Big 6 ~ 92 357 Mag & XTP
Posted: 16 Nov 2016 02:16
Four seasons ago I decided to hunt rogue, not hunting our normal stands, but find a new hot spot. My friend's farm is 200 acres divide by a county road. Half is river bottom with trees along the fence row and drainage creeks and a swampy area. The other half is wooded, steep, hillsides. The river bottom is soy bean fields. I decided to hang a climbing stand near the county road but on the wooded side. The plan was to catch deer in a staging area before they crossed to the road to the soy beans.
I connected with a fat doe. But, I was hearing deer and sometimes seeing deer legs on the ridge above me. The next year I put up a ladder stand higher up the ridge. I took the biggest bodied buck of my life. A 180 pound, small 8 pointer. The following year we moved the stand to the top of the ridge. Unfortunately, it was right on the deer trail. I deferred this stand to my friends for the first part of our hunt. One friend did take a fat 120 pound doe, but it was a tough shot because the deer was right under him and require zero movement.
This year we backed the stand down hill about 20 yards. This is a thick patch of second growth timber. Shots beyond 50 yards are highly unlikely--a perfect setup for a Rossi .357 magnum.
Saturday, the wind direction was perfect from the NE. Looking uphill to the ridge the light wind would be blowing in right eye. While I think this is an evening stand, I wanted to hunt it a morning and an evening hunt because of the wind.
Saturday morning, I saw nothing. I thought I heard a deer walking below me, but it was also down wind.
I'm in the stand for 30 minutes Saturday evening when a noise to my right causes me to take a look. It was a wide racked buck (for me) about 50 yards out. I can only see 1/2 his neck and head when he raises it to smack around an over hanging limb and chew on the limb. His body was obscured by a fallen limb and under growth. But something looked funny about the way the shadows of his body looked through the tangles. I'll admit that I was tempted for a moment to take the head shot, but better judgement prevailed. Unless he dropped over the ridge away from me, he would either go below the tangle or walk out the ridge. Either one would give me an open shot. I watch him for 10 minutes. He seemed really ticked off when the limb he was chewing on broke off. haha The shadows in the tangles had me confused. Sometimes I could see outlines of legs that made no sense with his bode position.
From his profile, I thought him to be a wide racked 6 pointer. The G2's look to be 9 inches.
Satisfied he had marked his territory, he turned way from the tangles to wall up the ridge. I was looking at a small bowl 4 pointer. NO WAY THAT'S THE DEER I'VE BEEN WATCHING! The big 6 stepped around his little brother to take the lead. I could see his spread was well beyond his ears.
He's the biggest 6 pointer I've ever seen. I'm going to take him and call my buck tag filled. This deer will be a good test for my new 180 XTP, 357 load.
At 35 yards he presented an open, slightly quartering to me shot. I found the green fiber optic front sight in my Marble peep sight with a Merit aperture peep. I touched off the load. The deer flinched then shock like a Lab just coming out of the water then paused and shook again. I've never seen a deer do that in the 40-plus years I've been hunting. I have heard poachers say that's what deer will do when shot with a 22mag.
The buck trotted up the ridge, stopping 25 yards in front of me. He was wobbling slightly. I could see a red dot of blood in the crease of it's shoulder. This deer is dead, but I didn't want him to go over the ridge (harder retrieving) and I didn't want him to suffer. I fired again. He goes 3 yard and stops. Now, he's barely able to stay on his feed. I need to end this. I have 2 double lung shots, I need to take out his heart. I aim a little lower, under his elbow. He drops.
His outside spread is 18 inches. It widest rack 6 pointer I've ever taken. But, I'm a meat hunter, not a trophy hunters. Field dressed weight was 140 pounds.
Ballistic/forensic Report:
The first shot was a pass through. It struck one rib entering and existed behind the ribs on the far side. It went through both lungs and through the liver. The lungs were mush do to the 3 shots going through them.The third shot cut his heart There was a good blood trail from the first shot. The other 2 shots broke ribs on both sides. One must have bounce back into the body cavity. The other embedded just under the skin.
The mushroom of the retrieved bullet was .6325. My test shots through wet, compressed sawdust gave expansion of .66. Also the retrieved bullet didn't peal back down the base as much as sawdust test bullet did. This lead me to believe that the sawdust is a denser medium than deer tissue is.
I'm happy with the results of my .357 as a close range (minus 50 yards) deer rifle. But, could I tweak it a little more?
RD AND OTHERS--A QUESTION:
Should I slow the bullet down a little to get the pass through, exist wound and a better blood trail? Or, should a push the load (15.3 grains of Lil'Gun) to get more mushroom and hopefully more penetration. My thoughts are if I push it more, I'll get more expansion, but I might not get more penetration?
Pictures:
I thought I had taken pics of the big 6 with my Nikon or at least MY cell phone, but I didn't. So here's a pic from my bud's cell phone. I did take pics of the bullet. The red tint is blood soaked lead.
