let's talk about BHs and hitting bone...
 

Hey all,

Let's talk about your broadheads and hitting hard bones along with the rest of the hunting experience that resulted...

I'm talking shoulder and spine shots, the shots that we all wish we had back once they leave your hand...

I personally have never hit a bone :D, ribs aside,(I’ve only been hunting for 3 years and haven’t had as many opportunities to ‘hit bones’ as I’d like:() but this past hunting season using the Rage 2blade I found myself aiming slightly towards the rear of the animal subconsciously. I’ve had great success with the rage 2blade but I just don’t trust expandables if bone issues occur, and I cannot shoot what I do not have absolute faith in. Also,I’ve been hunting with friends using expandables that claim a spine shot and we didn’t find so much as a drop of blood, could very well just be the shooters fault.
I know switching to fixed blades doesn’t buy you immunity, but it’ll probably be closer to it than expandables.
So, let’s hear your stories of hitting hard bones with your broadheads, fixed blades or not, and what ended up happening… pictures as evidence are preferable. [:-]

--tom

RE: let's talk about BHs and hitting bone...
 

I personally have never hit a bone :D, ribs aside,(I’ve only been hunting for 3 years and haven’t had as many opportunities to ‘hit bones’ as I’d like:(

You will!!:DTrust me my friend, if you stick around in this game long enough, it is goona happen!! I have hardcore bowhunting about 25 years now and it has happened to me a few times with different results.
I will tell you a few of the stories.
#1. Years ago, the first year that I shot expandables, I shot Wasp Jak Hammers. Had a decent buck come in on a friday mid morning. Slightly quartered away from me. I put my pin right behind the shoulder. Unfortunately my big old XX78 Easton alum. didn't follow the pin. I hit him a little forward. I heard the crack, and watched him run about 300 yards across an open field, and into a standing cornfield with the arrow dangling off his side, flopping back and forth. I finally found my arrow, and spent about three hours chasing him around that cornfield. Seriously. He literally just kept running circles around me in the cornfield. Sometimes we were looking at each other eye to eye 15 yards from each other. Luckily, the very next friday, from the very same stand about the same time, I drilled a buck perfectly and watched him fall within sight. When I walked up on him, he looked real familiar. I looked at his shoulder, there was a big old scab on him. It was the same buck. When I butchered him, the shoulder bone had a great big groove dug out of it about 3-4" long. I ended up doing a half mount of him and my taxidermist somehow left the scab on him. We call him the second chance buck!

#2. About 5 years ago, ( actually whenever the first year that the Rocky Mtn Snyper 2 blades were out , my first year of using them), I called a buck in with my voice from a long way across a field. He was walking paraleel from my stand about 28 yards away. I stopped him, but just as I was releasing my arrow ( a Gold Tip 5575), it was like he started to turn to walk towards me. Unfortunately I hit him dead square in the middle of the right shoulder. Man he went down like a ton of bricks. Hit the ground and let out a big long growl ( of course we all know that deer growl now!!:D) and then tried to get up but ended up dying right there. My arrow busted through both shoulders! When I butchered him both shoulders were broken.

#3. A few seasons later, on a sat. morning, I watched a beautiful buck coming through the woods parallel to my stand. He hit an open lane and stopped. I knew it was a 35-36 yd. shot, someting I shoot allthe time and have shot deer at seceral times. Well, this morning is one of those times when you realize how much an inch can mean in bowhunting! I let that Snyper tipped Gold tip fly, heard a CRACK!! and wached him take off, with the shaft flopping. I was sick. We started finding some blood, and my buddies were trying to get me pumped, but I knew in my heart what the outcome would be. I was right. About 4 hours later, we jumped him. As he was trying to mount a doe!! But we all saluted him as he ran away though! A fresh shoulder wound, and he was still trying to get him a little.:D
One of my hunting buddies actually lives right beside the woods I shot him in. Later that week, on the way in to my stand, I jumped him out of his bed, and he was running across the road. I know this sounds like a story, but buddies don't lie- My friend was just coming up to his driveway and saw the buck coming across the field. Ke also know it was the same one. He glassed it, and it ended up crossing about 20 yards in front of him. He was waiting for me at my truck when I came out all excited. He said buddy, I ain't kidding you, if you would hit him just an inch or 2 back, he would be in your freezer right now and his head at the taxi. He said that he had a scab about the size of a fist right on the back point of his shoulder blade. Just my luck!!

Sorry to be so long winded. I guess I got a little excited reliving the hunts. I think that there are several factors when talking about bone hits. That is why I told the stories. You have to take into consideration angles, shot distance, what broadhead, bow set ups etc. Just like for me. One year I hit one dead center shoulder, and I bust both shoulders. A few years later, I hit one on the back tip of the shoulder, bit about 10 yds. farther away, and he lived to see another day!

