Elk Question

[Roguemountainhunter]

I listen to the same Podcast often. I wondered the same question after he spoke about this.

Sometimes I think it's to promote monolithic bullets.

Vonbenidict has some interesting perspectives.

 

[Formidilosus]

Playing devils advocate here, maybe this is where they are thinking from?

Say you have a slab of meat 2" thick, if you come at from 45 degrees, your arrow has to go through 2.8" of meat to pass through.

2 inch thick, 60 degrees, 4 inches

4 inches thick, 60 degrees, 8 inches

Edit: ya know.. trigonometry

It’s not though. I’ve been measuring animal anatomy for a couple of decades and there is no elk alive where there is 8-12” of tissue on a quartering-to shot before being on the scapula or in the chest cavity. Even on a bull moose you don’t have that much. I carry a 4-5” blade knife as a usual thing, and there is no angle where the blade bottoms out without entering the chest cavity.

That podcast was full of so many factually incorrect and ridiculous things about tissue that nothing can be taken as being correct. There is not even remotely close to a foot of muscle over an elks shoulder, nor is the heart “tough and dense” as relates to bullets, nor is lung tissue a “frothy bubble”. Tissue is primarily made up of water- including the lungs, and bullets do not react substantially different in a heart than they do in the lungs at most impact velocities. For that matter they don’t react very different in “dense shoulders muscle” either. The scapula (shoulder) isn’t thick enough bone to cause issues; the blade itself -what people refer to as the shoulder- is actually thinner than a rib and causes no more problem to a bullet than a standard rib shot.
There’s no magic- cut a rib in half and measure its thickness, then slice the scapula and measure it. The only part of a “shoulder” that is thicker than standard cardboard is the scapula spine (the ridge) that runs vertically, and it on an elk or moose is only about 1-1.5” thick, and around 1/4” wide. It’s not a problem for a bullet.



As @Wrench stated- elk are a fantasy animal/life time goal for the vast majority of people, but are in actuality just a larger whitetail.
People desire heroes, villains, and mythical things. If people understood that animals are just tissue and aren’t magical, the novelty wouldn’t be there. Intuitively we know this because elk are stacked every year with pointed sticks- they can’t be that big of a deal if a sharpened stick kills them on demand.

The reality is that if a bullet will consistently penetrate 12” through a barrier (FBI tests) in 10% organic ballistic gel, there is no NA animal- elk/moose/brown bear that the bullet won’t get to both lungs if you put it in the front half.

 

[BRTreedogs]

JVB has the old school mindset, and is ether heavily sponsored or very loyal to friendships he has made as a gun writer.

He comments almost every episode how rugged Leupold scopes are.
But then also harps checking zero after any kind of ride.
I listen to episodes on adventures/hunts. But he is so biased i don't even listen to the cartridge/bullet episodes any more.

 

[Mountainrancher]

JVB has the old school mindset, and is ether heavily sponsored or very loyal to friendships he has made as a gun writer.

He comments almost every episode how rugged Leupold scopes are.
But then also harps checking zero after any kind of ride.
I listen to episodes on adventures/hunts. But he is so biased i don't even listen to the cartridge/bullet episodes any more.

He’s really gotten hard to listen to now that he has Barnes bullets and leupold as a sponsor so he sings their praises every chance he gets. He doesn’t hardly mention any other scope brands now just leupold vx5s as the do all end all scope

 

[Ucsdryder]

He’s really gotten hard to listen to now that he has Barnes bullets and leupold as a sponsor so he sings their praises every chance he gets. He doesn’t hardly mention any other scope brands now just leupold vx5s as the do all end all scope

Yeah I agree. I still listen to most of them but he pushes his sponsors HARD. It’s a turnoff.

 

[Mountainrancher]

Yeah I agree. I still listen to most of them but he pushes his sponsors HARD. It’s a turnoff.

I listen to most episodes as well I think he’s a great story teller and has an easy to listen to voice. Just whenever he starts talking about how you need a cartridge that has a lot of “wallop” to kill an invincible bull elk or that a 3-15 vx5 is the perfect most rugged long range scope I have to tune out or I start getting mad.