OK, my friend's cell phone, text image will not post. grrrr! I'll try to get him to email the pic to me. Maybe that will work better than the text image. Anyhow, here's the bullet pics
I connected with a fat doe. But, I was hearing deer and sometimes seeing deer legs on the ridge above me. The next year I put up a ladder stand higher up the ridge. I took the biggest bodied buck of my life. A 180 pound, small 8 pointer. The following year we moved the stand to the top of the ridge. Unfortunately, it was right on the deer trail. I deferred this stand to my friends for the first part of our hunt. One friend did take a fat 120 pound doe, but it was a tough shot because the deer was right under him and require zero movement.
This year we backed the stand down hill about 20 yards. This is a thick patch of second growth timber. Shots beyond 50 yards are highly unlikely--a perfect setup for a Rossi .357 magnum.
Saturday, the wind direction was perfect from the NE. Looking uphill to the ridge the light wind would be blowing in right eye. While I think this is an evening stand, I wanted to hunt it a morning and an evening hunt because of the wind.
Saturday morning, I saw nothing. I thought I heard a deer walking below me, but it was also down wind.
I'm in the stand for 30 minutes Saturday evening when a noise to my right causes me to take a look. It was a wide racked buck (for me) about 50 yards out. I can only see 1/2 his neck and head when he raises it to smack around an over hanging limb and chew on the limb. His body was obscured by a fallen limb and under growth. But something looked funny about the way the shadows of his body looked through the tangles. I'll admit that I was tempted for a moment to take the head shot, but better judgement prevailed. Unless he dropped over the ridge away from me, he would either go below the tangle or walk out the ridge. Either one would give me an open shot. I watch him for 10 minutes. He seemed really ticked off when the limb he was chewing on broke off. haha The shadows in the tangles had me confused. Sometimes I could see outlines of legs that made no sense with his bode position.
From his profile, I thought him to be a wide racked 6 pointer. The G2's look to be 9 inches.
Satisfied he had marked his territory, he turned way from the tangles to wall up the ridge. I was looking at a small bowl 4 pointer. NO WAY THAT'S THE DEER I'VE BEEN WATCHING! The big 6 stepped around his little brother to take the lead. I could see his spread was well beyond his ears.
He's the biggest 6 pointer I've ever seen. I'm going to take him and call my buck tag filled. This deer will be a good test for my new 180 XTP, 357 load.
At 35 yards he presented an open, slightly quartering to me shot. I found the green fiber optic front sight in my Marble peep sight with a Merit aperture peep. I touched off the load. The deer flinched then shock like a Lab just coming out of the water then paused and shook again. I've never seen a deer do that in the 40-plus years I've been hunting. I have heard poachers say that's what deer will do when shot with a 22mag.
The buck trotted up the ridge, stopping 25 yards in front of me. He was wobbling slightly. I could see a red dot of blood in the crease of it's shoulder. This deer is dead, but I didn't want him to go over the ridge (harder retrieving) and I didn't want him to suffer. I fired again. He goes 3 yard and stops. Now, he's barely able to stay on his feed. I need to end this. I have 2 double lung shots, I need to take out his heart. I aim a little lower, under his elbow. He drops.
His outside spread is 18 inches. It widest rack 6 pointer I've ever taken. But, I'm a meat hunter, not a trophy hunters. Field dressed weight was 140 pounds.
Ballistic/forensic Report:
The first shot was a pass through. It struck one rib entering and existed behind the ribs on the far side. It went through both lungs and through the liver. The lungs were mush do to the 3 shots going through them.The third shot cut his heart There was a good blood trail from the first shot. The other 2 shots broke ribs on both sides. One must have bounce back into the body cavity. The other embedded just under the skin.
The mushroom of the retrieved bullet was .6325. My test shots through wet, compressed sawdust gave expansion of .66. Also the retrieved bullet didn't peal back down the base as much as sawdust test bullet did. This lead me to believe that the sawdust is a denser medium than deer tissue is.
I'm happy with the results of my .357 as a close range (minus 50 yards) deer rifle. But, could I tweak it a little more?
RD AND OTHERS--A QUESTION:
Should I slow the bullet down a little to get the pass through, exist wound and a better blood trail? Or, should a push the load (15.3 grains of Lil'Gun) to get more mushroom and hopefully more penetration. My thoughts are if I push it more, I'll get more expansion, but I might not get more penetration?
Pictures:
I thought I had taken pics of the big 6 with my Nikon or at least MY cell phone, but I didn't. So here's a pic from my bud's cell phone. I did take pics of the bullet. The red tint is blood soaked lead.
OK, my friend's cell phone, text image will not post. grrrr! I'll try to get him to email the pic to me. Maybe that will work better than the text image. Anyhow, here's the bullet pics