I guess the moral of the story is: Be sure the only bone you hit is rib bone!!!

RE: let's talk about BHs and hitting bone...
 

When i've hit bone other than rib it has been on the far shoulder so i've gotten both lungs and found the animal but no pass thru or as good of blood trail as i woul d like .Last time it cut the heck out of the far shoulder as it ran and broke the arrow tip off . I was a little nervous gutting her that i would get cut until i was able to locate the head and remove it

RE: let's talk about BHs and hitting bone...
 

I stuck a Slick Trick Magnum 125 BH through the spine and into the lungs of a deer I killed this year that I dubbed "The Mercy Killing." He was a 1.5yr old Button Buck, with something wrong with one of his shoulders. I watched him try to get up several times to no avail. He was missing an entire muscle group from his shoulder, meat was ok, and the BH faired quite well. I actually re-edged it, and was able to heart punch a doe about a month later, and that BH is still on my #1 arrow after having been through the spine of that small buck, the heart of the doe, and the lungs of 2 coyotes, and God only knows how many times into foam. I also spined on once with a Spitfire, breaking the back of the 220# animal and rendering him paralyzed and waiting for a finisher shot. That BH also faired relatively well, one blade was bent, the other still ok.

Now in order to try to AVOID bone, I usually shoot for the heart nowadays, but the shot on the small buck was a difficult angle, but also a shot I was pretty confident I could put in it's place. The doe was a chipshot 15-16yd'er, no sweat except for the 15 or so other sets of eyes that were around as I had to draw and settle the pin.

I've also punched a NAP Shockwave through a shoulderblade in the past on a relative quarter-to shot I maybe should have held off on, but had a very good result with. The BH literally destroyed the shoulder blade, and broke the off side femur on exit, that young doe died 18 yds from the spot I shot her. Part of the reason I've faired relatively well is the 29" DL and 70-72# I pull, but I think the BH's have also been quite helpful as well. The ST is by far the best flying, and most durable BH that relatively decent money can buy as far as I'm concerned, and I'll actually take the flight of a ST over my old Jak-Hammers and Spit-fires because they really do fly as well as my FP's.

RE: let's talk about BHs and hitting bone...
 

I shot a 5pt in 2001 in the shoulder blade.He piled up in 40yds and when I cleaned it,I had to use a plier to remove the BH from the far shoulder.This was from a 53# longbow shooting a 530gr cedar arrow tipped with a 125gr Zwickey Eskimo 2 blade

RE: let's talk about BHs and hitting bone...
 

I shot a mature buck last year and took a chuck out of the paddle bone going in and right throughthe center of iton exit at 25 yards and still stuck the arrow in the ground. I shoot a 70 lb compound, 419 gr. EastonAxis arrow at 280 FPS and a Montec 100 gr. broad head. I have only seen it twice that a arrow broke a leg bone an few years ago I seen a guy do it on a doe and the front broken leg bone was sticking out to hole the carbon arrow came out off broken in two. Once a long time ago I was hunting with a guy out of state and he shot a buck with a old Jennings four wheeler compound at 75 lbs and the arrow broke the hind leg bone on the exit. It's some time crazy what a arrow will do and the next time it won't do. I do know when I went from aluminums to carbon arrow I seen some crazy things done that I never taught was possible with a arrow.

RE: let's talk about BHs and hitting bone...
 

Last November during opening weekend of the gun hunt I shot a seven pointer through the shoulder blade and it went through a rib on the other side. I was using a 125 grain Muzzy 3 blade, Allegiance at 57# and 28" draw. I still have the shoulder blade.

RE: let's talk about BHs and hitting bone...
 

I've hit several spines. They all went down right there.
I've hit a few opposite shoulders...they broke.
I've sent a few completely thru the flat part of the shoulder. That typically doesn't offer much in resistance.
I hit one on the "elbow". Only cracked the bone, but separated the joint and BARELY got enough penetration to kill the deer.

All my bone hits were either with the old rocky mtn razors or NAP thunderheads. The RM's would be toast, I only bent one ferrule on a spine shot with the TH's.

RE: let's talk about BHs and hitting bone...
 

This subject is one reason I shoot Slick Tricks. If I do accidently hit major bone I know they can not only survive but still get the job done after the fact.

Slick Tricks are the toughest Broadhead I have shot and in 40 years of Bowhunting there have been many. I've been shooting tricks since 03.

Dan

RE: let's talk about BHs and hitting bone...
 

I've hit bone quite a few times. After inspecting the broadheads after recovery, I firmly believe that using a head with a trocar type point is far superior to a COC type head when a bone hit occurs. I've never had any type of damage to trocar type head other than nicked blades. I have had COC heads severly bend on impact.