Ha. That is a loaded question (no pun intended).

Ok, this conversation will go nowhere and get a lot of clicks, but it is deer season so what the heck.

I think the 243 will kill deer of any size. All I was suggesting is that you could use a 35 Whelen to hunt Coues deer and you could use 243 to hunt deer in Canada. They will both get the job done, but there are probably better choices.

Now I might have to explain why I think a 35 Whelen is too big for Cues deer to the Whelen guys…

I have hunted with a 243 a little bit just to try it on does. I have seen the results of both a 243 and 6mm rem mag on dozens bucks up here of various sizes (up to around 200 lbs live weight). Boiler rooms shots of various angles. I can best sum it up as this. When you start to approach 200 lbs live weight, you will start to see a difference in the recovery distance for the 243 (unless you go for shoulder, head or neck shots).

I will also add that you will not see a difference in recovery for deer closer to 100 lbs live weight.

What I have seen is that with larger calibers, there is normally an immediate reaction from the deer and short recovery. With the 243, the deer seem to build up a head of steam before they react to the shot. I would say this is the case about 80% of the time. In fact, on deer that are closer to 200 lbs it is not uncommon to see them start to run away from the hunter, then either circle back around past the hunter again. It is an odd behavior that we don’t see with something like a 30 caliber, but that delayed reaction buys them some time and distance.

And this is not something that has happened once. It has happened multiple times to multiple hunters. I don’t know if this behavior happens in mule deer or other species. I have just seen it in large northern whitetails.