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Thread: Skeeter Load for Deer?

  1. #1
    Boolit Master curioushooter's Avatar
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    Skeeter Load for Deer?

    Many people, including myself, have extolled the so-called Skeeter Load: 7.5 grains of Unique with the 429421 in 44 Special case. In my 6.5" S&W 624 this goes ~975 FPS. I have personally verified this is an accurate load and a pleasant load. And it works pretty much with any ~255 grains SWC: the 429244, H&G 503, etc.

    But has anyone taken any deer with it? At what range? What impact location? It seems like it should be adequate, but I am curious.

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    Years back I converted a S&W M28 with a 4' barrel to 44 SPL. I most often carried it loaded with Skeeter's load [WA cases, CCI 300 primers, 7.5 gr Hercules Unique, Lyman 429421 cast of COWWs sized .429 and lubed with Javelina at 255 gr]. My old records show 853 fps (start screen at 10') with 12 shots giving a 2 1/2" group at 25 yards. I also occasionally used the same components but with 16 gr 2400 which ran right at 1000 fps.

    As an SO LEO I put down (as I recall) several injured deer, an injured elk and perhaps a couple injured domestic animals with it using both loads. However, I did take one mulie buck with it while hunting. The buck was stopped facing me at a slight angle about 30+ yards slightly down hill. I put the bullet with Skeeter's load just to the right of the brisquet center line. The bullet went through a rib just right of the breast bone, went through the heart, through the bottom of the bucks right lung lobe and exited through another rib just in front of the diaphragm. At taking the shot the buck turned and went straight away from me giving only a Texas heart shot for a follow up. I don't take those shots and knew from the blood gushing out the buck was dead on his feet. The buck went into some brush about 20 yards +/- and I heard him go down. The blood trail was easy to follow as it looked like someone was sloshing red paint out of a bucket. The buck was piled up just out of sight past the brush.
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    Boolit Master
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    Shot a 120 lb hog this spring with that load from a 5 inch GP100 using a NOE round flat nose that cast right at 240 from near pure lead, say 40:1 realm. First shot thru the ribs at about 25 yards, hog was walking and started to run. He turned broadside at about 20 yards going into a gully and the next da shot broke both front legs. Went and put another down thru the skull and neck to make sure. Hunting buddy had lost one that morning that looked down and out! First shot made a mess of the lungs and exited, hog was dead but didn’t know it yet. Bullet that broke both front legs was in the shank on the far side amidst the broken bone chunks, pretty wadded up but at least 90% weight retintion. The kid that cleaned up the shed found the other on the floor and brought it to me. I was the only one there hunting with a handgun and he seemed interested. He was impressed with the penetration and damage done from the belt gun. I have the two bullets, I will try to post a picture of them later.
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    Don't have a 44 special, but I have killed several hogs with a 45 acp carbine using a 200 rf at about 975. Largest was close to 200 pounds at 60-70 yards. First shot, high shoulder, passed through and dropped him. Second just above the spine and exited the belly. Opened my eyes to what a chunk of lead at modest velocity will do.
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    44 Special and 45 Colt in their original SAAMI spec pressures will humanely take deer, these are large heavy boolits that don't rely on expansion for terminal performance on game, but loaded warm with soft boolits so expansion does happen they are both made even more deadly. Not a whole lot of difference on paper or in the real world in these two for deer hunting.

    As with all big bore pistol caliber arms both revolver or carbine, the shorter the distance the better the performance, and shot placement is key no matter what caliber so in the best case scenarios the Skeeter load would not leave you undergunned in the deer woods, but as distance increases, velocity falls off, accuracy is degraded somewhat, and the effective killing power of the boolit is diminished.

    The question is not really whether the Skeeter load is viable for deer hunting, but at what range would the Skeeter load be maxed out? And of course what firearm it is fired in has a LOT to do with the answer.
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    "And of course what firearm it is fired in has a LOT to do with the answer."

    .......and of equal or greater importance is at what "maxed out" range will the shooter/hunter's ability to put said bullet into the vital area of the game animal for an effective kill.
    Larry Gibson

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  7. #7
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    "And of course what firearm it is fired in has a LOT to do with the answer."

    Adding to Doug's excellent statement; .......and of equal or greater importance is at what "maxed out" range will the shooter/hunter's ability to put said bullet into the vital area of the game animal for an effective kill.
    Last edited by Larry Gibson; 07-08-2020 at 09:18 AM.
    Larry Gibson

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  8. #8
    Boolit Master curioushooter's Avatar
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    soft boolits so expansion does happen they are both made even more deadly.
    In all the testing I've done I've never observed "expansion" of solid cast bullets of any construction or hardness under ~1300 FPS IMPACT velocity. Going as soft as 1:48 with 38 special. Certainly none at sub 1000 FPS. Sometimes they will smash up a little, but this is not the kind of mushrooming characteristic of a higher impact velocities or hollowpoints.

