Bear shot placement- vitals vs anchor

[Hardly_Hangin]

I recently shot my first black bear high shoulder with 165gr barns tsx federal premium ammo out of a 30-06 from 60 yards. Research would indicate that bears die quickly with well placed vital area shots, but are notoriously difficult to blood trail due to fat and hair. They can also curl up into hard to find balls of fur and tuck into inconspicuous holes, making it even harder to recover a dead animal. This shot effectively immobilized the 250lb sow by shattering both shoulders, and the bullets performed well by my estimation. However it did not flip the "off switch" and i had to humblingly dispatch, unpleasantly hearing the death moan from about 5ft.

Do bears have the same off switch? Is there a better shot placement location to "anchor" and mitigate risk of non-recovery? Did my bullet not perform? Did i miss the switch? Or- despite added blood trail difficulty associated with bears- are you aiming for vitals?

 

[TracksWapiti]

I carry a 375 Ruger with 270 Barnes TSX. Planning to take an anchoring shoulder shot when I get one and will let you know how it goes

Government websites, author/hunter Douglas Boze, and conventional wisdom says to wait for the bear to take a step forward with the near shoulder and take a vitals shot to prevent bullet failure in the near shoulder

Copper bullet technology plus extra horsepower should open up more options than this since I want to be able to take the best shot the bear gives me even if it's quartering, broadside rear leg back, etc

 

[Taudisio]

Anything into the CNS should do the trick. My sample of 3 bears I’ve shot, first was 200 yards and shot was from the top of the mountain. Hit the top of the shoulder blade on the right, exited her throat. Spine was destroyed. Second was 220 quartering away, shot through the ribs, exited mid shoulder. Double lung. Watched him run 20 yards and fall over. Third I shot on the run. Hit her twice in the gut, 3rd into the spine and rolled her, 4th into her chest laying down, 5th in the head to stop her moving. All shots were under 40 yards in the open and I had a 6 rounds in a semiauto. Seen others shot, never seen one anchored without a CNS hit.

 

[Drenalin]

I've only shot one bear, also a 250-lb sow, from under 50 yards with a 73 ELD-M. I went with vitals. She died inside 30 yards, but if she'd gone more than 50 or so, tracking would have been a challenge in the thick cover. I didn't get to hear a death moan, sadly.

 

[amassi]

Shoot them in the vitals: little forward of middle of middle they’ll die quicker use a bullet that will do as much damage to those vitals as possible.
Shoulder shots are why people incorrectly think bears are hard to kill. Bears can go a long ways with 3 legs and won’t be recovered because they die well after your search has ended.


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[mxgsfmdpx]

Every animal is different. I've had bears with minimal heart and minimal lung left run 200+ yards before dying. I've had bears hit in less than optimum "spots" and had them go nowhere.

 

[fatlander]

The bear I shot last year was a heart shot. 25 yards, she didn’t know where the shot came from and died under my tree. Red carpet blood trail to my arrow. Pretty wild to see the death moan from just a few feet away.


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[TracksWapiti]

I recently shot my first black bear high shoulder with 165gr barns tsx federal premium ammo out of a 30-06 from 60 yards. Research would indicate that bears die quickly with well placed vital area shots, but are notoriously difficult to blood trail due to fat and hair. They can also curl up into hard to find balls of fur and tuck into inconspicuous holes, making it even harder to recover a dead animal. This shot effectively immobilized the 250lb sow by shattering both shoulders, and the bullets performed well by my estimation. However it did not flip the "off switch" and i had to humblingly dispatch, unpleasantly hearing the death moan from about 5ft.

Do bears have the same off switch? Is there a better shot placement location to "anchor" and mitigate risk of non-recovery? Did my bullet not perform? Did i miss the switch? Or- despite added blood trail difficulty associated with bears- are you aiming for vitals?

FWIW, I think your cartridge, bullet selection, and shot placement were excellent. Finishing off big game at close range isn't fun but it's part of a successful hunt sometimes. Still a much more merciful ending than they get in the wild

Well done!

 

[Ramem7mm]

I shot a bear at about 50 yards broadside and impact was front shoulder hitting the shoulder socket and straight through off shoulder(shock of the bullet did damage lungs severely). Shooting 132 Gr Hammers at about 3500 FPS. The bear instantly took off running and I immediately chambered another round and shot again where I hit it again in the lower back breaking the spine. Between first shot and second the bear covered an easy 30 yards. After second shot the bear was wadded up in a ball and rolled around for a second and died. I was surprised that first shot did not anchor it being that impact was so close to the spine. I think if it would have been further away i would have played it safer and went middle of middle to make sure I got vitals.

