Bullet weight for deer hunting?

[parallaxbill]

My late father once dropped a nice big doe at 30 yards with my old Remington 12 ga Wingmaster 20" smoothbore with a 1 oz foster slug that hit in front of the shoulder and exited behind the offside shoulder. He had no problems with penetration.
As long as the distance is within reason I'd say the old punkin balls do fine job on whitetail deer and hogs.

[bigbrowndog]

I have shot feral hogs and deer with slugs, all were low recoil slugs, all were 1oz in weight. Accuracy degrades considerably beyond 100 yards with a smoothbore, however I would not hesitate to take a shot at 75-85 yards with a good slug. Of the slugs I’ve used on game Brenneke, Remington, Federal, Winchester, and Hornady. The only two slugs I’ve recovered were from mule deer bucks taken beyond 80 yards, one a Brenneke and the other a Winchester. Both dropped the deer in their tracks. The pigs were all shot in the 50-70 yard range and complete penetration was attained, easy blood trails due to large leaky holes. If it weren’t for the use of slugs in practical shotgun competition I would probably never have realized just how accurate a smoothbore can be with a rifled slug.

Trapr

[bula]

My M37 Ithacagun Deerslayer with Brenneke slugs kept the freezer full here for a couple of decades. Never recovered one. 

[bula]

Back to subject, thanks to Gary Alt, Penn deer have gotten some bigger than they used to be. I'd prefer 240gr class HP's. Good luck.

[jfs]

I settled on a handload for deer I call my "whitetail load" that has a standard (not mag) 300gr double crimp groove XTP over 27.4grs of H-4227 giving around 1450fps from my 454. The extra weight allows just about any angle shot to penetrate to vital but soft enough to open on broadside lung shot. 

[bigbrowndog]

My whitetail load is 44mag, 240xtp, 1400fps, accurate and deadly. James how old are you in that picture 19!!!!

Trapr

[jfs]

Feb 19, 2022 17:26:41 GMT -5 bigbrowndog said:

 James how old are you in that picture 19!!!!

Trapr

Does it make a difference?? 

[bigbrowndog]

Lighten up sport, geez…… I just noticed you awful young.

Trapr

[jfs]

Lets just say I was younger then you are now poppi...  light enough??

[rangersedge]

Suspect most decent bullets in the 180 and above range will work fine with any good hit.

Shotguns and shotgun slugs have came a long, long way in the past decade. Give a good scoped savage 220 some ammo it likes and it can take a deer at what used to be considered rifle only range.

[lostdoe2021]

Feb 21, 2022 21:34:27 GMT -5 rangersedge said:

Suspect most decent bullets in the 180 and above range will work fine with any good hit.

Shotguns and shotgun slugs have came a long, long way in the past decade. Give a good scoped savage 220 some ammo it likes and it can take a deer at what used to be considered rifle only range.

I have seen youtube videos of a savage 220 with 3 inch sabot slug kill a doe at 200 yards and the doe didn't go 20

[rangersedge]

I'm in what was a shotgun slug, handgun, muzzleloader only state. My wife, son, and I each have Savage 220s with Leupold Firedot 3x9 scopes. My wife (fairly petite) has gotten two deer in last two years with one shot each. My son has gotten two deer with one shot each (the first at about 80 yards when he was 8 years old and about 55 pounds). I shot one at about 180 yards. 3 of the 5 dropped instantly. None made it more than a few yards. The new rifled barrels and sabot ammo are accurate and effective - and not that punishing to shoot.

I think I have cell phone video of the last one my son shot at about 80 yards (both of his were about that distance). About as bang flop as you can get.

[oscar]

Feb 6, 2022 9:44:09 GMT -5 jiminpa said:

Can someone tell me what velocity i should use when using these weight bullets? Thanks.

I have never loaded the 200 xtp in 44 magnum but I have used it quite a bit in an FA 97 44 special.  I load them to 1200 fps and they work well on deer.  I've taken several deer with this combo. The bullet doesn't always exit - but the deer go down quickly.

[potatojudge]

Feb 18, 2023 10:14:04 GMT -5 oscar said:

Feb 6, 2022 9:44:09 GMT -5 jiminpa said:

Can someone tell me what velocity i should use when using these weight bullets? Thanks.

I have never loaded the 200 xtp in 44 magnum but I have used it quite a bit in an FA 97 44 special.  I load them to 1200 fps and they work well on deer.  I've taken several deer with this combo. The bullet doesn't always exit - but the deer go down quickly.

I’ll echo this. Same load. Same gun. Same results.

[cas]

To keep drifting... I shot at a "doe" with Rem 1100LT and 20ga Rem slugs. It had zero reaction to me shooting. It didn't even run away right off. Just stood there looking at me. I only went down the hill to track it a ways because it was the right thing to do. When I finally made my way down through some awful thicket to where it had been, there was not a drop of blood in the snow. I keep tracking it simply because that was the easiest way to travel. Fresh track in the fresh snow, no blood. Went over a rise and there it was laying dead. Crazy. (dressing it I found it was a button buck)

A couple years later a friend shot his first deer with that same load/gun. A TINY little yearling doe. Same thing, he really thought he missed because there was so little reaction. We tracked it a ways and found it dead.

What's that mean? Not much. Other than our personal experiences don't have to mean much.

As for 44's, when I serious about scoped revolvers (44 mags), a SBH and Bisley, I only shot 300gr XTPs because they grouped tighter at 100+ yards than any other weight. Found the same to be true with my Dad's Redhawk. Same applies though, doesn't mean it's true across the board. You also may not be shooting them far enough to notice/need the difference in group size.