It wasn't fun. But if you're gonna be dumb you gotta be tough. I was dumb. A latch on my harness failed. Fell 23 feet. I knew I shouldn't move but nobody knew where I was. I knew when the adrenaline wore off, things would be really bad. Plus I had some symptoms of internal bleeding so I was forced to make a decision. Ended up crawling on my elbows 50 yards back to my 4 wheeler. Calling my dad and telling him I had just broken my back and to meet me at the highway. Pulled myself onto the 4 wheeler, road 2 miles out of the swamp laying on my chest on the gas tank, and fell in the edge of the highway to wait for the ambulance. I couldn't feel or use my legs after I hit the ground. I was extremely lucky. Two vertebrae were destroyed. Two more were severely damaged. I landed on the roots coming out from the cypress tree yet right between two cypress knees. It sounded like a rifle shot when it broke. I have 11 fused vertebra, rods from tailbone to shoulder blades, wedges, pins, screws, titanium discs, and a titanium plate in my neck. There's a silver lining in every cloud. I got to stay home and raise my son. This is all way off topic but wear a harness or a lifeline and don't take your health and safety for granted. When something like this happens it turns your whole family's world upside down. But quitting isn't an option. I meet people all the time that have had treestand accidents now. Many ended up far worse than me. I actually worked with a quadriplegic today. He was able to push buttons and trap a sporting clays station for me. 25 years old. Broke his neck wrestling with a friend in his yard. Great kid. Amazing attitude. Uses an electric scooter to get around. I could easily have been in his shoes or worse. I'm thankful that I'm notThat sounds horrible. I've never had anything truly awful happen to me but have bore witness to a lot (my mother is amputee above the knee, has had about a dozen operations on that stupid leg - or used to be leg). Used to be a minister, did a lot of hospital visitation for those on their deathbeds. I have indeed seen that under certain circumstances death is gentle, merciful. It's also hard to watch suffering and not be able to take it away or do anything…a real challenge to my own faith, whatever that is (I admit I'm not nearly as certain about most things as I was a decade ago) … on the one hand, if there is a God and you see just how much misery goes on under the sun both in nature and humanity it's a real challenge to maintain belief in His goodness…on the other hand I have seen men and women who love Him and believe themselves to be loved overcome some the most horrific things imaginable, things I know nothing about (yet) solely by virtue of their faith in that same goodness and I've been very humbled in the presence of that.
But I realize this is officially a complete rabbit trail now, it happened again!. All the best in your continued recovery and rehabilitation, I've known people who have suffered broken backs and understand that's a lifelong journey. May God be with you. I'll leave it at that.
Anchoring game. Why high shoulder over neck shots?
- Thread starter 180ls1
- Start date
Help Support Long Range Hunting Forum
Calvin45
Well-Known Member
That's an inspiring and encouraging story friend, thanks for sharing.
But also….OUCH!!!!!! Roots are the WORST. Heck I thought my back hurt after sleeping in a tent that turned out to be set up on top of roots
…can't imagine falling from 23 feet onto them!My dad broke his foot on a big tree root when he was younger…running flat out and barefoot, hit his big toe into it so hard it blew the toenail right off with enough impact to spray blood up to his knee, turned his toe bones into gravel and broke three bones up into his foot as well. The ultimate stubbed toe.
He's been no stranger to pain, and according to him none of his ordeals were as miserable as
"My ******** foot!"
Needed numerous surgeries to fix it. Amazingly enough he said the surgeries caused more pain than the initial injury, I guess it just went into shock and suffered enough nerve damage it never fully felt all there was to feel.
You're so right In What you did ! And any real animal lover would know this !
I used to be a double lunger. Ive morphed into a mid to high shoulder shooter. Finding game doesnt go as far. Especially like the above heart center shoulder hit. That seems to drop animals the most often. Elk included. Wrecks lungs, saves heart, drops butt then shoulders, indicating it will be where it was at the shot pretty consistently.
