Effective Game Killing

[rsterne]

I have just started reading a very lengthy article about effective killing of big game, such as deer and hogs.... You can find it here....

https://www.ballisticstudies.com/Knowledgebase/Effective+Game+Killing.html

Only part of this will apply to airguns, but the anatomy drawings are an eye-opener, along with some of the comments on shot placement.... It shows the importance of knowing the anatomy of your quarry…. be it big game or small.... 

Bob

[Tiroflojo]

Great Bob, you make the best readings. It's a very interesting contribution. Thank you.

[Airgun-hobbyist]

There's a wealth of knowledge to be gained from the studying of anatomy for shot placement.  I remember an article years back on shot placement that was written by a doctor.  The guy always studied the circulatory systems of the game he was hunting and where aorta was located.  Then using that knowledge, he would calculate/picture the shot placement based on animal position.  He said that particular shot resulted in the animals expiring the quickest and running the least distance.   It makes sense too; as you can get two lungs and the heart on a broadside shot, and one lung and heart at a quartering-to shot.

I Google the circulatory systems and print those pictures in color to study and use as targets.  Here's a few of the real-deal I have gathered up over the years:

[lupus1]

Elk is extremely resistant to shot. Even with a Texan .457. I recommend shooting in the head. It stays there. Otherwise, he may fall into the swamp and then it's hard to take it. The enormous weight makes the task difficult.

[Airgun-hobbyist]

Here's one for the predator hunter's amongst us.

[oneshot61]

Thanks Bob, this needs to be a sticky, maybe ?

[Habanero69er]

Thanks Bob. Good information in the link you posted.

[subscriber]

This observation about preferred shot placement on live animals might be tangential.  It might also be an artifact of a non-representative sampling.  In other words, I might be misstating the facts, out of ignorance:

Many varmint hunters use only head shots.  Some claim that chest shots are not ethical, because animals take too long to die.

Deer hunters almost always use chest shots. Usually broadside.  Some of the animals drop on the spot, but the majority run off some distance, then die.  Depending on the caliber and the organs struck, it could take several minutes for a deer to die.  Longer for animals harvested by means of  handguns, or airguns with equivalent ballistics.  Heart, or double lung shots with centerfire rifles kill faster; while good hits with broadhead arrow take much longer to kill.  None of these are considered unethical.

So; what puzzles me is the "respect" for pest animals; and why that is not extended to larger non-pest species?  My guess is that pest eliminators that are also "big game" hunters do not hold such apparently contradictory views.  Or, killing for food somehow falls under different rules, than those who kill pests "for fun" or for money. 

My attitude towards rats is that I prefer snap traps to slow acting poison.  That shooting them "center of mass" above the diaphragm with an airgun is at least as effective as an appropriately sized snap trap.  My main concern is that they do not run off to decay somewhere where the smell would be a problem. 

Squirrels are tough, and can run far after a body shot.  If you want to eat them, that makes them hard to retrieve; so head shots are indicated.  However, if the goal is pest abatement, then body shots that hit at least one lung can hardly be considered unethical.  Or am I missing something?

[Back_Roads]

 Here is a video posted by an air rifle deer hunter, I had mentioned this in another post that may have brought about this post.

[subscriber]

The video in the post directly above was a useful summary of the article Bob linked to:

Choose an air rifle / bullet combination that can makes the largest hole that is guarantees to shoot all the way through the chest of the animal being hunted.  There exist nerve branches, that when struck may act as an "off switch". 

I would add that DRT shots often result from "knocking out" the animal, and having it die from blood loss before it wakes up again.  The article goes though hoops explaining how this can happen, without telling the reader specifically where to aim; or the best path for the bullet.  I did not see advice on lining up the "brachial plexus" with the lungs, so if the former is missed, the latter will still guarantee a fatal hit.  Just some diagrams that did not all seem to scale.

So, that article was too long, and seemed self contradictory at times.  Statements about hydrostatic shock only being effective with bullets travelling over 2600 FPS; followed much later by; if the caliber is large and the bullet has a large meplat, hydroshock with damaging temporary cavities exists at much lower velocities.  So the "rule" has to contain a conditional statement to make it true.  Not very useful to be emphatic about the rule, without mentioning the conditional statement.

The article went on to state that to be effective, the bullet chosen must not have "too much momentum".   That is a unique outlook for sure.  The writer might have stated that slower heavier bullets tend to sail through small animals, while faster lighter bullets in the same caliber can transmit more shock, do more damage and kill faster, if they expand properly. 

If the mechanism of hydroshock and damaging temporary cavity did not exist "below 2600 FPS", or some other number well above the speed of sound; how does one explain what happens to sparrows shot by Matt Dubber with .22 caliber hollow nose lead slugs, impacting at no more than 950 FPS?  There, the permanent cavity ends up larger than the bird was, before impact.  Pretty strong evidence of fluid pressure exceeding the strength of the container. 

A sparrow sized cavity in the chest of a larger animal will kill it fast enough, if it reliably damages vital organs, but without such obvious external damage.  It is not that hydroshock is absent with airgun projectiles, but that it is a matter of scale.  Obviously, shooting a sparrow or even rabbit sized crater on the outside of the  chest cavity of a deer would be ineffective.  So, a small light fast (for an airgun) projectile is not the right choice.   