 

[trophyhill]

I think the podcaster has hunted in the Gila to see elk that size

 

[sickles107]

It’s not though. I’ve been measuring animal anatomy for a couple of decades and there is no elk alive where there is 8-12” of tissue on a quartering-to shot before being on the scapula or in the chest cavity. Even on a bull moose you don’t have that much. I carry a 4-5” blade knife as a usual thing, and there is no angle where the blade bottoms out without entering the chest cavity.

That podcast was full of so many factually incorrect and ridiculous things about tissue that nothing can be taken as being correct. There is not even remotely close to a foot of muscle over an elks shoulder, nor is the heart “tough and dense” as relates to bullets, nor is lung tissue a “frothy bubble”. Tissue is primarily made up of water- including the lungs, and bullets do not react substantially different in a heart than they do in the lungs at most impact velocities. For that matter they don’t react very different in “dense shoulders muscle” either. The scapula (shoulder) isn’t thick enough bone to cause issues; the blade itself -what people refer to as the shoulder- is actually thinner than a rib and causes no more problem to a bullet than a standard rib shot.
There’s no magic- cut a rib in half and measure its thickness, then slice the scapula and measure it. The only part of a “shoulder” that is thicker than standard cardboard is the scapula spine (the ridge) that runs vertically, and it on an elk or moose is only about 1-1.5” thick, and around 1/4” wide. It’s not a problem for a bullet.



As @Wrench stated- elk are a fantasy animal/life time goal for the vast majority of people, but are in actuality just a larger whitetail.
People desire heroes, villains, and mythical things. If people understood that animals are just tissue and aren’t magical, the novelty wouldn’t be there. Intuitively we know this because elk are stacked every year with pointed sticks- they can’t be that big of a deal if a sharpened stick kills them on demand.

The reality is that if a bullet will consistently penetrate 12” through a barrier (FBI tests) in 10% organic ballistic gel, there is no NA animal- elk/moose/brown bear that the bullet won’t get to both lungs if you put it in the front half.

I don't disagree with you, and dont agree with the original idea of armor plated elk.

Just thinking of a scenario where there could actually be 8" of material to go through if you stack the extremes for very hard quartering and absolute thickest part of a very large bull.

If that 8" number could come from a 60 degree shot on 4" thick material, is there any spot on the front half of an elk that could be 4"? (Combination of hide, meat, bone, whatever)

Thinking out load here, starting from the outside in on the shoulder of a big bull:
Hide/hair- 1/4" at best?
Thickest bottom part of the larger muscle on the front of the scap - 2" at best?
scap flat - thin
thin layer of muscle on the back of scap - 1/4"?
Connective tissue where the shoulder floats - thin
Rib/rib meat - 1.5?

Numbers are ballpark are probly rounded up to get to 4, as I guess I don't pay too much attention to actual dimensions when butchering. But 4" is not totally out of the question.

Cow elk are more like deer, though I have killed 3 mature bulls, and they are build a little beefier. Below is the only picture I could find of butching a big bull, rib cage after front quarter pulled

Edit: some typos and found a pic of the quarters, with an oddly placed 3/8 ratchet for size lol

 

[Formidilosus]

I don't disagree with you, and dont agree with the original idea of armor plated elk.

Just thinking of a scenario where there could actually be 8" of material to go through if you stack the extremes for very hard quartering and absolute thickest part of a very large bull.

If that 8" number could come from a 60 degree shot on 4" thick material, is there any spot on the front half of an elk that could be 4"? (Combination of hide, meat, bone, whatever)

No. There isn’t a place where you can take an 8” long rod and stick it quartering-to on an elk that will bisect the lungs and not hit the scapula or be in the chest cavity. Look at a picture, or go probe your dog- the thickest part of muscle on the front on an animal before bone is the back half of the scapula- not the front. A quartering-to shot that hits the point of the scapula is real close to the surface.

Cow elk are more like deer, though I have killed 3 mature bulls, and they are build a little beefier.

Bulls are “larger” than cows, but not that much deeper than cows. In general, bulls are only a couple of inches thicker, side to side, than adult cows from the same area/herd.

People need to get out of their heads “tough” and “big”. Mountain goats are “tough”, yet are very narrow and their bones are not any harder to penetrate than any other like size animal. A moose is big by any measure. However, it is still a slab sided animal, and is not that deep through the chest. Neither of those animals cause situations that a deep penetrating, narrow wound creating bullet will kill better than a sufficiently penetrating, but wide wound channel bullet will.