The margin for error on deer-sized critters seems about the same between shoulder and meat-saver shots. So far, every shoulder shot has either gone above the heart and hit the nerve plexus, knocking the animal out where it was and it bleeds to death (still breathing, lung blood coming out nose) or has broken spine. No survivors of that yet. Been feeling out those limits. Forward hits neck base, rear still hits lungs and often aorta. I use soft bullets almost exclusively.
I prefer under 3k fps muzzle speeds because I find less meat loss to bloodshot. Count me as a 375 guy, as opposed to a 25-06 guy, mostly, but I have two 25-06 that I also hunt with. Soft bullets both ways, but much more selective with the faster bullet.
I prefer not to hit the heart because I like to eat it.
I treat shooting game as a study and try to be kind in killing meat. I certainly don't want suffering or lost animals. A little meat lost to bullet wounding/damage is preferable to me than a clean single hole and 100 yds of blood-drop trailing. Unless I can use a dog to track, but again would prefer drt.
I archery shot a big cow moose which left the scene (100yds or so) and died in a perfect spot about 10 feet from a road. Loaded her whole. That offsets some but not all of the dead-run heart-shot freaked-out whitetail I've followed over the years.
Faster bullet impact speed seems to impart more blunt force trauma and certainly blood-shots more meat. Heavier bullets seem to penetrate deeper, whether hard or soft. Not all HP designs explode. Not all tipped bullets are soft or expand well, nor do they all expand violently. Bondeds seem to stay together but my experience here is pretty limited. Short bullets seem to turn/tumble, sometimes backwards. Long bullets seem to go pretty straight inside animals.
Your mileage may vary! Go study, experience and learn. This site has more info, experience and knowledge than any ten men could ever possibly gain. Use it like the examples of a big brother, good and bad.
The margin for error on deer-sized critters seems about the same between shoulder and meat-saver shots. So far, every shoulder shot has either gone above the heart and hit the nerve plexus, knocking the animal out where it was and it bleeds to death (still breathing, lung blood coming out nose) or has broken spine. No survivors of that yet. Been feeling out those limits. Forward hits neck base, rear still hits lungs and often aorta. I use soft bullets almost exclusively.
I prefer under 3k fps muzzle speeds because I find less meat loss to bloodshot. Count me as a 375 guy, as opposed to a 25-06 guy, mostly, but I have two 25-06 that I also hunt with. Soft bullets both ways, but much more selective with the faster bullet.
I prefer not to hit the heart because I like to eat it.
I treat shooting game as a study and try to be kind in killing meat. I certainly don't want suffering or lost animals. A little meat lost to bullet wounding/damage is preferable to me than a clean single hole and 100 yds of blood-drop trailing. Unless I can use a dog to track, but again would prefer drt.
I archery shot a big cow moose which left the scene (100yds or so) and died in a perfect spot about 10 feet from a road. Loaded her whole. That offsets some but not all of the dead-run heart-shot freaked-out whitetail I've followed over the years.
Faster bullet impact speed seems to impart more blunt force trauma and certainly blood-shots more meat. Heavier bullets seem to penetrate deeper, whether hard or soft. Not all HP designs explode. Not all tipped bullets are soft or expand well, nor do they all expand violently. Bondeds seem to stay together but my experience here is pretty limited. Short bullets seem to turn/tumble, sometimes backwards. Long bullets seem to go pretty straight inside animals.
Your mileage may vary! Go study, experience and learn. This site has more info, experience and knowledge than any ten men could ever possibly gain. Use it like the examples of a big brother, good and bad.
A neighbor of ours wife shot a buck they had been after for two years. They had him on camera and we did too.
The buck went down like a sack of rocks. Lots of high fives etc. we're exchanged. They looked around and the buck was gone.
Two weeks later we killed him . He had been hit in the neck. Had an exit hole you could put a tennis ball in .
Reinforces my thinking about shooting them in the crease at the back of the shoulder.
Calvin45
Well-Known Member
Oh don't even get me started on that! Too late, I've started!
