4th 223 data point for me, whitetail buck i shot last night with speer gold dots. Im 4 for 4 on kills, 2 for 4 on exit holes. Kind of a mystery what exactly happened but i got stupid lucky and found him.
First shot was at last light ~15 yards away. He was on a scrape and i had to shoot through some leaves and must have hit a limb and my bullet deflected way back just in front of the ham (luckily no meat damage). He was sligtly quartered away but this is a crazy poa vs poi shift. Gun is zeroed and the second shot went where it was suppose to. Who knows. Guts were exploded big time and super ripe after sitting all night but i just had to look in his chest to investigate the second hole. You people have turned me into a forensics freak.
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He ran about 40 yards and wheeled right. I managed to stop him with a wistle and had a narrow window to put another one in him (big woohoo for quick follow up shots!) steeply quartered away. I have no idea how, but it looks like the bullet entered the hide and zipped up towards the shoulder while fragmenting, then tucked behind shoulder and barely punched into the rib cage and had a few fragments get into the lungs. Bullet was recovered and is shown below. Wild. I cant understand how that big ole chunk of retained mass got caught but them little bitty fragments made it through.
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No blood last night, so i came back this morning. No idea total distance or time on his feet but he must have circled back during the night after I left. I guess the good Lord let him die about 10 yards behind my stand just so i could find him

Cant believe the coyotes or bears didnt get him.
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