    50 caliber round balls cast of PURE LEAD do not expand even when impacting at >1500 FPS. Most of the time they pass through. One time I recovered one that looked barely disturbed under the hide on the far side. It was so nice looking one could have probably loaded it again without re-casting it.

    Indeed placement and range are greater considerations.

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    Good thread......
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  10. #10
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    Quote Originally Posted by curioushooter View Post
    In all the testing I've done I've never observed "expansion" of solid cast bullets of any construction or hardness under ~1300 FPS IMPACT velocity. Going as soft as 1:48 with 38 special. Certainly none at sub 1000 FPS. Sometimes they will smash up a little, but this is not the kind of mushrooming characteristic of a higher impact velocities or hollowpoints.

    50 caliber round balls cast of PURE LEAD do not expand even when impacting at >1500 FPS. Most of the time they pass through. One time I recovered one that looked barely disturbed under the hide on the far side. It was so nice looking one could have probably loaded it again without re-casting it.

    Indeed placement and range are greater considerations.
    What makes you think that? I've got a flattened chunk of lead from my 54 caliber that I shot a healthy doe with last December. It left the barrel around 1500-1600 fps. Hit the deer 40 yards later, about 1" behind the last rib angling forward, never hit anything but skin and organs. I never measured, but it went I'd estimate 22" before it barely got caught in the very front of the offside front shoulder, and stopped in the skin. That was a Hornady pure lead Swaged .520" ball. Impact speed is estimated 1170 fps, depending on what the exact muzzle velocity was. I don't remember what it was, Goex says 1570 fps with the 80gr charge of FFg I used.

  11. #11
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    I found that post to be quite contrary to my findings also. I had a .440 lead (cast it myself) RB shot at 1900+ fps (chronographed) stop just under the off side hide of a small spike elk. It was flattened to over .75". Had a 50 cal 370 MaxiBall cast of 16-1 shot at 1570 fps go through the shoulders of a cow elk and it was also considerably expanded. Have recovered numerous softer cast (40, 30, 20 and 16-1s) handgun SWCs bullets from deer/elk and have found expansion. Granted not as much as with the same alloys with HP bullets. That's why I favor hunting with GC'd soft cast (binary alloy) bullets in my handguns and rifles. I switch to a slightly HP'd 97/1.5/1.5 alloy in GC'd bullets if the muzzle velocity is 1800 fps or higher and restrict max range to impact velocity of 1400 fps. Performance [expansion with terminal effect] has always proven excellent.
    Larry Gibson

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    TC marketed and I have a tool to add 4 style HP's to a round ball as you seat it. I shot a whitetail doe with a hp but saw no need for any further expansion with a 50 cal RB. I successfully shot ww's in round balls but never at game though I have friends that do. At some point expansion slows down penetration that it becomes a detriment rather than an asset IMO.
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  13. #13
    Boolit Master curioushooter's Avatar
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    What makes you think that?
    What makes me think that is seeing the thing. Of course it's possible that some weird thing happened like I got very poor ignition and just happened to get massively lucky (very out of the ordinary) and hit the deer and the bullet was actually going much slower. I've seen soft lead round nosed projectiles expand impressively at not much greater velocities...~1600 FPS. 12 gauge lee slugs pancake out impressively at this velocity. It's sort of hard to measure these things in the field, which is one of the reasons I don't put a lot of stock in field reports from anybody, including myself, especially form a single data point.

    It has been a source of frustration to me trying to get good chrono reading from my Chrony as it often measures the patch or gives and error with all that soot (I don't have one that records). But when I get a reading it's ~1500 FPS with that load, so at the 60 yards or so that deer was from me (I could be wrong about this) I estimate it was going around 1500 or maybe more.

    If you don't have a consistent way to test things and good data it's hard to reach conclusions.

    It was a .490 RB from a Lyman Deerstalker impacting at maybe 1400-1500 FPS cast of nearly pure lead, as I add a pinch of tin. It is the same 80 grains of FFF load that seems that seems to be typical. It didn't hit anything harder than cartilage.

    At greater velocities I've observed expansion, at 1900 FPS there is no doubt you'll get expansion at any sane range (with basically anything), so that doesn't surprise me, or contradict my findings.

    The zone at which I've observed expansion with cast solids is from approximately 1300-1500 FPS IMPACT VELOCITY depending on shape, hardness, etc. This is true with shotgun slugs, handguns, muzzleoaders, and rifles.

    This also happens to be the range where cast hollowpoints generally begin to fragment, again depending on other particulars.

    Cast hollowpoints reliability expand from about 800-1200 FPS IMPACT VELOCITY without fragmentation, again depending on various particulars.

