I didnt have time,it was going out of view in a hurry...thats the third time Ive taken a running shot in last 3 years and called it too far back straight away...didnt loose any of the animals as I tend to shoot high at same time so take out hips or spine.....now if Im using my .223 which Ive shot hundreds of wallabies with...running shots seem easy....I dont gut shoot on purpose,but sometimes it just happens when Im in a hurry.

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Originally Posted by Micky Duck

doinit....I can think of 3 occasions in my hunting lifetime Ive come across sleeping pigs....managing to shoot one in the head while it was asleep after getting within 10 yards of it made me feel rather chuffed with my dog...the 2nd one didnt get hit right as I didnt have time,it was going out of view in a hurry...thats the third time Ive taken a running shot in last 3 years and called it too far back straight away...didnt loose any of the animals as I tend to shoot high at same time so take out hips or spine.....now if Im using my .223 which Ive shot hundreds of wallabies with...running shots seem easy....I dont gut shoot on purpose,but sometimes it just happens when Im in a hurry.

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Gidday there M-Duck
Ha'ha..I wasn't actually lookin at you bud when I said the above.
Running shots on Roos eh, ha I spent a few years on the Wallaby Board aways back, chompin through 3'000 rounds of ammo per case didn't take long at all and yeah, you lost count of gut shot roos lol. You were allowed 3 shots per kill or you were down the road,one got quite nifty pretty quick lol.

I know of 3 deer shot front on that have not been recovered and believe the same thing happened as stated in the OP (going front to rear without hitting any vitals. A mate shot a sika stag front on at 30m. He said it did a back flip and hit the ground stone dead, or so he thought.. He and his son went over to it, put their rifles down and got out the knives to process it and as he bent down toward it, it jumped up, ran off never to be seen again (they looked for it for 2 hours). I have had the same with a sika stag hit front on at less than 5m. Hit centre of the chest, it turned around, ran off and that was the last I saw of it despite looking for over 3 hours on two separate days.

One of my first deer had the same with the 243. Not more than 50yrds away and walking up a little rise. I've never been good enough at head shots so aimed centre of back so it would pass through things. Yeah well it didn't. dropped like a stone at the shot but as I started to get my shit together my mate said its up!! it started trotting to the left, panic stations, missed with the second shot, 3rd into the shoulder.
When cutting it up with my more experienced friend back home we worked out that the first shot missed basically everything.
Just missed the spine and that's why it dropped but the first shot went centre through everything missing heart lungs etc.
Inch or so to one side and thru the spine-all over. couple of inches other way clipped a lung or such.

Bullets ending up in unexpected places is not that unusual. Last one for me was in November, shot a dry hind at 225m or so quartering away, the usual .243 Win and 100gr ProHunter, placed the shot in behind the last rib, it flew through the top of the heart and rear of lungs and then straight upwards and out through the spine at the very front end of the backstrap. The trajectory meant it did a roughly 80° upward turn, considering there was no damage to the brisket, humerus or scapula I don’t really know how the bullet managed it. Didn’t much care though, the animal dropped on the spot.

The front on shot that ends up traversing most or all of the body without killing the animal quickly is also quite common. The bullet can easily run down the side of the animal without hitting anything that will cause it to collapse or even bleed out anytime soon.

Saw that first hand on a very large sambar stag in the Vic high country in 2015, perhaps the worst “miss / hit” that I’ve seen, what a bloody mission. Stag was standing motionless front on at about 80m or so, dogs pointing perfectly... Shooter used a heavily suppressed .308 single shot with a Barnes monolithic, crystal clear thwop of the bullet striking home and a surprised looking stag, but off he trotted down a gully and gone. Shooter was convinced he’d missed and was cursing and freakin out but I was damn sure he’d hit. Sent the dogs in to track the animal, took friggin’ hours, eventually the dogs show some real interest and there he was, still very alive in the bottom of a steep blackberry gully, worst place, right on dark. I head shot him, marked the GPS and went back in the next morning to try and recover, dragged him out with several strops shacked together with a hand winch, far enough out of the thicket to cut him up... fark he was heavy.

Bullet had hit too far to the left and too high in the chest and run down the inside of the scapula and into the rib cage about half way down, then along the inside of the ribs, down the outside of the gut bag doing some minor damage, and straight out through the rump, bouncing off the pelvis on the way. Only thing it had taken out along the way to slow him up with internal bleeding was most of a kidney. It was a terrible outcome that came down to bad shot placement due to over excitement, the shooter was very very unhappy with himself as the rifle was a proven sub-MOA gun with lots of history.

