In a world of super fast and ultra long distance we, me included, get carried away with Ballistic Coefficients in the 0.5 to 0.7 range. The fact is when hunting east of the Mississippi it is often not necessary to use high BC bullets (bean fields excluded) and certainly not in New England. Yes it is fun to write about!

For mid-range hunting say out to 150 yards that your bullet need not have a BC above 0.3 or so for mid range hunting say out to 150 yards. Here in New Hampshire most shots are in the 40 yard range. Many deer over the years have been dropped in their tracks with 240 grain flat nose bullets as well as round nose with sufficient mass and sectional density and modest muzzle speeds of say 2300 fps. The advantage of shooting a round, semi-spitzer or even flat nose bullets is that upon contact the bullet is already formed into a pseudo mushroom shape on contact. Thus this shape provides a audible whack sound and radial energy on contact with the hide of the animal.

Just imagine getting hit with a 100 mile per hour brick verses a pencil point.  Put a sheet upon a clothes line and throw a dart at it. What did the sheet do? Not much but punctured. Now throw a fast brick at the sheet. What did the sheet do? It likely was torn off the clothes line. If that were a game hide, it would have created a large radial tissue crushing dent and shock wave at the skin level before it passed through game.

I believe that the brick (round/flat nose) will shut out the lights of a game animal “instantly” more times than the sharp pencil which deforms and will kill in seconds but not often as instantaneously as the brick. Shotgun slugs do that trick all the time as do most 50 cal in-line muzzle loaders. Dangerous game calibers like the 416 Rigby, 458 Win Mag and 500 Nitro Express shoot round bullets for a reason. To provide instant bone crushing energy at the getgo. Odds are very high that this drops them where they stand provided you hit the vitals and the animal provides a vital shot angle.

I was very happy that I used a semi-spitzer round point 50 cal muzzleloader in Texas with 150 grains Pyrodex. I did not want to walk 20 yards into cactus to recover my deer. In fact, the guides don’t want to follow a blood trail in Texas if they don’t have to. I mentioned my .375 Ruger I left home and got lots of approval to bring it next time. My friend Larry Weishuhn calls the .375 Ruger a one gun for the world as I do.

I shot a large 6 point buck way up in Errol, NH  years back with a .338 Win Mag 250 grain round nose. That buck never took a single step, he just crumpled right there. My nephew was very impressed as he was beside me when I shot. The bullet entered the lungs and missed the heart but the heart was not edible as it was flat and totally bruised purple. Lights out!!

So don’t forget ( I remind myself too) that round, semi-spitzer and flat point along with mass and Sectional Density are great game stoppers.

Good Hunting!

© 2018