bogobble,

I feel for you man and that really stinks. But, you have to see the point about a rifle. A bow slices meat open and causes blood loss, that is how it kills an animal!!!! A rifle will explode on impact and it uses shock to kill. Like I said above, that shock is enough to snap bones, shatter bones and punch huge holes through things! I would never aim for the bottom portion of the neck, but, if I am rifle hunting, a deer is standing at a close distance, and I have a good rest, I will put a bullet in the top portion of his neck. My .280 can put a serious hurtin on a deer and will put a big hole through a deers neck!!!!!

My best friend had the same situation as you this year except he was using a rifle. We were hunting together and a doe came out. There were a couple branches between the deer and us and he put his .308 right behind the shoulder and shot. The deer dropped instantly! We instantly got up and went over and the deer was entirely dead, we poked its eye with the gun barrel and it didn't blink. Well, we then looked and couldn't find a hole in the chest area. Well, we looked for awhile and found the hole a few inches down from the jaw bone. When we skinned it out, it put a dime sized hole on the way in and a half dollar sized hole on the way out! Not to mention the pieces of bone that it exploded that went through the neck, which cut open vanes! I have only seen one deer in my life that was lost to a "neck" shot and I wouldn't even call it that. The deer had a bullet hole at the top of the brisket region, and I am not sure that somebody didn't just shoot the buck and leave it as the buck was tiny! I have seen some great shots and some terrible shots come from guys who I have met in the woods and these rifles they were using killed these deer. I guess it is about knowing your personal limits. I won't criticize anyone about shot placement "unless it is blatantly retarded (such as the guy on another board who shot a deer in the head with his bow to "see if he could do it"), but, I also want people to respect my personal limit! [8D]