ENERGY FOR DEER ?

[bigngreen]

I've been very effective with a 22lr and 22 mag on whitetails, a bunch of them with a 223 and 22-250.

 

[vancewalker007]

The standard rule of thumb to kill an elk is 1500 lbs of energy because the average elk weighs about 1500 lbs right ?

So why then do most list the minimum energy to kill a deer at 1200 lbs ? Shouldn't the effective energy level to cleanly dispatch a deer be around 350 lbs being the largest deer falls into this weight ?

Thoughts...........

I used to worry about energy alone for a long time until I spoke with Aaron Davidson at a seminar a few years ago on bullet performance and how bullets kill. His team has tested just about every popular hunting and target bullet at many different long ranges into various media. His team has killed hundreds on head of game in North America and Africa at long range using lots of different bullets and cartridges.

Through all of this the most important factor they found in proper bullet function to kill was velocity. The bullet must mushroom symmetrically for it to travel straight through the vitals and provide enough damage to kill cleanly. This velocity for most standard bullets was around 1800 fps which is directly related to the physical properties of copper and lead.

The bullets built for long range like Berger VLDs, ELDs M and X, etc. have a lower effective velocity, around 1400-1300 fps. Now, its not to say that energy isn't a factor particularly in the case of large hard to kill animals like Cape Buffalo. But, deer are a lot softer than a CB so any typical center fire cartridge used to hunt big game within North America will be carrying more than enough energy at 1800 fps to kill any deer with a well placed shot. Now, if your trying to game this and use some very small caliber to take deer then you may get into a situation where the bullet doesn't perform well at 1800 fps. But, if you are using say a typical 308 Win you're going to get 1800 fps out to 400-600 yards depending on temp and alt. With a VLD you might press this out a little more.

My personal experience on the longest kill shot, lowest energy, I've seen on an elk (way tougher than a whitetail deer) stretched a 7mm 180gr Berger VLD Hunter to 1816ish fps and 1319ish fps. The elk tip over dead. I say ish because I cannot remember the temp, I know it was somewhere between 45 and 55 deg F.

 

[PredatorSlayer]

The standard rule of thumb to kill an elk is 1500 lbs of energy because the average elk weighs about 1500 lbs right ?

So why then do most list the minimum energy to kill a deer at 1200 lbs ? Shouldn't the effective energy level to cleanly dispatch a deer be around 350 lbs being the largest deer falls into this weight ?

Thoughts...........

Energy is way overstated. A 9mm at the muzzle has about 350ft lbs of energy. If you shoved a 9mm up against a big buck's vital area and pulled the trigger would it die? Yes.

As a general rule, we use 1000ft lbs for elk and 600ft lbs for deer. I like watching the velocity because I want the bullet to expand reliably. Having said that, even a bullet that doesnt expand will kill the animal if you put it in the vitals - just might not be as fast as we want.

 

[palerider3]

Energy is way overstated. A 9mm at the muzzle has about 350ft lbs of energy. If you shoved a 9mm up against a big buck's vital area and pulled the trigger would it die? Yes.


As a general rule, we use 1000ft lbs for elk and 600ft lbs for deer. I like watching the velocity because I want the bullet to expand reliably. Having said that, even a bullet that doesnt expand will kill the animal if you put it in the vitals - just might not be as fast as we want.

I'm not a fan of minimum ftlb numbers, but these seem a lot more reasonable than most that people through out. Also, well placed 9mm does fine. I killed a whitetail buck with a 135 Hornady out of an M&P Shield a couple years ago. Double lung at 20 yards. It ran 50' and fell over and left a blood trail a blind infant could follow.

 

[AZhunt1121]

Bullet mushrooming symmetrically is the design of the bullet not dependent solely on velocity. Of course there are minimum limits as far as weight and velocity that effect that,that is my entire point. Bullets have to have energy to penetrate and open correctly and velocity is only one factor in figuring kinetic energy. This latest hype of velocity is the only factor will lead to you all elk hunting with super fast light bullets that have no energy to effectively dispatch the animal. .220 Swift for elk now ?
Energy is mass, times speed squared and if you don't understand physics please refrain from joining in.

