Catus Magnus

Well, here's my take on shot placement & bloodtrails. I think you're more likely to get a bloodtrail if you hit chest area relatively low - it's thinner there, bullet will almost certainly blow through, blood gathers down low & drains out. Downside of that low shot - I think they'll more likely run off. If I've got a good shot at a deer where I can see a long ways, I'll aim mid-low for bloodtrail and no meat loss. In thicker stuff - I'm always in thicker stuff - I'm about halfway to the backbone - that way I figure I'll prob get a lung or two, break a shoulder, do damage to running parts. Also, if my shot is off - is often is, seems - more margin for error. If I aim lot and hit lower than I intended, that deer might get away.

The one deer I hit right in the sholder dropped straight down last year - bullet didn't quite exit (under hide). It was a 240gr Hornday. All the other deer ran off a ways, after being hit in chest. Only one other - hit in the back lungs/piece of liver broadside - fell right down and stayed there.

I once shot a little runt deer at about 25 yards with a load of 000 right through the chest, and he kept on going as if I'd missed. I kept shooting, he kept running. I thought I'd missed, 'til I found some blood... some more... then a LOT more. When I found that little deer, his ears where shredded - one shot pattern just missed head. One of his front legs hung by a tendon; and about six or seven pellets in a hand-sized pattern went right through the chest broadside. That convinced me that sometimes, no matter how good you hit them, they're gonna run off.

Put me down as a mid-high shoulder shot guy, unless I'm REAL close.

Sharp Shooter

This will be my first year with a muzzleloader but I like to aim for the heart. I will do the same with BP as I do with a rifle or bow.

Whitehair

Depends on a lot of things, but generally...
-On a broadside deer, I shoot for low lungs/top of heart
-On a quartering away deer (My favorite) I shoot for the off shoulder

Good to hear some hunting stories here...Must be October! Good luck this season guys!

Omegalover

I prefer the lower chest about one third up to take out heart and lungs. It gives you a little room for error and still get a killing shot hit if you are off just a skosh. As in my first Crossbow kill.

I shot at a nice sized doe, I knew the arrow hit good after the shot, waited about 30 mins in the stand. My buddy came walking up and said he had come to get me and saw me aiming so he sat down.

He couldnt see the doe, and asked if I got a good shot on her, I said I thought I hit her in the heart lungs. He said he didnt hear it when I hit her, just the noise from my crossbow. We walked over to investigate and found my bolt only slightly bloody about 5 feet past where I had told him the doe was standing, a few cut hairs, but no blood at all.

He asked again if I had actually hit her or if she had jumped the string, but I was sure I had hit her good, but we couldnt find any trace of it. So I took him where I had seen her run. We went over 70 yards without a drop of blood, just sign where she had really been on a hard run, torn up dirt, etc.

Again he accused me of missing or her string jumping me. To tell the truth he was finally starting to make me doubt I had hit her as hard as I had thought. We still followed the obvious sign of her departure with no blood when all of a sudden there was a swath of blood about 12" wide for about 20 feet and she was laying at the end of it.

When I hit her she was just very slightly facing downhill away from me, her left (away) leg was out in front.The arrow entered just above mid body angling down, passed through near lung, cut top of heart and exited far side behind her leg. I guess when she started running and her leg moved back below her it helped close the exit wound so not much if any blood came out there. When we field dressed her she had bled out into her forward body cavity.

She had run about 70 or 80 yards, since she had circled some real dense thicket stuff she was only about 30 yards from where I had shot her.

My point iseven though I had a low exit wound, it doesnt mean you will necessarily find a good blood trail.

Ruddyduck

Well this is the Blackpowder part of the forum,not the bow.
When using my smokepole Imy target is the heart providing I have a good opportunity to make a good steady shot and the range is 60yards and in. Thishas been the case more times than not and for the few times the range has been a bit more I take the shot dead center of the lungs.
Blood trails have never been a problem as I've never shot much past 85 yards but once and everytime my prb or maxi has gone straight thru even when the deer ran the blood trail has been massive and never have run more than 100 yards or so.

