GRAPHIC Why you don't hunt whitetails with a .300RUM

[big honkin jeep]

I'll start by saying I didn't shoot this one and yes it's Ultra dead. I borrowed this photo from another forum. I used to be of the school of thought that there was no such thing as too dead or too much gun till I saw it for myself. Yes it's graphic but necessary to show the power of such cartridges. Deer was shot with a 180gr core loct from a .300RUM. I promise that the shock was so great that there is very little of this deer worth eating. I got the rear hams and a small portion of the backstraps from the one I shot with a 180 sirocco bonded at 250 yards several years ago. After having the same results several years ago I parked my 116 FLSS in .300 ultra dead. I know many people read numbers etc on the internet and think "the .308 is almost the same as the -06 there's only a couple of hundred FPS difference. Or the .300 Win mag is about the same as the .300RUM there is only a couple of hundred FPS difference. Truth when you double the velocity you multiply impact by a factor of 9. That's right 9. That couple of hundred FPS can literally make a cartridge hit with easily double or triple the energy of the next couple of calibers down. If you didn't know what these modern magnums do to game I hope you learned something. If you already did know it's just gore.

[Stockrex]

That is lot of meat wasted, what a shame, I reserve my 300 rum (don't have one) for squirrels.
A fast bullet will destroy meat due to the vibrational energy.

[stangfish]

That is lot of meat wasted, what a shame, I reserve my 300 rum (don't have one) for squirrels.
A fast bullet will destroy meat due to the vibrational energy.

...and hydraulics.

[missed]

I saw one like that down here this year with a 30-06 from 50 yards. Yep the deer is definitely dead.

[psharon97]

Doesn't seem ethical IMO. My favorite cartridge inside 100 yards: 30/30.

[yobuck]

Doesn't seem ethical IMO. My favorite cartridge inside 100 yards: 30/30.

i guess if we all hunted inside 100 yds there wouldnt be any need for anything more. my first rifle was a 94 win. 30/30.
at one time it was the most popular cartridge in america.
obviously some feel thats where we should all be and magnums should be outlawed.

[whiteknuckle]

Doesn't seem ethical IMO. My favorite cartridge inside 100 yards: 30/30.

I don't think he suffered much:)

[thermaler]

Got a friend who takes deer all the time with his 300 win mag and it doesn't blow them up--did you recover the bullet or did it explode in the innards? Just wondering.

[big honkin jeep]

Thermaler I didn't shoot this one. I shot a couple several years ago when the 30-06 I was hunting with had a long hand load that left a bullet stuck in the lands. I didn't have a cleaning rod to dislodge it only a bore snake and I was 300 miles from home. I had my .300RUM in camp and decided to hunt with it. I had never taken a game animal with it before and had gotten an unreal deal it from a friend who fired it 5 times and decided it was too much gun. ($250) 116 FLSSAK I was shooting Remington factory ammo loaded with a 180gr sirocco bonded bullet that I had sighted the rifle in with. I shot 2 deer the same evening, a buck and a doe at around 250-260 yards. At that range with the .300RUM you just put the crosshairs on em and squeeze the trigger. The doe was broadside and went down like a ton of bricks. When I flipped her over the results were exactly the same as seen in the photo. No bullet recovered. The buck was facing me and I shot him in the chest. It left about a 3/4" entrance wound exactly where I had aimed with no exit. after seeing what had happened to the doe I was a little more optimistic with the buck. When I hung him on the gambrels and made an incision to dress him a steady stream of purple goop pushed out and filled the gut bucket, basically leaving a nearly empty hide hanging there. I dressed him out and everything inside was destroyed and blood shocked to purple goo and bone fragments. The bullet passed through him lengthwise and stopped in the right ham between the meat and the skin nearly making an exit. I recovered a perfectly mushroomed bullet and was only able to get one ham from the left side as table fare. The does whole front end was destroyed and I got both hams and a small portion of backstraps from near her rear. after returning home I relegated it to range duty. several months later I went to the range and benched 2 boxes from it in an afternoon. The next day I woke up with bad chest pain. I went to the doctor who ran lots of expensive tests (heart attack type) as well as X rays. Not knowing about my range session with the beast he informed me that somehow I had separated my ribs from my sternum. I had no bruising or tenderness of my shoulder thanks to the limbsaver and the factory brake. After this I pulled the scope and put it on my 22-250 and parked the .300 ultra dead in the safe. Kinda a rare bird too as the 116 FLSAK would make a fine left handed .338 Edge repeater that would feed from the mag. Any way that's my story of learning that there is indeed such thing as too much gun and too dead.

