First Deer With Cast, . . .

[Jeff R]

Today was our Minnesota fire arms deer opener. Since 1980, I have used a 30.06 to hunt deer. It has never failed, but I wanted to take the plunge into hunting with cast. I chose the 325 gr. FPGC (BHN 14) over the Gould Boolit, even though there are many accounts of minimal meat damage using the Gould HP. Here is the Boolit.

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Here it is, next to the Gould Boolit

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Here is the Guide Gun in my blind,

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It rained hard last night, so the forest floor was really quiet. The leaves didn’t make much sound. About half the times, I hear the deer before I see it. At 7:30, this little buck came by. I never heard it walking, about 75 yards away.

Here’s the view from my blind,

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Here’s the deer and the view of my blind from the flop site.

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I’m going to have to practice more with this rifle. The deer was quartering away. It didn’t look like he was going to stop and give me the standing broadside shot, so I had to shoot. The shot was a couple inches high. The entry hole is on the bottom, and the exit is on the top.

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The deer dropped in his tracks, but lay there looking around. I waited for a minute for it to go down, but it wasn’t happening. It was lying, quartering toward me, and I didn’t want the dang thing to suffer more, so I tried a shot at the base of the neck. I didn’t want to hit any shoulder bones. That shot went a couple inches high also.

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The entry hole is on the top. The bullet went under the skin and exited in front of the left shoulder. It jumped up and started waking toward me. After about ten steps, it presented a nice broad side view, and the third shot was a bang flop. The entry hole is on the left.

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Here’s the exit,

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I feel pretty fortunate to have a deer with three 45-70 holes in it, with minimal meat damage. The first shot caught the top of the lungs. I think the deer would have bled out just fine after the first shot, but I wanted it to die quicker. The chest cavity had massive blood clots in it.

I'm going to have to practice a lot more with this rifle.
Jeff

[Piedmont]

How fast were you pushing that bullet?

[Three-Fifty-Seven]

Looks yummy!

[azrednek]

Although it wasn't mine. About 15-16 years ago. A hunter sharing our camp nailed an Elk with a custom Siamese Mauser in 45/70. I don't recall the weight of his store-bought cast bullet but was surprised by the minimal meat damage. The only thing I recall about his load was his use of 2400 powder. At the campfire bull session he claimed a jacketed factory soft nose 45/70 he used earlier in the year on a buck deer. Was as he described explosive, dropping the deer instantly but ruined plenty of meat.

[Jeff R]

How fast were you pushing that bullet?

My load was 48.0 gr. of Varget, which should have given a mv. in the 1400 to 1500 fps range, I think.
Jeff

[RickinTN]

If I'm looking at the pictures correctly you were shooting at a pretty steep downhill shot. In this situation always expect the bullet to impact high. Hold a little low next time.
Congrats on your buck!
Rick

[TXGunNut]

Good enough, you got the job done. Steep downhill angles are tricky; if you sight in a little high you will want to hold low.

[white eagle]

way to go

[roverboy]

Congratulations on the deer. And don't feel bad about having to shoot him more than once. I had to shoot one twice last gun season. I dropped him on the first shot but, had to hit him again.

[Djones]

You did the right thing putting him down quickly. Congrats on your cast boolit harvest!

[OnHoPr]

Nice backstraps there. Looks like a good setup for the guide gun and cast boolits. Shoot the guide gun more to get use to it after shooting the same different rifle for over 30 years. congrats