A couple years back I attempted a 50 yards shot at a doe that was across a creek bed. I was on the crest of a hill in a cut corn field, and she was halfway up the hill in the cut cornfield on the other side. There were trees without leaves (it was January) along the creek bed, but she was standing in a clear gap (or so I thought). Shot was taken from the prone position from atop my pack, so my rest was rock solid. The gun was my .50cal T/C White Mountain Carbine, 90gr Pyrodex RS with a 460gr Hornady Great Plains flat nose conical (aka, the freight train conical). I squeezed the trigger, the gun fired, and I was dead sure she'd be laying there when the smoke cleared, but when it did I saw her running hell-bent over the other hill. There was 1/2" of fresh snow, but not a single drop of blood, hair, nothing. I could clearly see where she was standing, and I found the furough cut by the bullet 6 feet short and almost 3 feet to the right of where she was when I took the shot. Then I noticed that there was one tiny little branch across the gap that I hadn't noticed that wasn't more than 1/4" in diameter that was broke and dangling. Turns out that the bullet grazed that branch just enough to cut it about half through, but it was enough to deflect that big chunk of lead over 6 feet in the 25 yard distance between the branch and the deer. I was not a happy camper after that, especially since I got skunked for the rest of the my time out there and went home empty handed. But, such is life when deer are involved.

Mike