Kill Shot ~ The second shot

[Springer]

Lots of us have been faced with this after pulling the trigger and you were hoping for a one shot kill.
It does not always pan out that way. You Hit your animal and it goes down but does not die, May be even trying to get back up and you see it stressed and suffering in front of you.
If your a Meat hunter you want as little bloodshot meat as possible so you shoot it in the head or neck. Now if you have that Trophy of a lifetime you intend to mount you probably are not going for the neck shot.
I have watched the odd hunt show where they keep pounding lead until it goes down even if its a lethal shot but the animal is still standing.

How do you decide especially if its not holding still on the ground. Heart , lungs, just somewhere in the chest........

I was in on 2 Elk last year ,(plus my own) Both 1 shot into the neck. There sure was no wasted shoulder meat , It made me think ,you know on a closer ethical distance i just may start aiming there myself...

How about Y'all.

[elkhunter11]

I know of animals that were lost, because the hunter didn't keep shooting, because be didn't want to ruin any more meat. I have also cleaned moose in the water, instead of on dry land, because the hunter didn't keep shooting until it went down. And I have been on long tracking jobs when head/neck shots went bad, which they sometimes do.
My first priority is a quick clean kill, so I take the highest percentage shot for the vitals, and I shoot until the animal drops, or no follow up shot is possible. Anyone that respects the game that they hunt, should have the same priority, and should do what they can to make the kill as quick and clean as possible.

[Hoopi]

Hi: Although the bang/flop hit in the spine is nice to see (a relief really). I did this on a bull elk and he flopped over. I found the bullet lodged in the spine, deformed but not expanded. 30-06 165 grain Hornady boat tail.

I prefer to shoot just behind the shoulder into the lungs because it is a larger target area and margin of error. Yes, they run off and I need to do a little tracking. Yes they run into nasty cover and I have to drag them out of there. BUT, I feel more comfortable aiming for that off leg at various angles KNOWING it will be dead. The neck shot is a small target and elk are tough...if you slightly miss that spine/jugular they MAY get up and run off. The second shot is a very difficult running shot where you may not hit the vitals.

When my buddy and I went to Africa where we got to shoot a lot of really tough antelope in the shoulder, 300 WSM 180 grain branes triple shock. We initially had a bugger of time training ourselves to shoot there. They still RAN off. But a quick tracking job usually solved that issue...because they sprayed blood all over the place making it fairly easy to find. I did note we had a couple "bang flops" and the guide was on us to put in a follow-up shot...on the "run offs" he OFTEN said "hold your fire" he is dead! His experience meant something to us.

My two sense.

Hoopi

[58thecat]

one well placed shot initially, hit it, set up for quick follow up shot right away...no farting around hi fiving etc...be ready for second shot if needed you are ready and hit it again....walk up ready to finish the animal off...once its over unload and then get all hi fiveee! :sHa_shakeshout:

[calgarychef]

Just like archery. Double lung, for me and quartering away is nice too.

I’m a softy though. I hate having to do the coup du grasse, a bullet high in the neck or the back of the head to finish things off. I hate even having to think about it though.

[Lefty-Canuck]

Neck shots are great until they don’t work out.. I had a 160” class white tail get up after a neck shot... after I drug the “dead” deer 15 yards and left to go get my knife.

Never a neck shot on a mobile animal... maybe as a dispatch shot.

LC

[EZM]

I have to say, even at a 75 yard broadside target standing still, the double lung boiler room bullet is the way to go. You just never know when that "perfect target" decides to take a step forward or something.

I hunted with a "only neck shots" guy, and usually it was effective ......... until it wasn't ........then it was a circus. So NO neck shots for me unless it's a varmint.

[astepanuk]

On my caribou hunt this year my initial shot was a bit back, the bull was laying in the tall willows unable to see other than his rack. When we got within 50 yards of him, the bull stood back up I remember thinking I don't want to wreck the cape and purposely shot and dropped him behind the shoulders.

[vcmm]

Neck shots are great until they don’t work out.. I had a 160” class white tail get up after a neck shot... after I drug the “dead” deer 15 yards and left to go get my knife.

Never a neck shot on a mobile animal... maybe as a dispatch shot.

LC

Exactly! Aim for heart lung shots.