    Jacketed hollowpoints advantages are twofold. They can be made with soft cores that expand at low velocities but hard jackets that help keep the bullet together at greater velocities. The 357 180 grain XTP is a most impressive bullet. It expands to about a half inch as low as 1050 IMPACT VELOCITY but still holds together at 1700 FPS IMPACT VELOCITY with over 80% weight retention. This is why I load it in my 357 carbine. I can use the exact same charge to propel solid NOE 357-180 RNFPGC or a MP 357-170 Hammer GC bullet and it will expand very nicely about ~1600 FPS even with hard alloys, actually it expands and penetrates a little better than the XTP owing to nearly 100% weight retention. Trouble is they expand not at all at 1300 FPS or so IMPACT velocities, so a 100 yard shot will be not get any expansion.

    Last year I put all this stuff on here, with pictures, load data, etc. if you want to go read about it. Search Real Gel testing if you are interested.
    Last edited by curioushooter; 07-10-2020 at 01:41 PM.

  14. #14
    Boolit Master curioushooter's Avatar
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    At some point expansion slows down penetration that it becomes a detriment rather than an asset IMO.
    This is absolutely true, and of especial concern with a lightweight for caliber round ball.

    The way I think of it is a hollowpoint acts like a parachute. It slows down the bullet much faster so it loses momentum faster and momentum is what pushes through. So it is even more important that any HP have enough weight and hang onto that weight as it travels through. Penetration depth is where hollowpoints disappoint, but it is much more fun to shoot a bucket of water and show a pretty flower petal on the internet and feel good about yourself, so expansion is all anybody wants to talk about. Cooking up properly calibrated ballistic gel, calibrating it, and they carefully measuring depth is not as fun, is somewhat expensive, and there is no way to show off penetration depth on the internet with pretty pictures.

    In the end getting complete pass through is the most important thing with hunting something like a deer. Hollowpoints make a wider hole but it may not go all the way through. The best performance I've gotten is ~19" of penetration in 357 cast Hollowpoints. Adding more velocity just exploded them. Best penetration was observed from 1000-1200 FPS. This is THE reason why I decided to start working with large bore solids. Their performance is boringly predictable and is maintained over a wide range of velocities instead of a narrow range. This makes me more confident, and allows me to focus on more important things like accuracy!

    I have not tried super-heavyweight 357 hollowpoints like the 358627, but I hypothesize these would deliver the best performance. Problem is paying Eric Ohlen as much to convert it as it costs to buy a decent mold is something I am not willing to do. Maybe if I got my lathe running again...

    At sub 2000 FPS cast solids hold together remarkable well if made of a an alloy with sufficient hardness and malleability (lots of TIN). They are a monolithic construction like the new all copper bullets, just a much softer metal. The most appropriate platform for cast solids is big bore and slow. This where the advantages of cast are realized. Smallbore and fast is where jacketed is more appropriate. And everything else is something in between.
    Last edited by curioushooter; 07-10-2020 at 01:35 PM.

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    The more I learn, the more I'm realizing a pass through is the most over rated aspect of hunting rounds.

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    That Skeeter load of 7.5 Grains of Unique in a 44, will this work in the 44 magnum cases as well as the special cases cited above?

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    Having a pass thru capable load is insurance that if something goes sideways you have a good blood trail. Of 15 to 20 deer shot with 50cal round balls I have recovered 1 , it broke the round shoulder bone on the near side and smashed the ball end of the opposite shoulder, stopping there and looked like a half dollar. 85 gr fff with a swagger ball. No blood trail at all, deer was very fat. But he didn’t get far with only 1 front leg kinda functioning. I was amazed that he was able to even take a step, much less go 20 to 30 yards!
    Here are the hog bullets, almost pure lead on 7.5 of unique from a 5 inch GP100. The one on the left is the same bullet and load that hit a 2 inch grapevine when I was plinking, same load same gun. The vine swung back 4 to 5 feet and trapped the bullet, thought that was cool and kept it. The middle went thru the skull and neck into the lower chest, maybe 10 yards. The right broke both front legs at the knee, stopped in the mess of the far side, eh say 20 yards. The one thru the lungs is still in the woods somewhere.
    Click image for larger version. 

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  18. #18
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    8.5 gr Unique in magnum cases duplicates it.
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  19. #19
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    Quote Originally Posted by rking22 View Post
    Having a pass thru capable load is insurance that if something goes sideways you have a good blood trail. Of 15 to 20 deer shot with 50cal round balls I have recovered 1 , it broke the round shoulder bone on the near side and smashed the ball end of the opposite shoulder, stopping there and looked like a half dollar. 85 gr fff with a swagger ball. No blood trail at all, deer was very fat. But he didn’t get far with only 1 front leg kinda functioning. I was amazed that he was able to even take a step, much less go 20 to 30 yards!
    Here are the hog bullets, almost pure lead on 7.5 of unique from a 5 inch GP100. The one on the left is the same bullet and load that hit a 2 inch grapevine when I was plinking, same load same gun. The vine swung back 4 to 5 feet and trapped the bullet, thought that was cool and kept it. The middle went thru the skull and neck into the lower chest, maybe 10 yards. The right broke both front legs at the knee, stopped in the mess of the far side, eh say 20 yards. The one thru the lungs is still in the woods somewhere.
    Click image for larger version. 