 

[Theringworm]

I have shared this before….. Here
is the carcass of my 2021 fall black bear, just shy of 8’ squared. If you take the two red dots as being just inside the legs then the red hashed line transecting the body is the “MIDDLE” of the bears body. Now take the middle of the bears body from left to right (the red dashed line) and the middle of the body from top to bottom. Where they both transect is the far left blue X. Now take that left blue X and put a blue X to the right behind the bears front shoulder and now split the difference, the YELLOW CIRCLE (aka my bullet entrance). That is MY interpretation of the “Middle of the Middle” (middle of the body further divided by the half way point from the middle of the body to the shoulder crease). This placement put my bullet straight through both longs and dead center on the heart. I waited as was described above until his near leg to me, was a step forward of his body. I was shooting a 375 H&H w/ Buffalo Bore custom loaded Barnes 300g TSX bullets. I shot my bear at around 75 yds in the middle of a narrow shallow stream that was maybe 20 ft in diameter from dense tree line to tree line. When I hit him it was like I had exploded a can of Red Fanta. Despite that, he still ran about 30 yds before we heard a death moan. Took us about 30 mins to find him. No blood trail but his heart was more or less evaporated with the bullet placement. They are tough critters. Would have an anchoring shot done the job and had him DRT, maybe. Not sure if there is really a right or wrong answer. If you go for the vitals and are good/great at tracking (blood, prints, broken foliage), at least you know they are more than likely dead just got to find them. An anchoring shot means they may not be super mobile but maybe not dead either. With the environment you are hunting in, one option may be better than the other. My guide in SEAK where it’s dense as all get out, only recommends vital shots.

 

[Poser]

Not a fan of shoulder shots on bears. If I can determine where the shoulder seam is, slightly forward of middle, but when you get into longer shots, you often won't be able to determine such detail on a bear unless you overzoom on your optic. Their longer hair can make determining such a precise shot placement difficult and you're usually find yourself aiming at a "black blob" more than anything else. In that case, I just aim center mass.

 

[Jtb.kfd]

I live in WA and we can shoot multiple bears a year. My family really focuses on them as we use the fat for grinding into our deer and elk burger. We usually get a few bears each year and switched shot placement to center on center a few years ago. It was hard for me to wrap my head around but we haven’t lost a bear since. To be fair, we have only lost a handful over a 30 year span, but most of them we did lose I was shocked. One took a shoulder hit with a 220gr Barnes @ 220yds out of a 300 WSM. Dropped him hard but he got up and ran. Followed blood for two days for close to 1/2 mile. One other was a 70yd shot right behind the shoulder with a 300 RUM (don’t remember the bullet), it took off and never stopped. Our go to bear guns now are 6mm Creedmors with 103gr ELDX. All bears shot with this setup ranged from 30-440yds and have tanked hard. Paying attention now when breaking them down has shown me their vitals are indeed a bit farther back than other big game.

 

[Jtb.kfd]

Not a fan of shoulder shots on bears. If I can determine where the shoulder seam is, slightly forward of middle, but when you get into longer shots, you often won't be able to determine such detail on a bear unless you overzoom on your optic. Their longer hair can make determining such a precise shot placement difficult and you're usually find yourself aiming at a "black blob" more than anything else. In that case, I just aim center mass.

Great point, I couldn’t agree more.

 

[Blind Squirrel]

I have shared this before….. Here
is the carcass of my 2021 fall black bear, just shy of 8’ squared. If you take the two red dots as being just inside the legs then the red hashed line transecting the body is the “MIDDLE” of the bears body. Now take the middle of the bears body from left to right (the red dashed line) and the middle of the body from top to bottom. Where they both transect is the far left blue X. Now take that left blue X and put a blue X to the right behind the bears front shoulder and now split the difference, the YELLOW CIRCLE (aka my bullet entrance). That is MY interpretation of the “Middle of the Middle” (middle of the body further divided by the half way point from the middle of the body to the shoulder crease). This placement put my bullet straight through both longs and dead center on the heart. I waited as was described above until his near leg to me, was a step forward of his body. I was shooting a 375 H&H w/ Buffalo Bore custom loaded Barnes 300g TSX bullets. I shot my bear at around 75 yds in the middle of a narrow shallow stream that was maybe 20 ft in diameter from dense tree line to tree line. When I hit him it was like I had exploded a can of Red Fanta. Despite that, he still ran about 30 yds before we heard a death moan. Took us about 30 mins to find him. No blood trail but his heart was more or less evaporated with the bullet placement. They are tough critters. Would have an anchoring shot done the job and had him DRT, maybe. Not sure if there is really a right or wrong answer. If you go for the vitals and are good/great at tracking (blood, prints, broken foliage), at least you know they are more than likely dead just got to find them. An anchoring shot means they may not be super mobile but maybe not dead either. With the environment you are hunting in, one option may be better than the other. My guide in SEAK where it’s dense as all get out, only recommends vital shots.

I feel like you explained the theory of relativity in there somewhere, but I’ll have to take your word for it. Great shot though.

 

[Luke S]

I've been in on something like 18 bear kills. I prefer the vitals a bit behind the shoulder. Bears can run fast and far on 3 legs the ones that we killed that way weren't anchored any faster than bears with a good lung hit.
I'd use a softer bullet than a Barnes though. They do seem to drop faster and leave more blood if you hit them with an ELDM type bullet that makes a wide hole.