Bullet performance on deer has always fascinated me, and been the subject of much experimentation with my reloads. I was lucky to be in a club for about 8 years when my kids were younger, got to do a lot of post-mortem exams. Ours, and the other 20 or so guys in the club. I’ve put most of em through deer at various angles, from basic soft points up through barnes solid coppers. I’ve noticed close shots where velocity is higher tend to make them open more violently, penetrate less. Add in some bone hit, and there ya go. Everybody has different situations and preferences, but I’ve settled on 150 nosler partitions out of a 300 H&H pushing 3400 fps mv. Effective without being too messy, and got a reserve amount of penetration if needed. Never caught one of those, but have found partitions from a 243 under the hide on the butt of a chest shot deer. My so-called primitive rifle is a 375 H&H slinging 235 Speer hot cores at 3000
I did dig one of those out of a pine tree behind a buck I shot once. I got a little excited and clipped his spine in to. Rifle is an 1885 Winchester, buck came out and sun hit antlers, thought it was a lot bigger. Got a bead and started trying to cock the hammer, it was GONE lol. In my haste I had snagged the lever on my coat and partially opened the action, which drops the hammer down into the well on an 1885. Had to take it off my shoulder and look to see the problem. Since then I grip it with a finger wrapped over the lever
Sent from my iPhone using Crappie.com