Go read the book Alaska's Wolf Man about Frank Glaser. He really liked the 220 Swift and light bullets. It was WAY before 1984. The concept is not new and it does not require modern match bullets. Heavy for caliber, rapid expansion bullets work better because they have high sd's. You get massive damage and penetration. With light bullets, the sd is low and penetration is sometimes lacking.
I live in what was a shotgun only state. When I started hunting I was the only one that knew how to kill a deer without a deer drive in my group of 20+ people. Deer hit with 20 gauge and 12 gauge slugs also run like they are not hit only to tip over after a bit. It happened with expanding type modern slugs as well as the old foster style. The same thing OCCASIONALLY happens with a smokeless ML that shoots a 300 grain bullet that pretty much grenades at 2700 fps. Deer are just able to run with massive damage at times.
We had some issues with a 6.5 Weatherby Magnum on mule deer. Those bullets we're traveling so fast and would zip right through occasionally without causing a ton of damage. This resulted in a "Did you hit it" scenario more than once. One deer didn't seem to react at all. Just kept walking over the rise. Eventually we did find a dead on the other side.
What bullet was it? Generally speaking “bullets traveling so fast they zip right through” is what people would call fudd lore. Velocity initiates expansion/fragmentation. They might of over expanded back to caliber size or sheared petals leaving a very small shank to travel the rest of the way through the animal, but I highly doubt they didn’t expand at all if that is what your inferring.
Pete from pathfilmsnz?
Mean as! Loved it. One of the best youtube channels in it's day. Along with thlr.no.
But a hole say 0.061 inches larger (7mm) makes them bleed more? I never knew that. I just learned something new. Thanks.
haha! My buddies in NZ all say "mean as!" Thought it might had just been their circle of buddies, guess not!
I took what he was saying to be that a .223 that doesn’t exit makes for harder blood trailing than something that exits and leaves two holes. No caliber guarantees two holes but all things being equal a heavier, stouter bullet is going to exit more. I don’t think he’s wrong, especially since he’s talking about deer drives specifically. In my experience having an exit dramatically increases the blood trail
Ditto.
And going back further, in the early 1950's my father was a pilot flying out of Billings (Lynch's). One of his jobs was flying groceries and mail to snowed-in ranches (on skis). After the goods were delivered, as anyone that's been around ranching or farming knows, it's customary to sit in the kitchen and have a cup of coffee. Dad said there was almost always a good set of antlers or four tacked to the wall. He'd always ask what the big mulie was shot with, and invariably the answer was "220 Swift."Hurt feelings...I don't have feelings.
In 1984 you don't think there were people killing antelope, deer, and elk and all other western game with the same gun that was in the truck for coyotes? Back then there were 3 kinds of bullets. A FMJ was just for paper, a hollow point was for prairie dogs, and the soft point was for everything else. Every rancher I know kept a 22-250 in every farm truck until the madness of covid killed their ability to buy a box of shells when they went to town for fuel or feed. I knew several kids in high school who's only gun was a 22-250 and they killed everything with it. The 55 grain soft point 0.224 caliber bullet has been killing everything from Alaska to Florida since before 1950. I know this makes you irrational, but it is irregardlessly true. The 55g 0.224" soft point has killed more game than the TMK has since it was designed. Is the 55g sp a better bullet on game than the TMK? That is an entirely different discussion over the fact that the 55g sp has killed more game than the TMK.
Jay