For the longest time the law here in Saskatchewan was nothing smaller than .23 caliber for big game hunting. There are no true .23 cal bullets I'm aware of, and there weren't a ton of 6mms out there, certainly not the plethora of small ones that we have now. The unspoken rule, mostly enforced by this minumum caliber law, was that real hunting cartridges begin with the .243 Winchester. I always thought that was a sensible, ethically minded law! And I know there are exceptions to every rule and every line you draw is arbitrary in terms of what's on either side close to said line. I can see why it would be silly to say "no hunting deer with a .220 swift, but the old .25-20 lever gun is perfectly fine". But the fact that there are some inconsistencies and exceptions to the rule doesn't invalidate the rule! And I think most people understood that, as a kind of common sense. Unfortunately in this day and age there's no place for common sense!!!! Everything has to be spelled out for us all. Now I acknowledge that bullet technology has come along ways, and that the .223 is VERY capable of killing all North American animals. That doesn't make it a sensible choice. If the .243 is too much for ya, I say stick to berry picking.
. This isn't the Great Depression where old Uncle Henry was dropping moose with a .22 to feed his starving kids with the only thing he had. If you can afford everything that comes with hunting nowadays you can afford an appropriate rifle for the job. That's just my opinion. It's a strong opinion haha. All this to say I think my province made a big mistake in the last few years changing that longstanding law to allow the sub 6mm centerfires for legal big game hunting. They've tried to address some of the old issues of arbitrarily allowing weak cartridges just because they're not small bore, banning many light varmint and handgun cartridges by name for hunting. But this just adds to the confusion even more:
The ultimate example of thsi is that I now live in a place where it is legal to hunt elk and moose with the .204 ruger (it's not on the naughty list yet
) but to hunt them with the .44-40, being an old black powder round, is now against the law. It's banned by name. If that isn't the height of governmental stupidity I don't know what is.
As an edit to my post above and as witness to my theory of mid-to-high shoulder shot placement:
I shot a buck pronghorn last night. 280 yds due east. Sun going down with wonderful light. Held at about 2" under spine, center of shoulder. Resting on a rock with a bipod. 6.5/284 with 147 eldM at 2902 avg. 0.6 Mils elevation. Hit exactly at that height but a bit right on a left-facing buck. Missed spine by a tad, but solid double lung hit and about 6" of aorta wiped out. He turned right and trotted 65 paces, shooting blood out the 2" exit hole as he went. The snow was an amazing blood trail. Of course there was no vegetation to lose him in. But they can cover some serious ground and the terrain can hide amazing things. Needless to say, i am comforted by a dropping shot, and almost as much by a short run and a visible drop. But I sure like that my 6" error was not a paunch hit and hours of suffering in the quarry's part while I attempt to find it.
If you are interested, the buck was alone and pretty lean. Cool 90 degree spread, small mass, high cutters and about 13" length. Small hooks, no ivory tips. A good experience, a good end to a 5 goat season (2 hunters) and good hamburger patties. I mix with 10% pork fat and 5# of bacon ends. Deelish!
I shot a buck pronghorn last night. 280 yds due east. Sun going down with wonderful light. Held at about 2" under spine, center of shoulder. Resting on a rock with a bipod. 6.5/284 with 147 eldM at 2902 avg. 0.6 Mils elevation. Hit exactly at that height but a bit right on a left-facing buck. Missed spine by a tad, but solid double lung hit and about 6" of aorta wiped out. He turned right and trotted 65 paces, shooting blood out the 2" exit hole as he went. The snow was an amazing blood trail. Of course there was no vegetation to lose him in. But they can cover some serious ground and the terrain can hide amazing things. Needless to say, i am comforted by a dropping shot, and almost as much by a short run and a visible drop. But I sure like that my 6" error was not a paunch hit and hours of suffering in the quarry's part while I attempt to find it.