 

[palerider3]

Bullet mushrooming symmetrically is the design of the bullet not dependent solely on velocity. Of course there are minimum limits as far as weight and velocity that effect that,that is my entire point. Bullets have to have energy to penetrate and open correctly and velocity is only one factor in figuring kinetic energy. This latest hype of velocity is the only factor will lead to you all elk hunting with super fast light bullets that have no energy to effectively dispatch the animal. .220 Swift for elk now ?
Energy is mass, times speed squared and if you don't understand physics please refrain from joining in.

So let me get this straight. You started this thread asking a question that pretty much told us all you were either new to hunting, new to LR hunting, or most likely both. And now you want to preach "physics" and don't want anyone to chime in with real life experience? Sounds good, I'll unfollow this thread then. Keep killing critters with physics, I'll stick to bullets and arrows. You've sure made a great impression here...

 

[Thescandinavian]

hmmm that law seems a bit crazy to me. That would rule out the 243 and some of 270 ammo on deer here in the US because they typically come less than 140 grains.. Both these rifles have killed thousands of deer.

It rules out everything smaller than 6.5(264) actually.
So energy numbers quoted here seams not so high for me.

 

[AZhunt1121]

Experience from what ? You guys are just giving story after story and theory after theory that you regenerated from someone you heard. Show me the facts as far as kinetic energy that backs up your " I shot a deer with a .22 lr at 500 yards, died right on the spot"

 

[PredatorSlayer]

Bullet mushrooming symmetrically is the design of the bullet not dependent solely on velocity. Of course there are minimum limits as far as weight and velocity that effect that,that is my entire point. Bullets have to have energy to penetrate and open correctly and velocity is only one factor in figuring kinetic energy. This latest hype of velocity is the only factor will lead to you all elk hunting with super fast light bullets that have no energy to effectively dispatch the animal. .220 Swift for elk now ?
Energy is mass, times speed squared and if you don't understand physics please refrain from joining in.

Ah, you are one of those guys? Noted.

 

[del2les]

How o' how did our fore-fathers kill so many deer, bear and other game with flint locks that did not even have 1,000ft/lbs at the muzzle.....rhetorical

Energy is way overstated. A 9mm at the muzzle has about 350ft lbs of energy. If you shoved a 9mm up against a big buck's vital area and pulled the trigger would it die? Yes.

As a general rule, we use 1000ft lbs for elk and 600ft lbs for deer. I like watching the velocity because I want the bullet to expand reliably. Having said that, even a bullet that doesnt expand will kill the animal if you put it in the vitals - just might not be as fast as we want.

I've killed a few whitetails with 6 and 8" revolvers in 357mag loaded with hard cast 158LSWC, and the impacting energies at range were at or below 500ft/lbs. One was killed using a 38Spec+P load which may have impacted with 250-300ft/lbs. All died within 75 yards or much less. I have a 300grLFN load in 44mag that when fired from my 7 1/2 inch Redhawk will double lung and exit on cow elk all day.

 

[del2les]

Experience from what ? You guys are just giving story after story and theory after theory that you regenerated from someone you heard. Show me the facts as far as kinetic energy that backs up your " I shot a deer with a .22 lr at 500 yards, died right on the spot"

??? Maybe I missed it, but who/where did anyone state this? I think most here are speaking from experience in the field, and many of us, from many decades of actual kills.

 

[bigngreen]

The way a bullet kills just can not be expressed with math, there is no measurable way to measure the resistance of an animal and the bullets reaction to that at a given velocity and how that effects the wound channel and blood loss, that has been a lot of speculation and trying to boil it down to something quantifiable but it's just not going to happen.
The best way to know where you want to be is know your bullets function vs impact velocity and how that interacts with the animal your putting it on.

 

[martinakl]

The standard rule of thumb to kill an elk is 1500 lbs of energy because the average elk weighs about 1500 lbs right ?

So why then do most list the minimum energy to kill a deer at 1200 lbs ? Shouldn't the effective energy level to cleanly dispatch a deer be around 350 lbs being the largest deer falls into this weight ?

Thoughts...........

I think you might enjoy these two articles.

Deer:
https://www.chuckhawks.com/deer_cartridges.htm

Elk:
https://www.chuckhawks.com/elk_cartridges.htm

 

[del2les]

Just for variety in the well below 1,000ft/lb dept.



Kill on nice whitetail with a Glock. DRT at 2:50 mark 6:23 runtime.