Re: SMK's for deer hunting?
<div class="ubbcode-block"><div class="ubbcode-header">Originally Posted By: Rancid Coolaid</div><div class="ubbcode-body">A quick update with new details: I hunted hogs this weekend with a 260, running 142-gr SMKs. Only brain- and spine-shots resulted in instant incapacitation (bang-flop.) I made several low shoulder shots and, in each of the 3 instances, the hog ran for at least 10 yards.
No more SMKs hunting for me, unless the caliber is far beyond what is needed for the animal being hunted.
I was hunting outside Laredo, TX; if the animal moves more than 5 feet off the road, brush is so thick the animal might be gone forever.</div></div>
Accubonds are better than SMKs, but the SMKs are not likely the problem. No offense please but there is really no such thing as instant incapacitation with any round unless it is a CNS hit. For instance, last year I shot a big-bodied 8 point, mostly broadside, from only 140 yards with a 165 grain Accubond from a 308 at 2700fps. It went down, popped right back up, and ran 85 yards, then disappeared into a thicket. It was obviously hit but ran fast enough to make me question my shot placement - "how did I mess up a 140 yard shot??!"
I waited about 20 minutes and then went looking...found it a ways into the thicket. Fist size exit would that obliterated the off-side shoulder, obvious huge expansion. Field dressing revealed that the bullet entered right behind the near shoulder like it was supposed to, and completely destroyed the heart. I mean, the whole top two-thirds was gone, in fact the remaining bottom tip of the heart was upside down in the chest cavity, completely disconnected from the lungs. Bottom line is instant incapacitation doesn't exist, even with a great shot. This deer ran three legged with no heart near one hundred yards faster than a wide receiver even dreams about.
The only way you are going to immobilize any animal without a CNS hit is to break both shoulders, so that mechanically it is impossible for them to run.
Three takeaways for me from that and similar experiences is:
1. Always meticulously search for hair/blood even though you think you may have missed...deer have the heart of a champion and can shrug off massive hits for at least a short amount of time. I have a lot of respect for what these animals are capable of.
2. Hunting over the years has caused me to rethink my handgun philosophy...even though most animals are tougher than humans, humans are still capable of amazing things under stress/adrenaline or drugs. The failure drill (or Mozambique) is my standard shot philosophy and I consider capacity as more important than I did in the past, leading me away from the single stack to the polymer guns if you can shoot them well.
3. Considering that the energy from that 308 shot was around five times that of the common defensive handgun rounds, it is clear that to me now that the difference in energy and effect between the three most common rounds is likely moot in most cases, and that all are woefully underpowered for any hope of instant incapacitation, and that none of them should be chosen on that hope alone.
How's that for thread creep!
