Elk and multiple shots

[ElDiablito]

ElDiablito and wind gypsy, you guys agree with him, maybe you can explain why a maxiball isn’t a good choice? Maxiballs or other conicals - just a big soft piece of lead - seem to work just fine in the field.
View attachment 852972

See post #6. As I wrote, BIG conicals work well. I would absolutely NOT use a light soft one like a Powerbelt on elk.

 

[Ucsdryder]

That right there is funny...........

What part is funny bud?

 

[ElDiablito]

ML suck at killing. They’re big and slow and don’t penetrate well.

I agree, but you have to qualify that with “the average muzzy shooting the average load.” Think “two pellets and a Powerbelt.”

Modern rifles, with modern powders, modern bullets and competent shooters are a slightly different story.

For example - my Knight Peregrine shooting 160 grV BH209 and a 225 gr Fury is pushing 3100 fps and over 4700 ftlbs of energy at the muzzle.

And we won’t even get into smokeless muzzies.

 

[ENCORE]

What part is funny bud?

ML suck at killing. They’re big and slow and don’t penetrate well.

If you're only talking flints or percussion side hammers, I would still disagree, range within reason. However, if you include a modern inline, well, its very easy to send a 350gr or 400gr bullet at 2500fps. There's nothing in North America you can't hunt with that. Including all the large bears.

Some states allow smokeless muzzleloaders, with more and more states allowing them. You can send the same 350gr or 400gr bullets at >3,000fps.
Many African animals, including the cape buffalo, have been harvested with 50cal rifles using T7 pellets and heavy bullets.

You can kill an animal with a marble if your shot placement is correct.
Practice, practice, practice and practice more............

 

[Ucsdryder]

If you're only talking flints or percussion side hammers, I would still disagree, range within reason. However, if you include a modern inline, well, its very easy to send a 350gr or 400gr bullet at 2500fps. There's nothing in North America you can't hunt with that. Including all the large bears.

Some states allow smokeless muzzleloaders, with more and more states allowing them. You can send the same 350gr or 400gr bullets at 3,000fps.
Many African animals, including the cape buffalo, have been harvested with 50cal rifles using T7 pellets and heavy bullets.

You can kill an animal with a marble if your shot placement is correct.
Practice, practice, practice and practice more............

I stand by my comment.

Yes with perfect shot placement a 22LR will kill. Unfortunately, not every shot is perfect. I have experience with 4 shot elk. 3 dead and one not dead. All the performance was crap, blood trails nonexistent.

Colorado requires a 50cal so you get slow, with little penetration and no expansion.

 

[ENCORE]

I stand by my comment.

Yes with perfect shot placement a 22LR will kill. Unfortunately, not every shot is perfect. I have experience with 4 shot elk. 3 dead and one not dead. All the performance was crap, blood trails nonexistent.

Colorado requires a 50cal so you get slow, with little penetration and no expansion.

The 50cal. Remington Ultimate (RUM) will send a 320gr Fury bullet at 2,300fps. You'll blow right through and it'll destroy the heart and/or lungs. You're talking 3,785 foot pounds of energy.

 

[MallardSX2]

I’ve only seen 1 elk get shot with a bullet. It was my kid and she shot her bull at point blank f.r….with a .50 caliber 350grain fpb hornady out of a cva wolf. . It died very fast. lol

 

[Jon Boy]

?
I’m not sure what you’re saying. What does archery have to do with muzzleloader bullet selection? I reread what you’ve written above and I’m still at a loss.

Man there are so many threads on this forum this that go over this and how bullets actually kill. Listen to the hunt back country podcast with form as I don’t have time to type it all out for you at the moment. In my experience muzzleloader don’t have the velocity to do much beside a maximum of a 3/4 in hole through the vitals. And that’s what it looks like. No fragmentation, no bruising, no permanent crush cavity, no blood trail etc. with a broad head you’ll get a 1.5 in hole. I’ll take a 223 with a 77 TMK over any muzzleloader and any projectile combination Any day of the week. I’ll take a broad head wound channel out to 75 yards over a muzzleloader. Beyond that a muzzleloader has a little better precision. This is the same bullet you posted, but didnt open. Second one did. Inconsistent.

 

[Jon Boy]

To be fair, I still hunt with a muzzleloader quite often. And apply for lots of tags. I have hunted wa, or, Id and mt with a muzzleloader. I don’t need to pretend they are a great killing mechanism and enjoy hunting with them. But I know there limitations and that I’m generally in for a long track with any thing less than a perfect shot. And approach it as such.

 

[elkivory]

I shot my 2023 Colorado elk twice. First shot 120 yards with a 340 bore driver eldx. Hit front shoulder and bullet blew up in that shoulder. Second shot 130 yards with 350 federal borlock. Double lung and bullet lodged against offside skin. Elk went about 50 yards. I recovered borlock and I would call it a text book mushroom.
2024 I was with my daughter when she shot a bull at 200 yards with a 300 win mag 180 grain Trophy bonded tip bullet. Probably double lung and bullet was lodged against offside skin. Recovered bullet and I would say it was pretty much text book mushroom. Since I have to use open sights in Colorado I don't plan on taking any shots beyond 150 yards. I feel confident in the 350 grain borlock for my muzzy hunting. I just struggle with consistent accuracy with open sights. I spend the summer in Colorado and plan to practice several times with my muzzy before elk season. Didn't gut either of these elk, so I don't know what internal damage either bullet did.