[freeride]

I always aim boiler room. As stated there are a lot of things that can go wrong on a neck shot, and a lot more movement from the animal that can happen while your pulling the trigger. Even if it takes a step your still hitting it where it counts, if it snaps its head up your shot can be way off on a neck shot.

I have had an animal fold then jump up and run after, I did track it down, but as the OP stated it was a sickening feeling. Now if it gives me a chance I will put a second one in, even in archery.

I havent noticed a huge amount of meat loss putting in a second one, I try to hit the same lung/heart shot and usually the bullets go pretty close to each other.

[jef612]

I shot a moose last year standing broadside at 70 yards. I pumped all 5 shots I had into his chest and he didn't budge from shot 1 to 5. No flinch, no reaction - nothing. He tipped over maybe 10-12 seconds later, but he was dead on his feet. One through the bottom of the heart, one through the top and three through the lungs. Sometimes they are dead and just don't know it.

I would keep shooting until you are positive that it is not getting back up. Losing an animal when you "could have" shot again would trouble me.

If the animal is down and struggling - its your responsibility to finish what you started as quickly and humanely as you can.

With some hunting experience you will see the difference between an animal struggling to regain its footing and escape - and the thrashing due to nervous shock / blood loss of something dying. 2 different things - yet many don't know the difference.

[sns2]

My motto is shoot at brown until it is really down.

[Salavee]

I have to say, even at a 75 yard broadside target standing still, the double lung boiler room bullet is the way to go. You just never know when that "perfect target" decides to take a step forward or something.

I hunted with a "only neck shots" guy, and usually it was effective ......... until it wasn't ........then it was a circus. So NO neck shots for me unless it's a varmint.

Many folks worry about saving meat and take some stupid shots for that purpose only. The neck shot is one.

There is nothing worse IMO that getting a package of meat back from the processor that is full of blood. To get good meat the animal should be bled out to the last drop possible. Head shots won't do that , nor will neck shots.
If you have to "break an animal down" do so, and follow up with a shot that will ensure most of the animals blood ends up on the ground, not in a package. That makes for good meat.

[Pathfinder76]

Watching meat run away is not saving any.

[Sooner]

Each situation varies. If I see that obvious view that their dead on their feet and going down play out in front of me, I will wait till they drop. Run up and put one at the base of the skull/neck to end any suffering.

Took a young bull moose in Nov once with my 8 yr old watching. Spine shot. He asked why we were running up, I said so it don't suffer any longer than it has to.

If my quarry is still standing and not doing the I'm going down dance, it will get another(and I have been know to do another after that too). At that point meat is secondary. Most times the shot area is still the lungs so another one placed there still misses most of the shoulder. If a shoulder shot means it don't run away to be lost, so be it. I'm not a fan of the neck shot.


Haven't had a trophy on the ground yet but I guess if a second shot is needed to end things, one to the heart/lungs would have to do.


Years ago my dad shot a mulie buck just before last light, I got to it first, dad was a minute back(old guy walking in snow vs me running). I couldn't finish it off, he had the tag, so I sat there listening to it struggle to breath for that minute till dad walked up and ended things. Not fun.

[fordtruckin]

It took 3 rounds to drop my elk this past fall. First shot would have killed the elk as it was a perfect vital shot. After loosing an elk a couple years back because I only shot once and waited for it to expire based on the volume of blood loss before the elk got enough energy to cross property lines and ran away, I kept shooting until it was on the ground. I did not notice any more meat loss due to the extra 2 rounds as they were all in the vitals.

[RayL42]

The last 3 deer I have shot I shot twice, all three times the first shot was a lethal shot. The amount of meat you loose with follow up shots is nothing compared to one lost animal.

[marky_mark]

Watching meat run away is not saving any.

This

[roper1]

Seems like first shot kills are self explanatory, whether the critter drops immediately or dies on it's feet. Been a long time since I took a marginal shot, but might on the next one.

Heart/lung just such a bigger, more stable target. Stay away from neck shots unless you're 5 feet away.