Edit: some typos and found a pic of the quarters, with an oddly placed 3/8 ratchet for size lol

View attachment 536930

View attachment 536909

Well, your pictures are great for different reasons. In the first, look how thin the front quarters are pertaining to the “8-12 inches of muscle”; and in the second- you’re holding a sharpened stick that killed the elk.

 

[sickles107]

I think we are on different thought trains here..

All I'm saying is I think it's plausible there could be 4 inches of material between hair and lungs on the thickest section of the front half of a big bull, regardless of what that material is (combination of scap and rib, and multiple muscles on each side of scap and rib)

And yes a very hard angled shot entering at that thickest part would likley not have the bullet path intersecting vitals.

 

[Formidilosus]

I think we are on different thought trains here..

All I'm saying is I think it's plausible there could be 4 inches of material between hair and lungs on the thickest section of the front half of a big bull, regardless of what that material is (combination of scap and rib, and multiple muscles on each side of scap and rib)

And yes a very hard angled shot entering at that thickest part would likley not have the bullet path intersecting vitals.

4 inches, yes. That’s actually about what a bullet goes through in the thickest portion before entering the lungs.

 

[5MilesBack]

4 inches, yes. That’s actually about what a bullet goes through in the thickest portion before entering the lungs.

Ya, but if a guy shot a more quartering shot that wasn't going into the vitals, they "might" be able to go through a few more inches of meat on the way to the guts.

 

[ElkNut1]

5miles, that's the point! You nailed it! I believe the podcast guy (didn't listen to it) was just saying that worst case scenario you could have to go through 8"- 12" of hide, meat to get to the vitals on specific quartering angles, I don't see that as an impossibility at all. Best to be prepared for any situation & not just the obvious!

ElkNut

 

[sickles107]

Not to scale, but gets the point across.

 

[MEdude]

Ya, but if a guy shot a more quartering shot that wasn't going into the vitals, they "might" be able to go through a few more inches of meat on the way to the guts.

I think this is the crux of the matter.
Is there a path that includes 8”-12” of muscle on a frontal shot on an elk?
Theoretically yes, but not with any possibility of a heart or double lung shot, and a real likelihood of no vitals being on the path.

 

[Formidilosus]

Ya, but if a guy shot a more quartering shot that wasn't going into the vitals, they "might" be able to go through a few more inches of meat on the way to the guts.

That’s not what he stated. He stated that there was 8-12” of muscle on a quartering-to shot on an elk before reaching the “shoulder”, and then into the lungs.

5miles, that's the point! You nailed it! I believe the podcast guy (didn't listen to it) was just saying that worst case scenario you could have to go through 8"- 12" of hide, meat to get to the vitals on specific quartering angles, I don't see that as an impossibility at all. Best to be prepared for any situation & not just the obvious!

ElkNut

If you didn’t listen to it, why are trying to justify what he said? He’s said it on multiple podcast going back at least two years.

 

[Lil-Rokslider]

This thread is proof that hunters can debate endlessly, about the tiniest semantics, regarding literally anything. We are officially in the deepest lulls of the off-season. Thank God for turkey season......... and then draw results. Go shoot your bows people.

 

[ElDiablito]

That’s not what he stated. He stated that there was 8-12” of muscle on a quartering-to shot on an elk before reaching the “shoulder”, and then into the lungs.

Actually…..what he said is, “Man, I have measured on elk, that I have shot just this way, between eight and 12 inches of muscle alone that you have to go through…” before hitting the ribs and on into the thoracic cavity.

Doesn't sound that far-fetched to me based on the mature bulls I’ve killed….

 

[35WhelenAI]

He’s really gotten hard to listen to now that he has Barnes bullets and leupold as a sponsor so he sings their praises every chance he gets. He doesn’t hardly mention any other scope brands now just leupold vx5s as the do all end all scope

If he was singing the praises of Berger hunting bullets and SWFA scopes, for instance, it wouldn't be hard to listen to?

 

[Valsport]

If he was singing the praises of Berger hunting bullets and SWFA scopes, for instance, it wouldn't be hard to listen to?

Agreed.