Anyway regarding the comments above about energy, weight, calibre etc, there’s a lot of myth and speculation I think in what’s better or worse. Fast and light, slow and heavy, or somewhere in the middle? I mostly use .243 Win loaded quite modestly [2800fps] with a frangible bullet (aforementioned ProHunter), and I shoot a lot of reds, fallow, goats and small-medium pigs with it from less than 50m to well over 300m. It is a highly effective combination. I also use a .223 with 60gr BTs, a 6.5 Creedmoor with 143gr ELD-X, a .270 Win with 130gr ProHunter, a .308 Win with various bullets (150gr Nosler BTs, 155gr A-MAX, 178gr ELD-X, 150gr GameKings), a .338 Federal Savage Hog Hunter shooting 250gr round noses, a .44 Mag single shot pigger shooting 240gr cast bullets... and over the years a bunch of others.

All the above will drop a large red or large pig on the spot assuming I place my bullet right. The point of aim with vary according to the specifics of the rifle / cartridge combination, the range, wind etc, the position of the animal, the gradient, whether I need to recover it or not.

Whether small bore / high velocity is better than large bore / slow or vice versa is missing the point, shot placement trumps everything, doesn’t matter what you use. Pretty much all the fails I’ve witnessed have been down to poor shot placement, missing vitals or spine / CNS, from a range of rifles from .22 cal to .45 cal. I’ve seen deer run flat out and far after being rocked hard by .30 cal magnums shot too far back, but I’ve never seen one run at all after being shot in the front lungs / nerve plexus with a frangible .223.

I think we get hung up on calibres and cartridges and maybe don’t spend quite enough time on anatomy and how to target specific vital organs or the CNS from certain angles. When you’ve put weeks of effort into developing a half-MOA load then you should be able to DRT every deer you shoot assuming patience and good shot selection. Unlike my mate and his sambar-of-a-lifetime which turned into an experience he’ll never forget for other reasons.

(sorry... much longer than I meant, just such SHIT weather out there why does it always come on the bloody weekend)

@Flyblown - thanks for an excellent post

Yeah thanks really enjoyed that

Had it happen to me as well did what I thought was a really good shot and watched a nice fallow just walk off into the bush waited for a bit then spent a couple of hours looking for it with no luck then the next weekend :(

Once lined up on a sambar hind with a 7mm mag at about a range of about 60 metres....Fired two shots at the animal, it didn't flinch...It just walked away. I put a target up at the same distance and further and fired...nearly spot on for accuracy. I meant to go back and look / smell for that deer later on but never did. Some times these things happen.

I shot a whitetail hind on the island last week hit the thing in the chest good blood trail for 10 meters until it ran into high fern couldn't see anything under that , 2 of us searching but after 45 mins gave up :(

Today with @Cupcake and @Shootm, I watched a fallow hit in the chest with a 7/375 (168gn pill doing 3250) run like a clean miss... I called it as a miss but we went to have a look anyway. Found blood, tracked with dog for a good half hour before finding her nearly dead from blood loss. Shot was a bit low and managed to smash a big hole in the offside leg without hitting vitals. Lucky we had the dog and perseverance to follow up.

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Originally Posted by Dorkus

Today with @Cupcake and @Shootm, I watched a fallow hit in the chest with a 7/375 (168gn pill doing 3250) run like a clean miss... I called it as a miss but we went to have a look anyway. Found blood, tracked with dog for a good half hour before finding her nearly dead from blood loss. Shot was a bit low and managed to smash a big hole in the offside leg without hitting vitals. Lucky we had the dog and perseverance to follow up.

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those wee deer can take a good hit & keep running I shot a buck a couple of years ago in a swede paddock it took off at the shot like it had never been hit jumped 2 fences , covered around 350M before it gave a couple of big leaps in the air & dropped dead on inspection the shot was mint straight through the heart if the deer hadn't of been in an open paddock we likely never would have found it

""So somehow, the deer was shot more or less front on, "right above his front leg". the bullet traversed the whole body, missing all bone (there was some bruising in one shoulder, and a little bit to the fillets) missing all organs and the gut, and finished up deep in its hind leg.""

As the deer was moving toward you when it was shot the second time Im not supprised it went from front to back. What calibre where your shooting with anyway?

Hmmm - I didn't make it clear in the OP, the first shot from my mates 308 was the one that hit high and traversed the length of the body, it dropped on my followup shot with the 6.5x47, which was a clean close to side on shot.