[thumper]

Guides sure get tired of clients that take the shot, and then dismount their rifle to watch what happens ! Beside every guided hunter, there's a guide urging them - "Hit him again ..... now Hit'em again" right up until it's "OK, he's down - put your safety on"

[EZM]

I shot a Moose broadside, first shot was right in the boiler room, he shook like a wet dog and just stood there. Put and other 2 in him as he seemed to slowly walk toward the willows like he was going for a stroll, Put the last one and hit him right in the shoulder and finally took a noser going straight down. All 180gr pills, 150 yards, from a 30-06 like nothing happened ...... it amazes me to see how tough some animals can be. All 4 shots would have/should have, by themselves, finished the game ...... but it makes you wonder if I just stood there and admired my work what a crap show it would have been if he just kept on trucking into the bush. I say keep shooting until he goes down.

But that new "perspective" came as a lesson to me ....

All of us have made "a near perfect hit" - admiring our shot, expecting him to go down in a few yards, then worked our butts off hours into the night packing out an animal that went straight into the bush for a nice long walk through the thickest, most tangled bush in the world.

YUP ... There is no better lesson than packing out quarters in the deep snow to the truck, till midnight, cold, hungry, tired and ****ed off to teach you to keep shooting.

[TomP]

I always find it powerful how our hunting instincts seem to kick in when it counts...only had one animal that didn’t go down with the first shot. It was a brisket shot on a black bear that was sitting looking at me up a steep hill at about 125 yards. As soon as o hit him I knew it wasn’t the best shot based on body language. Managed to hit him in the spine as he went to climb a tree. I guess I also neck shot a buck my brother had liver shot...neck shot for dispatch seemed to work well.

[huntinstuff]

I know of animals that were lost, because the hunter didn't keep shooting, because be didn't want to ruin any more meat. I have also cleaned moose in the water, instead of on dry land, because the hunter didn't keep shooting until it went down. And I have been on long tracking jobs when head/neck shots went bad, which they sometimes do.
My first priority is a quick clean kill, so I take the highest percentage shot for the vitals, and I shoot until the animal drops, or no follow up shot is possible. Anyone that respects the game that they hunt, should have the same priority, and should do what they can to make the kill as quick and clean as possible.

X2. I do the same.

[huntinstuff]

Guides sure get tired of clients that take the shot, and then dismount their rifle to watch what happens ! Beside every guided hunter, there's a guide urging them - "Hit him again ..... now Hit'em again" right up until it's "OK, he's down - put your safety on"

You nailed it. I tell everyone "if you want to watch, use binoculars. If you are the shooter, you dont get to see the animal go down because you are shooting"

[Phil McCracken]

I know of animals that were lost, because the hunter didn't keep shooting, because be didn't want to ruin any more meat. I have also cleaned moose in the water, instead of on dry land, because the hunter didn't keep shooting until it went down. And I have been on long tracking jobs when head/neck shots went bad, which they sometimes do.
My first priority is a quick clean kill, so I take the highest percentage shot for the vitals, and I shoot until the animal drops, or no follow up shot is possible. Anyone that respects the game that they hunt, should have the same priority, and should do what they can to make the kill as quick and clean as possible.

Yep...same here.

[Smoky buck]

We can all assume the first shot is good but until you make a recovery you are not 100%. For this reason if I believe I can make a follow up shot I will take it

I never want to be that hunter looking back going why didn’t I take that second shot when I could have

[wildwoods]

This

x3

[Big Grey Wolf]

Guys mentioned this before, I do not like the "poke the animal in ribs" to confirm he is dead. He is not dead until you touch his eye with your gun barrel. You shoot him behind the ear if the eye blinks.

[marky_mark]

Second shots if needed
Should go in the same place as the first
Right through the lungs

[roper1]

Second shots if needed
Should go in the same place as the first
Right through the lungs

Yessir!

[fordtruckin]

Guides sure get tired of clients that take the shot, and then dismount their rifle to watch what happens ! Beside every guided hunter, there's a guide urging them - "Hit him again ..... now Hit'em again" right up until it's "OK, he's down - put your safety on"

Couple years back I watched 3 legal bulls come out in a group of several hundred cows. One outfitter got 3 clients on those bulls before any of the do it yourself hunters could. I counted 26 rounds to drop those 3 bulls. I was set up to cut the herd off but they never made it to me so I just watched. One hunter would take a shot, run up 20', take another shot, run up another 20', take a shot etc... eventually the guide coming up behind him handing him more ammo. Pathetic! Sad thing is this is quite common place with this particular outfitter. Had them screw my FIL out of a bull this past season when they shot 4 minutes early... Never saw the hunters but that one shot caused the elk to jump one draw over instead of running up to where we were. Can't fix stupid!