If you are interested, the buck was alone and pretty lean. Cool 90 degree spread, small mass, high cutters and about 13" length. Small hooks, no ivory tips. A good experience, a good end to a 5 goat season (2 hunters) and good hamburger patties. I mix with 10% pork fat and 5# of bacon ends. Deelish!
If you don't think the government can mess up, just look at what they have done to the common gas can.Oh don't even get me started on that! Too late, I've started!
For the longest time the law here in Saskatchewan was nothing smaller than .23 caliber for big game hunting. There are no true .23 cal bullets I'm aware of, and there weren't a ton of 6mms out there, certainly not the plethora of small ones that we have now. The unspoken rule, mostly enforced by this minumum caliber law, was that real hunting cartridges begin with the .243 Winchester. I always thought that was a sensible, ethically minded law! And I know there are exceptions to every rule and every line you draw is arbitrary in terms of what's on either side close to said line. I can see why it would be silly to say "no hunting deer with a .220 swift, but the old .25-20 lever gun is perfectly fine". But the fact that there are some inconsistencies and exceptions to the rule doesn't invalidate the rule! And I think most people understood that, as a kind of common sense. Unfortunately in this day and age there's no place for common sense!!!! Everything has to be spelled out for us all. Now I acknowledge that bullet technology has come along ways, and that the .223 is VERY capable of killing all North American animals. That doesn't make it a sensible choice. If the .243 is too much for ya, I say stick to berry picking.
All this to say I think my province made a big mistake in the last few years changing that longstanding law to allow the sub 6mm centerfires for legal big game hunting. They've tried to address some of the old issues of arbitrarily allowing weak cartridges just because they're not small bore, banning many light varmint and handgun cartridges by name for hunting. But this just adds to the confusion even more:
The ultimate example of thsi is that I now live in a place where it is legal to hunt elk and moose with the .204 ruger (it's not on the naughty list yet
If that isn't the height of governmental stupidity I don't know what is.
Calvin45
Well-Known Member
I'd be more surprised if they didn't mess it up. And that's conservative, liberal…while I still vote conservative, that hardly means I feel great confidence in ANY bureaucracy…and it's not always a conspiracy or deliberate thing either, well-meaning incompetence is still incompetent! I saw a sign a while back that showed a bunch of hands together in a circle (like if you were cheering for the other team after a game) and it said
" "teamwork" - remember, none of us is as dumb as all of us."
That about sums up government and institutions in general, and I'm not an anarchist or anti-establishment kind of guy either, but just seeing it for what it is…as the old saying goes, too many cooks spoil the soup. This is why I like government to do its job AND NOT EVERYTHING ELSE as well haha…whether liberal, conservative, or some other option, big bloated governments with too many officials minding too much that isn't their business find a way to screw everything up and make the simple things painfully complicated. And yes, regardless being politically conservative, I'll GLADLY be the first to admit that this is a potential problem that can happen with just about ANY ideology of government.
I try not to talk politics as I tend to get irritated these days but suffice it to say while I may lean one way I have little confidence in either these days. I'm more in favor of a system that will leave me alone and let me make my own decisions as long as I don't bother anyone else. Our system is corrupt and polluted with excess baggage. Big corporations can be much the same way. Common sense and integrity are not a common trait these days.
On color blindness. I set sporting clays course and targets. I'm always amazed at the folks that cant see green or pink. I get an earful all the time about certain colors. Pink pops for me but I'll only throw green on certain backgrounds as it always tends to give trouble.
Bright green is actually more visible to me than red but that's on bow sight pins.
Sold a pair of Zeiss Victory RF Binos for Leicas because of the display color's visibility also.
Im not very good at repairing multi-wire harnesses as you can imagine
Sold a pair of Zeiss Victory RF Binos for Leicas because of the display color's visibility also.
Im not very good at repairing multi-wire harnesses as you can imagine
That is so true in so many ways.
Last edited:
I shoot sporting clays with a friend who is red /green color blind. I can't tell you how many times he never sees the clay with a dark background