Omegalover

Dude it was only an example of how even a good shot may not leave a good blood trail. Most of my kills with both a bow and ML have left very good trails, but there are times when that doesnt happen even with a well placed shot.

Have you never heard of someone shooting a deer with a ML and not getting an exit hole? It does happen, a friend shot a doe two years ago that the bullet hit in the front, went through both lungsand when itreached the far side of her body cavity turned along the hide, traveledover 14" before it stopped under her skin within about 2 inches of her tail.

nchawkeye

Omegalover...Good story...Sounds like your friend is like a few of mine...I have had them try to talk me out of a kill a few times...That's why its best if you know when you take the shot (with any weapon) that it will be a killing shot...

A couple of years ago I had put a buddy on a stand...We were hunting with muzzleloaders, I heard him shoot, and heard the bullet hit...When I got down to help him recover he was all worked up...He had seen 2 bucks...Didn't get a shot at the 1st one, but watched it stop and make a scrape...The second one is the one he shot at...We couldn't find a blood trail....He was about ready to give up, thought he had missed, I told him, "You didn't miss, I heard the hit"... Fortunately we have owned this farm about 30 years and I had a pretty good idea where I thought the buck would head...I searched about 100 yards in the direction where the buck had headed and found a blood trail going into the woods... The deer was about 25 yards inside the woods, headed to the swamp...The blood trail was only the last 30 yards or so...The range was about 100 yards, he was shooting a 100gr charge behind a 295 PowerBelt...No problem with bullet preformance, it gave a good exit wound and the hit was about 3 inches behind the crease of the shoulder...The deer was probably dead within 10 seconds of the shot, but they can cover some ground in 10 seconds...

Blackpowdersmoke

Hello Cayugad. On reading your post...I had to think about a deer I shot 3 yrs. ago with a T/C Firehawk in .58 cal. with a patched roundball almost EXACTLY the same scenario but the deer was quartering more towards me. Anyway, same thing...about a 45-50 yd. open shot and the deer did a 180 like it had never been hit. Peeled out and ran back into the thick woods out of sight. I climbed down, went to where it had stood and not a drop of blood...just the tracks where it had spun around. And I don't care who says I'm nuts...I could smell that the deer had been hit...that's right..it smelled just like it does when you open a deer's body cavity. I began to follow the trail it was on and found blood about 40 yds. from where I shot the deer,but nothing significant. I continued to follow about another 70-80 yds.with minimal blood trail and stopped to survey the situation...about 40 yds. further the deer laid in a heap in one of those little "divots" that dot all hardwood hillsides. I had taken it cleanly at an angle through the left lung, caught a small portion of the rear of the right lung and the tip of the liver. I'm not dissing round balls but I wasn't impressed with the blood trail...BPS

Blackpowdersmoke

Yea..it happens. My neighbor's son shot a youngdoe last year with a .50 CVA in-line and a Powerbelt hollowpoint bullet at about 30 yds. He hit her at an angle quartering towards him in the right shuolder and the bullet exploded inside her there was not one small fragment that exited..what a mess! An older gent I used to work with kept a flattened .50 round ball in his toolbox as a conversation piece. It was a little smaller than a quarter, and hehad taken it from a nice buck he shot with a CVA Mountain rifle some years back. It smashed through a shoulder, passed through a rib on the opposite side, and stopped at the hide but not before it had slid under the hide all the way back on top of the deer's hind quarter. Personally, I have never had that happen with any of the deer I've shot with a muzzleloader...BPS

nchawkeye

Once the bullet or ball flattens, the opposite hide kinda acts like a catchers mitt...It can actually strech away from the body and absorb the flattened projectile....Mushrooming is good as it leaves alot of damage on the inside...Alot of variables come into play once it hits a deer...as we all know, a bullet that doesn't mushroom and exits can be bad business, as well as one that opens too quickly...Its sorta a catch 22...We all want exit wounds for better tracking, but a bullet that does more damage inside a deer will usually drop them faster...And even if you have an exit, you can't be sure that you will have a blood trail....That's where confidence comes in, you must know that you hit the deer properly so you will look longer and recover the deer.