[Springer]

Couple years back I watched 3 legal bulls come out in a group of several hundred cows. One outfitter got 3 clients on those bulls before any of the do it yourself hunters could. I counted 26 rounds to drop those 3 bulls. I was set up to cut the herd off but they never made it to me so I just watched. One hunter would take a shot, run up 20', take another shot, run up another 20', take a shot etc... eventually the guide coming up behind him handing him more ammo. Pathetic! Sad thing is this is quite common place with this particular outfitter. Had them screw my FIL out of a bull this past season when they shot 4 minutes early... Never saw the hunters but that one shot caused the elk to jump one draw over instead of running up to where we were. Can't fix stupid!

Those Crazy Hunts make for good stories in the end though. Ya i would be ****ed knowing they shot before legal light..

[BorealBucks]

Neck shots are great until they don’t work out.. I had a 160” class white tail get up after a neck shot... after I drug the “dead” deer 15 yards and left to go get my knife.

Never a neck shot on a mobile animal... maybe as a dispatch shot.

LC

do you poke animals in the eye after approaching them? A blink is an auto response and will happen if they are still alive.

[BorealBucks]

Guys mentioned this before, I do not like the "poke the animal in ribs" to confirm he is dead. He is not dead until you touch his eye with your gun barrel. You shoot him behind the ear if the eye blinks.

It's literally that simple. It blows my mind that hunters do not do this and just poke the animal instead. This should be taught in hunters ed.

[bdub]

Learned two lessons when I was a young man. A bull moose that could have got me in a patch of thick alder. Dropped him with what I thought was a shot between the eyes. It was a struggle to fight through the alders and when I got up to him I set the gun aside and started to get my stuff out of to deal with the moose. I heard him start to get up and had just enough time to get my rifle loaded and put it against his forehead as he got to his knees and deliver the coup de grace. Got lucky that day. The original shot hit him below the horn base and missed the brain. I should have waited for a better shot, should have given him another through the vitals when I could and approached with much more caution.

[trooper]

Many years ago, I saw a 10 pt buck appear at 311 meters from my position in a makeshift blind on a cutline. I had a pair of home made shooting sticks made from a set of ski poles. I had a custom made 280 rem bolt action based on a parker hale action.
I took aim and fired I pulled my shot to the left and hit the buck in the spine behind its front legs. That buck went down, but attempted to get up and run. I hurried down to that animal and dispatched it with another shot to the base of its neck. Not the good clean kill that I aspired for, but at least the animal didn't need to be tracked through the bush in the failing light.

[trooper]

Another horrible incident haunts me to this day. I was prone on a hill 200 meters from a tree line and watched this buck come out of those trees. I got over confident and took a headshot. My .308 was zeroed with sierra 150 spitzer boat tails for two hundred meters. That buck moved his head just as the trigger broke. I ended putting that bullet through the top of that bucks muzzle and I watched it take off into the bush. I tracked it for 100 meters and found him laying in a small clearing. I could hear his breathing, it sounded bubbly and labored. The animal saw or heard me and took off again before I could take another shot. I waited about 10 minutes before I could track him again. I found him at the base of a hill and was able to administer the coup de grace. Never again will I get cocky and attempt such a stupid trick again. As I stated, it haunts me to this day and it happened east of Hastings Lake in 2007. I've had many successful one shot kills before that and since. A lesson learned.

[JULIUS]

A very experienced elk hunter was with me on my first Elk in about 1985. His name was Gavin Craig. I still remember three things in particular he said to me while we were were walking and calling elk. First. Noting can go very far if it can not breath. two, shoot till it hits the ground and three, if your partner can not stand still for at least 2 minutes without moving find a new hunting partner. I fired into that thing and did not quit until it was on the ground and yes they were all into the lungs.
I still follow all three of his rules.

[thumper]

Our PH in Africa carried a little 'zip' gun. It looked like one of those spring-loaded bear-bangers - steel pencil style. It was loaded with a single .22 cartridge. If game was down but still breathing, he'd dart in from behind, grab the left horn with his left hand, push the animal's head forward and down and with his right hand, place his 'zip gun' against right where the vertebra meets the base of the skull, and release the spring trigger. POP It looked dangerous - but it was very effective!

