Until I got my first muzzleloader about 9 months ago, I wasn't much of a gun hunter. 1 deer with a shotgun, as opposed to 6 with a bow. I know where to aim with a broadhead. But is the behind the shoulder shot the best for a muzzleloader? Reason I ask is I took that very shot on a small sixpointer, and got two tiny holes with a miniscule blood trail. It ended up being shot and tagged by another hunter. My theory is the bullet impacted between the ribs and had no resistance to expand on. Great for an arrow, though.
With all this talk of bullet selection, I hear hardly anything about where to put that bullet. So, where do I shoot? Pics are helpful...thanks.

Oooh. I should probably make it known I'll be using a 250grain shockwave and 2 50grain triple 7 pellets. Perhaps 3 pellets if I can handle it @ the range tommorrow.

think of your bullet passing through as you would an arrow. With a hollow point I avoid massive bone structure. I like to tuck them behind the front leg where the elbow of the deer is. This shot, angled towards the other shoulder will take the top of the heart off, cut those arteries, blow the bottom of the lungs off, and make a good blood trail should they run off. Normally it plants them within 30 yards of where you hit them.

The deer anatomy doesn't change with the seasons so any shot that will kill a deer during the bow season will certainly kill it with a shotgun or rifle. Its a safe bet to make your point of impact just behind the shoulder so that both lungs are destroyed. There will be a thousand opinions from a 1000 hunters regarding point of aim but if you take out the lungs you'll cleanly and effectively harvest any anima that walks. You also have the benefit of little to no meat loss with this shot.
Good luck.

Just behind the shoulder is the best shot. Very often the lungs of my deer are totally destroyed after being hit with the 250 grain SST or the 240 grain XTP.

That was a lethal shot you made. And it may have had more to do with the deer's death than the other hunter. For a behind the shoulder shot aimed at theopposite shoulder, which happens to behands down my favorite shot, there is something to be said for a moderately charged all lead hollowpoint.

The expansion and the energy dissipation is going to be there. As long as the rib cage is pierced with plenty of energy left over, the will be a very large wound channel carved through the lungs/heart area. The shockwave is probably better suited for 3 pellets or 110 grains 777 than it is for 2 pyro pellets. So that is definitely will help in the quest for better expansion / energy dissipation.

If you are picky about placement, as you seem to be, and if 120 yards is plenty of range, then you also have the alternative of soft, smushy, all lead projectiles. There are alot great saboted projectiles on the market which would have expanded better, creating a larger wound channel, and dissipated more energy in your whitetail. I really like the 375 SSB for deer but I haven't yet had the opportunity to shoot anything with them yet.

I have a couple of expanded lead bullets right here. The 385 GP is expanded to a diameter of almost 1", the 270 ballet is expanded to a little over 3/4".Were you to choose the 375 SSB and charge it with 80 grains of pellets, it would deliver more energy at 100 yards than 100 grains of pellets and the 250 shockwave. It would do that for a little more recoil than the 100 grain/shockwave load and alot less recoil than the 3 pellet load. So if you picky about your placement and will wait for that behind the shoulder shot, you have more than just the 3 pellet solution.

I've shot alot of deer with 7mm Rem Mag behind the shoulder. It is not unusual for them to run 70 yards. In my experience, a muzzleloader projectile will generallyplant a deer quicker with the same bullet placement. But no more than 90 grain 3f is the mostI've ever used in combination with all lead projectile.

I almost always aim my M/L just like I would a bow. Going for a double lung, just behind the shoulder, in the ribs.They usually run 30 yards or so and pile up. I did shoot a small, cull buck 9 point last week with a high shoulder shot because I did not want him running into a swamp. Was looking for the pop and flop. Got exactly that. My load is a 250 grain shockwave with 110 grains of loose 777. The bullet went through his right shoulder, clipped the bottom of the spine and out the opposite shoulder leaving a softball sized hole (a single hole, not a bunch of little holes from the fragments). Damage similar to a 30-30.

The reason I always went for the same aimpoint as a bow is I had doubts about penetration w/ the M/L and wanted to make sure I got a hole in and a hole out for blood and tracking purposes. This technique has never failed me.

I am not doubting you at all on your performance, but I have shot numerous deer in the past 3 years with this combo, and I have never had a shockwave not expand. I've hit them broadside, quartering and head on, missed bone and hit bone, always get a good mushroom. I've even recovered three bullets from heavy quartering shots on big deer. The bullets, despite passing through bone and several feet of meat in two cases and nothing but meat in the third, were nicely mushroomed and retained most of their weight. That said, 110 grains of loose 777 is about like 145 grains of pyrodex compared of your load of 100 grains. You might want to try bumping up your powder charge to 130 grains of pellets or go to loose and try 100 grains of 777 loose, that would be about like 130 grains of pellets or pyrodex.That could have been the problem. In all the deer I've killed with the 250s the damage has been like a 308 or 30-30. Never had a bullet break up or explode either.

Good luck
Hank

As I've gotten older I've given up on shoting deer with anything bigger than a 7mm projectile. I wrote a line or two on another thread about 7mm-08 and the 280 Remington. During our regular season I killed all but one deer with a .243. The 280 was used on a bruiser of a buck that weighed about 175 pounds and I definitely didn't want running off to get lost or tagged by someone else.
You are correct in your assessment, caliber and bullet weight are entirely secondary to a well placed shot. That's why we shoot so much during the year.