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    Like most things, it is a matter of opinion, and sure to be debated to the end of time.

    The problem with blood trails is that they can't be depended on. Or better said, there are better ways to find deer. It is hard to find a more dramatic example than a shotgun slug, which as Curiousshooter pointed out, can blow over a 1" hole clean through an animal. Yet they too don't always provide a worth while blood trail.


    Here is the issue. One good shots, with a good round, deer don't go far if you hit them through both lungs and/or the heart. I know it is entirely possible for some individuals to make a mad dash for 100 or maybe more yards (usually in wide open spaces where tracking is a non-issue) with the few seconds they have left of blood and oxygen, but the great majority don't go but 40 yards. In that scenario, a blood trail is useless. I'd say 9/10 deer I find, all I do is go to the spot I shot them, look in the direction they went, and can see the deer. If I don't see the deer, I look for hair. If I'm confident in a good shot, find brown hair, I know the deer isn't far. I don't care about blood, I start following it based on tracks, disturbed leaves, broken branches, etc. And Usually I find the deer stuffed up in brush not far away.

    That's the thing about a good shot, they don't bleed much until you are within spitting distance of the deer. It is way easier to follow tracks, leaves, brush, etc. Than to follow a few drips of blood.

    Now on the other side of the coin, the very best blood trails I've followed have universally been very poor shots. Usually not lethal shots. I'd be lying if I said I've recovered every deer that was grazed. In this instance, sure a blood trail could be a benefit. The thing is, they bleed no matter what. It doesn't matter if you slice their back with an arrow, or a varmint bullet, grazing wounds bleed.

    Now the other unfortunate case is a gut shot, and I have recovered most gut shot deer we have had. I'm not going to pretend I know the difference between what a 44 caliber hard cast that exits, and 308 round that doesn't on a gut shot deer. My approach is the same. If I suspect a gut shot deer, and I don't see it, I walk away. A couple times I heard them in the distance, and managed to put a finishing shot. Most of the time I leave them overnight. It is an unfortunate truth, but the best way to go about a gut shot deer is to let them lie in their bed. The next morning often I go back, start tracking to in the direction they went, and find them curled up in brush. The downside to this is anything can happen overnight. Sometimes animals get them, sometimes it rains, removing any trace of a trail. Sometimes it snows.

    In all my time hunting, I can say that a blood trail has never been the difference between me finding an animal or not. For the most part, worrying about this or that bullet is just mental exercise, and real world differences are minimal.

  20. #20
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    Have to agree about worrying about this or that bullet or expansion testing for that matter. But the one deer I have lost was a lethal shot that would up in the jam and didn’t exit. Thought it was broadside, but was at more angle. Was certain of the shot, but the blackberries were so thick I only had a general idea which way, think anywhere in a 270 deg arc. No hair, no blood at impact. No tracks other than the launch, deep grass and a thicket around pines about 10 feet tall. The way the sun was I couldn’t even see the ground, but I think I would have been able to narrow the search with some blood on the briar leaves, who knows. The deer only went 50 yards, I found him next morning but the coyotes had found him first. Only other one that comes to mind was a deflected round ball that nicked the main artery or vein in the neck. No blood or hair for 40 yards, then it looked like paying sloshing. Till it quit, she went another 60 yards out into a bean field without a drop of blood! No blood in the deer when I dressed it either, completely bled out. Without the blood trail I might have found her that night, but would have been pure dumb luck.
    Make a good shot and it won’t matter, most of the time, like 98 of 100 or so. Just my experience over about 48 years of shooting them whit things I liked to hunt with. 222, 36,45, and 50 round balls 243, to 45-70, well nearly anything. They aren’t hard to kill, but takes them a while to realize they are dead! I hunt close and with cast, may as well use a heavy bullet, easier to get good accuracy frequently as well.
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Abbreviations used in Reloading

BP Bronze Point IMR Improved Military Rifle PTD Pointed
BR Bench Rest M Magnum RN Round Nose
BT Boat Tail PL Power-Lokt SP Soft Point
C Compressed Charge PR Primer SPCL Soft Point "Core-Lokt"
HP Hollow Point PSPCL Pointed Soft Point "Core Lokt" C.O.L. Cartridge Overall Length
PSP Pointed Soft Point Spz Spitzer Point SBT Spitzer Boat Tail
LRN Lead Round Nose LWC Lead Wad Cutter LSWC Lead Semi Wad Cutter
GC Gas Check