[32-40win]

Shoot at enough critters , something will screw up somewhere and a shot will go screwy on you. Had a few bush shots that went screwy because of something I didn't see. One was a doe that I will still swear was a clear shot, aimed at heart, hit in the front of the hind quarter. Few where I'd made what I thought was a screwup, turned out to be a good shot. Few where I tried to thread the needle, nope, didn't happen, it never got there. Bow shots that I aimed away from a tree, still hit the damned tree. Couple of moose that were on the edge of really ugly spots, just shot til it went down, both went down within 10 yds. 95% of my second shots were on spine shots, just walked up and finished it.

[Bruce71]

Interestingly it seems that there is an assumption that the first shot was a well placed shot.

I always keep shooting until the critter is down or out of sight. Even if you are shooting premium ammo, one or two more shots is the cheapest part of the hunt and the best insurance you can get from having to haul an animal further than when you first shot at it.

I have only had one animal run closer to me once the shooting started. A young bull moose actually ran about 50 yards closer from the first shot. I seem to remember firing three shots at him.

If they are still breathing when I get up to them, one shot right behind the ear will end it every time.

[Roamer]

Bad shots happen, and it sucks. I had my first one two years ago. Shot at a whitetail doe 35 yards away, must have hit a twig or some brush, bullet hit a little lower than I wanted. I was aiming boiler room, the bullet did take out the bottom 1/4 of one lung, shrapnel went into the heart and both front legs got broken. She fell immediately, I thought “job well done”. Then I heard flopping, I though “she’s just working it out”. Then more flopping, then more, getting further and further away. “Dang it, it wasn’t a good enough hit”, I said to myself. I threw my rifle down out of my tree stand (10 foot drop, had a soft moss landing), then I jumped down, picked up my rifle and chased the deer down. Caught up with her 30 yards from where I first hit her, missed the shot because I was huffing and puffing. Now she’s going really hard. Finally caught up with her again, another 70 yards later (this is all in thick new growth pine) and was able to put one in her neck. It was the worst experience I’ve had, I felt so bad for her.

I took two things away from this:
1. One small twig can really ruin your day.
2. The survival instincts of animals is plain unreal. This dear was missing 25% of a lung, had shrapnel in her heart, had no front legs and still made it 100 yards. I was amazed.

The real kickers were:
She was going downhill the whole time, I had a bit of a drag ahead of me!
My tree stand was a self climber. I now had to jump to grab the bottom of it and pull myself up to get my stand and pack down out of the tree. Thank goodness I didn’t go any higher, haha.

I wish I could have kept shooting when she originally hit the ground, but she fell out of view behind some brush.

[KegRiver]

First, I don't aim for bone, not in the shoulder or the neck. On anything but beaver and grouse.

Second, I always prepare for a backup shot, until I can check for reflexes.

Since I only hunt for meat I haven't killed a whole lot of big game animals, probably no more then thirty over the years.

Of those only a few have required back up shots, and only two have gone more then a few yards.

When I was learning to hunt the first lesson was to give the animal time to die.
Pushing them after the initial shot only makes them run further before they go down.
The second was to never let my guard down until I had checked for and found no sign of life.
The third was to never approach from the front, always approach from behind and stab a hind leg to check for reflex with the gun in one hand and the knife in the other.

The last was to aim for the heart/lungs. Bleed them out and they won't go far, unless you push them. Try to break them down and they'll run far and fast if you don't hit them perfect.

Last summer I help my BIL butcher a 1500 pound steer. After five shots from a 264 to the side of the head from a few feet that animal still wouldn't go down.

We had to cut it's throat to finish the job. A dismal effort. Not enough gun and poor shot placement. A lung shot would have done a far better job.
It takes some serious FP energy to bust through two inches of bone.

That's the thing about head and neck shots, the target is much smaller then many realize and it's protected by a lot of bone or muscle.

It's like trying to shoot a Squirrel hidden by leaves and branches. You may think you know where it is, but do you really, and do you know what is blocking the shot? Not likely.

[cowmanbob]

So your saying a 264 win mag would not penetrate the skull from a few feet away? Am I reading this right?