RR, I can certainly believe that the heart stops "sooner" with a head shot. My comment was to "The heart stops immediately", And maybe it does more often than not, but I have definitely seen different.

Mind you that it was back in 1976, so I won't tell that the memory is vivid, but it was my first deer so the memory is still there.

Instant death leaves more blood in the animal. That is a fact. That is why slaughter houses knock animals out or gas them then bleed them out.

As someone who processes deer from September to January every year for the last 10 or so years for local and out of State hunters and myself since 1974 as well as I do taxidermy I can assure you What I have personally witnessed your statement has NOT been the case. Not to say that what you have witnessed is different from my Hands On experience.
Fascinating!

Lunkerdog: A nitpicker ought to know, one is .224 and one is .228

I am still kind of curious, how do you shoot the jaw off a deer that is either facing you or facing away? None of the experts want to address that question ?

That is a good question. As you will notice in my very first post on this thread I stated the buck was facing away from me when I took the head shot. So I'm interested in hearing the answer to that as well! Improbable.

***Question: Who said any deer that had it's jaw damaged was facing toward or away from a hunter? I would have to assume that the animal would be pretty much broadside or turn it's head sideways to the hunter taking that shot to damage the jaw. What am I missing here?

So the Savage is not a .22 caliber?

I was actually nitpicking that they were different cartridges vs different calibers... The data I found for the Savage said .227/.228... Other .22 cals I found ran from .223 to .2245

A side shot at a deer's head is somewhat risky and I won't do it. A frontal shot, if low will go right through the neck. Same with a shot from the rear. It is not impossible to hit ONLY the jaw with a face on shot (Nothing is impossible with deer and bullets), but the risk of a bad shot is no worse than anywhere else you shoot.

I never noticed more blood from a head shot. I know some guys that soak the meat in salt water overnight if it looks too bloody. I do it with small game and it works. The salt draws the blood out into the water.

How about this simple old country rule of thumb......,

Unless it's something charging you and you need to shut off its porch light instantly to save your ass just wait for a good angle on the lungs or let it walk.

I suppose if you rounded up, a .22 HiPower could be considered a .22 cal. Why don't you load some Hornady .228 bullets in your .223 and tell us what happens? Sounds like an experiment to me.