One should remember that air rifles shooting at 300 or 400 FPE are only in "medium handgun caliber" territory.  While much more capable than Dubber's 50 FPE sparrow detonator, top end commercially available air rifles are about 5 to 8 times less potent than the typical centerfire rifle used to hunt deer.

The article closes with the old saying, "use enough gun".  It could have elaborated on that with, "to makes the largest hole possible at a given power level, all the way through the animal you are hunting; with the shot placed to pass through vital organs and blood vessels", and left it there.  The rest of the articles is begging for some serious editing; much like most of my overly long posts...

[rsterne]

I know most of the article deals with PBs, and velocities over 2600 fps.... I was more interested in the anatomical drawings.... I absolutely agree with the "punch as big a hole as you can, all the way through, hitting as many vital organs as possible" philosophy.... I came away with more knowledge than I started with, which IMO made it worth the (albeit lengthy) read....

Blowing up sparrows with a slug that is about 1/6th the diameter of the body isn't particularly amazing, if you think about it.... I wonder what you would look like after being hit with a 3" solid round at 900 fps?.... Probably pretty similar, I would think.... Call it "overpressure", I guess.... Hydraulic shock, rather than Hydrostatic shock.... 

Bob

[subscriber]

Yup, a .22 that opens up to .4 on a sparrow is like a person being hit by a bowling ball.  Hence, my statement about it being a matter of scale.

Now, I could be wrong, but the lungs in this drawing taken from that article appear too small:




Sure, aiming "small" would help prevent missing the organs; but if I can't trust the size, I can't trust the position...

Someone is wrong here, based on the info below:




https://www.google.com/search?rlz=1C1NDCM_enUS793US793&q=anatomical+images+of+deer&tbm=isch&source=univ&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwiuh_PCm6DnAhUErp4KHVz_ABEQsAR6BAgHEAE&biw=1341&bih=640

[rsterne]

I dunno…. That drawing from the article looks pretty close to the photo in Reply #2 immediately below it.... JMO....

Bob

[subscriber]

Hydraulic shock, rather than Hydrostatic shock....

The article made a distinction between fluid pressure being high enough to tear tissue, VS causing "water hammer" in blood vessels running to the brain.  Calling one hydraulic and the other hydrostatic shock.  Which of these two effects is involved when a pile of BS on the ground splashes from being struck by a projectile? 

Seriously; if an article wants to be pedantic it need to be clear.

In case you think that I am holding you responsible, Bob; your articles are always amazingly clear and to the point.

[subscriber]

I dunno…. That drawing from the article looks pretty close to the photo in Reply #2 immediately below it.... JMO....

Bob

The Cabelas video I added (above) is what I am used to seeing on deer anatomy:  Large lungs that extended all the way to the liver.  When the lungs are pulled out of the way, the liver is also much larger than that line drawing suggested...

[rsterne]

What amazes me on a deer is how far forward the shoulder blade is.... and that the triangle formed by that and the upper foreleg surrounds the heart.... The heart is much lower in the body than I thought, and the spine is very low as well.... About 1/3 of the neck is above the spine, and there is a large ridge on the vertebrae forward of the diaphragm that pushes all the vitals lower in the chest than I thought.... It looks to me that directly above the leg, and about 1/3 of the way up the chest, is the sweet spot.... 

Bob

[nced]

I have just started reading a very lengthy article about effective killing of big game, such as deer and hogs.... You can find it here....

https://www.ballisticstudies.com/Knowledgebase/Effective+Game+Killing.html

Only part of this will apply to airguns, but the anatomy drawings are an eye-opener, along with some of the comments on shot placement.... It shows the importance of knowing the anatomy of your quarry…. be it big game or small.... 

Bob

LOL....anatomy of a squirrel...........

I prefer a "brain shot" and even this well armored squirrel would be taken with a 7.9 grain CPL between eye and ear from my .177 R9 or HW95...........

[subscriber]

What amazes me on a deer is how far forward the shoulder blade is....
....
It looks to me that directly above the leg, and about 1/3 of the way up the chest, is the sweet spot.... 

Archery hunters have to be careful of the shoulder blade acting as a shield over the "sweet spot" when the deer's leg is moved back.  This is probably also good advice for airgun hunters using hollow pure lead bullets... 

Many centerfire rifle hunters aim right at the shoulder on African antelope, with a line on the vitals behind it.  The idea being to break one or both shoulders, and to take out both lungs.

What amazes me is that broadhead arrows seem to pass so easily between deer ribs.  Because arrows have a high trajectory from travelling so slowly, the POI on the deer's skin needs to be a little higher, than with a faster travelling projectile, aimed at the same internal "sweet spot".  That said, I am often amazed at how effective very low arrow hits are on deer.  Some of this seems to be from them jumping up at the sound of the let-off.

[subscriber]

I am surprised at how smooth those squirrel brains look, Ed. Not "groovy" at all, like our species.  Brain coral is even named after its similarity with the human brain:

[BackStop]

I pest.   My main goal is to kill pests.   I try to make clean kills.   Sometimes, the kill is not as clean/quick as I would like, but the end result is the same.

Am I unethical?   Am I being inhumane?

No.