With about a half our of light to go yesterday on MD's early black powder opener, a buck comes into range. I initially was going to pass thinking it was a young deer until I saw the size of his body. He was just about broadside at 35yds when I took the shot, but the bullet went clean through a branch about 8 ft from me! It was so close, I never saw it through the scope or at least don't remember seeing it. I found blood, but I had no idea how far off the bullet strayed from the branch. As I'm slowly following the blood trail down into a swampy area, I hear him up on the other hillside about 30 yds away. He was down on all fours looking back at me. I held the flashlight up against the forearm and took the finishing shot. Turned out that the bullet ended in the front of the guts and from the look of the entry wound, it must have mushroomed a bit from the branch and didn't have enough left to exit. I was shotting 240gr XTPs w/ 100gr 777. One nice thing was that he actually died right on the trail making it that much easier to drag him back, which is a good thing since he is the biggest bodied deer I've ever shot. I wish I had a scale!
Live and learn with the branch thing. [sad]
Here's some pics.
Mike