 

[TaperPin]

Man there are so many threads on this forum this that go over this and how bullets actually kill. Listen to the hunt back country podcast with form as I don’t have time to type it all out for you at the moment. In my experience muzzleloader don’t have the velocity to do much beside a maximum of a 3/4 in hole through the vitals. And that’s what it looks like. No fragmentation, no bruising, no permanent crush cavity, no blood trail etc. with a broad head you’ll get a 1.5 in hole. I’ll take a 223 with a 77 TMK over any muzzleloader and any projectile combination Any day of the week. I’ll take a broad head wound channel out to 75 yards over a muzzleloader. Beyond that a muzzleloader has a little better precision. This is the same bullet you posted, but didnt open. Second one did. Inconsistent.

Lol
So your argument is the title of this thread is wrong and you want to talk about something unrelated to the current topic.

 

[Ucsdryder]

The 50cal. Remington Ultimate (RUM) will send a 320gr Fury bullet at 2,300fps. You'll blow right through and it'll destroy the heart and/or lungs. You're talking 3,785 foot pounds of energy.

I called in a 5x5 raghorn for my dad a few years back. 10 yard broadside. Double lung and no exit. If I remember correctly it didn’t catch a rib either. Bullet didn’t exit. That was at 10 yards on a double lung. If a bullet doesn’t exit in that situation, then I’m not sure when it would.

I shot a spike this year. Quartering away. Penetration was barely adequate, got 1 lung. Zero blood.

I shot a bull quartering away, hit 5-6” back and caught hip. Bull limped off. 3 drops of blood 150 yards from the shot. Definitely didn’t “blow right through” anything. Confident that bullet didn’t make it out of the hind quarter. Left him for 8 hours. Looked for him over a couple of weeks and never found any sign of him, no smell, no birds, no nothing.

ML suck at killing. Yes, they’ll kill animals, but blood trails suck and the bullets do weird things.

 

[Jon Boy]

Lol
So your argument is the title of this thread is wrong and you want to talk about something unrelated to the current topic.

No you are ignorant as to how bullets kill and have no data to back up your claims. You don’t know how bullets kill and killing mechanisms as far as temporary crush cavities, permanent crush cavities, and penetration go. You have a limited experience with muzzleloader bullets entering flesh and how that affects them. Along with a number of people commenting on this thread.

 

[TaperPin]

No you are ignorant as to how bullets kill and have no data to back up your claims. You don’t know how bullets kill and killing mechanisms as far as temporary crush cavities, permanent crush cavities, and penetration go. You have a limited experience with muzzleloader bullets entering flesh and how that affects them. Along with a number of people commenting on this thread.

Lol
You think killing elk with muzzleloaders is something new that nobody knows anything about except for you? That’s funny.

 

[antaresproper]

Elk populations in the east were wiped out before the widespread adoption of metallic cartridges.

 

[cnelk]

Again.
Last fall - 60yd shot quartering to me. Bullet damn near went all the way through but stopped at the opposite hip.
Bull went 70yds

420gr bullet only lost 15grs

I’d say that was pretty good performance

 

[feanor]

I called in a 5x5 raghorn for my dad a few years back. 10 yard broadside. Double lung and no exit. If I remember correctly it didn’t catch a rib either. Bullet didn’t exit. That was at 10 yards on a double lung. If a bullet doesn’t exit in that situation, then I’m not sure when it would.

I shot a spike this year. Quartering away. Penetration was barely adequate, got 1 lung. Zero blood.

I shot a bull quartering away, hit 5-6” back and caught hip. Bull limped off. 3 drops of blood 150 yards from the shot. Definitely didn’t “blow right through” anything. Confident that bullet didn’t make it out of the hind quarter. Left him for 8 hours. Looked for him over a couple of weeks and never found any sign of him, no smell, no birds, no nothing.

ML suck at killing. Yes, they’ll kill animals, but blood trails suck and the bullets do weird things.

Did you say what bullet you were using? I may have missed it.

 

[ElDiablito]

I’ll take a 223 with a 77 TMK over any muzzleloader and any projectile combination Any day of the week. I’ll take a broad head wound channel out to 75 yards over a muzzleloader.

Wow. We need to educate you on muzzys……

 

[kylem]

I’ve killed 3 muzzleloader elk and 2 have been shot twice. First was a cow at 35 yards who only took a couple steps after my first shot so she got a second through the lungs about 30 seconds after the first. This year shot a 6 point bull 30 yards away hard quartering to and a little downhill at the base of the neck angling into the chest. He went down hard at the shot, but after a minute or so I wasn’t liking the way he was twitching (I’ve saw a lot of dead animals twitching, this just seemed different) so I shot him again just to be safe.

I don't think either of these needed a second shot but I’m in the camp that if I can get a second shot I will even if the first was good.

 

[Felix40]

The reason nobody can agree on this is because there are a lot of really bad ML bullets out there. Then add in the fact that a lot of states require full bore bullets and it can be hard to find an accurate well designed bullet. I had to do a crap ton of testing to get my renegade to shoot a bullet that I know will kill well.

I’ve only killed one elk with a ML. It was with a .490 round ball out of a flintlock. The ball was as caught under the offside hide. Zero blood but I only had to trail about 50 yards. It worked but like some had said, I’ve seen them die faster and be easier to find with a broadhead.