Maximum effective range of buckshot

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buckhshot

ATN082268,

I would agree that my figures for that post are not accurate. Not sure what I was figuring, but 20" at 7 yds is indeed too generous a figure. The accepted norm is 1" per yard from an IC or CYL choke.

I never was any good at math. Thanks for the check.
 
We had tags and I had a S/S shotgun in the truck. I dug around in the truck and found some Federal 00 buck. Well, I was down in a corner and a big doe pops out and stands there. I shot at her neck and was about 25 FEET away. I could not believe it. She did not jump, just turned her head and saw me and took off. I could not believe I missed. Flash ahead one year. My brother-in-law kills a big doe right at that spot with his bow. This is in the mountains where nobody uses a shotgun. When he went to skin it he called me up. There were about 7-8 pellets in the deer from right below the head to halfway back the body. The pellets stuck in the meat and the hide grew back over the pellets. I totally believe that a leather coat could stop buckshot in certain circumstances.
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Had you patterned your shotgun with the Federal 00 buck? I think it's more likely that you missed the deer than getting a 30" spread at a bit over eight yards. I don't see a deer's hide being enough to keep a hit with seven or eight pellets from penetrating to the far side of the deer at that close of a range.
 
What does patterning the gun have to do with anything? The buckshot did not penetrate the side of the deer, the easiest part to penetrate. Obviously you know nothing about deer. By the time a deer is 3 years old, the hide is twice as thick. If you are going to pattern it like a turkey load, you may as well use a slug.
 
Here is a video were a fellow kills a Canadian mule deer at 55 yards with Federal 00 buckshot. link to video He butchers the deer in the video and we can see that the five pellets that hit penetrate through the deer and are stopped by the hide on the far side.

I think 55 yards is pushing the range for buckshot but at closer ranges such as 30 yards or less, I'm confident that 00 buck will cleanly kill any deer, if you have patterned your gun and hit the deer in the vitals. I wouldn't hunt a deer with a rifle I hadn't sighted in and I won't hunt deer with a buckshot load I haven't patterned out of my gun.
 
You don't know what you are talking about. I would rather rely on experience than sit on my butt and watch videos. What does pattern have to do with penetration?
 
Patterning a shotgun has to do with whether you get lethal hits on a deer. 00 buck doesn't lack the ability to get sufficient penetration a Canadian mule deer with a winter coat at 55 yards and it certainly will penetrate just fine at closer ranges. If you shoot 00 buck at a deer less than ten yards away and don't kill it, it's not because of insufficient penetration.
 
Approx. .30 caliber lead balls at 1200-1400 FPS, that will leave a mark!

Lots of folks died from similar size lead balls, just one of them.
 
I'm sure that you believe what you are posting is correct but I think you are mistaken about what happened.

You shoot a load of Federal 00 at a deer 25 feet away and the deer looks at you and runs off showing no sign of injury. A year later, your brother in law kills a deer in the same place with his bow. Upon skinning the deer, you find seven or eight pellets under the skin in the meat.

You conclude that you hit the deer and its thick hide prevented the 00 buck at 25 feet from causing a serious wound. I conclude that you missed the deer and your brother in law killed a deer that someone else shot at a much longer range.



7-8 pellets spread over half the deer sounds like an aim point at the neck to me. The rest of the pattern probably went over and in front of the deer.
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If you patterned your gun with the Federal 00 buckshot, you might have a good idea of where the pellets would be expected to go.


This is not second hand information or some video I had nothing to do with. This actually happened.
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I accept that you shot at a deer at 25 feet and it didn't go down and your brother in law killed a deer a year later that had pellets in it. I draw a different conclusion than you on what happened based upon my experience with buckshot. I also don't discount evidence such as the video which shows a Canadian mule deer with its winter coat falling to Federal 00 at 55 yards.
 
I don't care what you do or do nor accept. This was in the mountains where hunters even look on a shotgun for turkey with disdain. You would have a better chance of hitting the lottery than having those sequence of events you described happen. It is like talking reality to a liberal Democrat. The logic is "Because I said so". I'm done.
 
ammo

Gunplummer,

You mention you "dug around in the truck" and I wonder if you came up with some contaminated or otherwise, spoiled, weak ammo? In the truck , in the heat , in the humidity, agitated by drving, etc, I could see ammo, espcially shotgun ammo, going sour if it had been there very long. That is about the only explanation I can come up with for buckshot, 00buck no less, not penetrating a deer neck at the ranges you advise.

I have an acquaintance who lost a gobbler over the very same issue with a turkey load dug up "in the truck".
 
I have to agree with 2damnoldforthis. The likelihood of your brother in law killing the same deer is remote.
Gunplummer reminds me of those deer hunters that saw the deer get blown off it's feet when they hit it with their rifles. Explaining physics to them didn't help at all. There was no convincing them it was impossible.
bamaranger may have a point, too.

A good load of buckshot at 25 feet is a devastating load.
 
I have knocked a deer over on it's back twice with a rifle. Shot them head on low in the neck. The bullet hits the spine head on (Very solid hit) which immediately drops the back end. The force of the bullet carries the front of the deer over backwards. It all happens in a split second. You need to get out more, maybe actually shoot a deer. I was my Physics teachers worst nightmare.
 
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