when they are in the water in Big Game Hunting?
 

It just isn't that you are not allowed to it is just not good hunting etiquette because an animal in the water is not able to move quickly , it would be the same as shooting cows standing in a field.
acai complete 6

Unless you are in a an area that legally prohibits it, it is an ethical call and ethics will vary from person to person. A sport hunter isn't likely to shoot an animal in the water. Someone looking for some good meat for the freeze probably would. I say to each their own within the bounds of the law. We always hope people's personal ethics are tempered with a dose of common sense in terms of how actions can affect people's views on hunting...

Shooting something in the water isn't just an ethics issue, it's also a saftey issue. Bullets can ricochet off of water very well and travel very far. Hunters safety 101, never shoot a bullet at a body of water.

Having said that there is some common sense that comes into play. If an animal is standing say knee deep in a small cattle watering hole and there is a good back drop I'd take the shot. If the animal is swimming in pond or a lake, no way!

I may be all wet (sorry, I couldn't help myself!), but I have never heard that it is unsafe to shoot a high power centerfire bullet with a body of water in the line of fire. What about firing a high power centerfire bullet with a rock in the line of fire? Don't rocks likewise deflect bullets? Perhaps the key question is what is the backstop rather than whether water is present. If an elk is standing in a 100 foot diameter lake, I'm not suppose to shoot at it, but it is OK -- safety wise -- if it is standing on the shore beside the lake? I'm not sure I understand.

As far as ethics, why is it unethical to shoot big game standing in water? The preferred method is to shoot the animal, while it is standing still, while it is not excited, and while it is totally unaware of the hunter's presence, and it is best if one bullet dispatches the animal promptly. If the animal is running after you shoot, you may want to consider whether the chances are you scored a hit on the first shot. If you think it was a clean miss, the ethical course would be to pass on the running shot. I think if you cleanly missed the first shot on a standing, unsuspecting animal, odds are you aren't going to connect with a running shot on the animal. If you DID score a hit, of course, you need to try to bring that animal down, thus you ought to shoot again.

One important consideration involved in the question of shooting big game animals standing in water is the question of how will you recover this animal if it drops dead on the spot? This is an important consideration for moose which are huge, have long legs, and do often stand in water. It seems like it could also be an important consideration for elk. An elk, I suppose, could stand in 3 feet of water, be shot, drop on the spot, and yet be impossible to difficult to drag out of the water. What then?

Pretty obvious to me who has never been moose hunting. But in some circumstances shooting some thing standing in the water would be just plain DA. I guess I'm never that desperate cause at some point you have to get it out of the water.

I thought someone would come back with something like that. I just went through the Utah Hunters Safety Course with my 12 year old daughter and my with my wife last year. (I also took the course when I was a kid) One of the shooting safety tips they cover (and is a test question) is never shoot at anything in or around a body of water due to bullet ricochet. Heck they even made em watch a video and take a quiz called "Shoot or don't shoot" and after each scenario in the video they had to mark whether it's safe to shoot or not. My daughter brought it up the other day when a hunting video was on and they were near water.

Now to discuss it like big boys rather than looking at it from a childs view. Water is always flat and you will typically hit it at a pretty shallow angle drastically increasing the risk of ricochet causing the risk of hitting something on the other side, like an unseen hunter in the trees for instance. Rock ricochets should be considered when taking a shot but generally the direction of the rock face (meaning which direction will my bullet likely ricochet), the angle of the shot and the back drop would dictate whether it is a safe shot. A water ricochet will not destroy a bullet or slow it down much due to the angle where rocks usually will destroy a bullet and slow it way down.

Again this would be in and AROUND water. Rock ricochets are something else to consider when taking a safe shot but the circumstances are generally safer but left to the shooter to decide. This is all in the same realm as never shoot at something that is on a ridgeline from your vantage point. You never know what's on the other side.

Amazing how safety is rarely discussed on these boards.

This page doesn't quite highlight water as much as the Utah hunter ed course does but it does mention it.

http://homestudy.ihea.com/hsafety/11safeunsafe.htm

This is from the International Hunter Education Association

That would be me. It sounds like I've said something dumb related to the known precepts of moose hunting. What is that, so I can avoid embarrassing myself again. Is it that it is pretty difficult to find a moose NOT in water?

If I'm bow hunting, a standing stationary target is what I look for, in water, feeding, around water getting a drink... don't matter.

Many years ago when I was a Deputy WCO in an eastern state the game law said something to the effect that if big game was IN the water it was considered to be 'taking refuge' and was not allowed to be shot.

Now THAT seems like good sense and a good ethical standard (for me). But that state has probably changed by now, as (sadly) most of the world has by now.