[nso123]

It probably doesn't help that the little deer probably weighs around 70 pounds. Looks like some kind of ballistic tip too. I prefer bonded bullets for deer personally.

[big honkin jeep]

It probably doesn't help that the little deer probably weighs around 70 pounds. Looks like some kind of ballistic tip too. I prefer bonded bullets for deer personally.

180gr Remington Core Loct on this one. Not sure of the size of the one in the pic, but I would guess the doe I shot would have gone about 125# before her guts fell out, and a 180gr Remington factory loaded Sirocco bonded did the same thing at 250+ yards. When a bullet hits bone, even a little rib, going that fast it turns everything to shrapnel. The hydrastatic shock of a bullet traveling that fast turns the liquid inside into a shock wave that does absolutely incredible damage. There's a lot of internet talk but this is the no BS reality of the .300RUM I am certainly no advocate of outlawing anything. Just using the right cartridge for the right job. Remington has had so many complaints of this type of damage that the .300RUM ammo now comes in 3 different power levels, The whole point of the original postin of such graphic carnage was to separate the truth from internet BS and to help wake up those that don't know to what a couple of hundred more FPS can do. Lots of folks thinking is misconstrued taking those couple of hundred FPS for granted and not understanding the physics behind it.

[BoilerUP]

...wasn't very good shot placement with the Uber Mag...

[thermaler]

Definitely have to watch speed/load/range combo--I've heard from a hunter who was mystified when his perfectly-placed 243 vaporized on impact.

[nso123]

I know that hydrostatic shock can be a source of much discussion and debate, so I am not going that direction other than to say that my understanding was that velocity was one of the major factors in that idea. Now, looking at the Hodgdon manual and .300 RUM loads, it shows 180 grain bullets at a max of around 3200 fps, and .300 WM at 3050 fps. I have shot several deer with the Win mag, and never had this problem. I use a Nosler Partition and shoot them in the crease behind the shoulder. My exit wounds are generally around an inch in diameter. I have also shot dozens of deer with a .280 and 140 grain partitions, and doubt that I could have told the difference in the damage. This brings the question of kinetic energy to mind. Obviously, a .280 and a RUM have vast differences in energy. What confounds this for me is looking at a 45-70 shooting a 300 grain bullet at much lower velocity, but creating more kinetic energy than the RUM and again, nothing close to that damage. Now that I have made this as clear as mud, why does the RUM create this kind of damage? I still stand by my idea of poor bullet selection in many cases, but I also agree with BoilerUp on the idea that there was poor shot placement on this particular deer. This is definitely interesting if the damage is unique to this cartridge, but a look at the reloading data does not really suggest that to me since we are talking about an advertised velocity difference of 150 fps.

[bythebook]

About 25 years ago a friend who was hunting with us on our farm said he ran out or ammo and left his spares back at the house. We were both shooting 270 Win. so he ask me if I had a couple extra until we got close the house. I gave him some of my reloads, I think I was loading 130 Sie. then at about 3200 fps. Later he killed a nice 6 point Buck and we were all looking it over and the only hit on it was across the left front corner of the chest. The bullet had gone between the hide and the meat without even cutting the thin membrane on the meat but tearing a patch of hide off about 7 inches across. The deer had been quartering to him and he had only fired one shot and it dropped in it's tracks. The only thing I could figure a shock wave from bullet energy had stopped his heart. This was about a 150 to 160 lb Deer.

[mojoe1]

saw pretty much the same thing on a deer shot with 7mm mag at 50yrds with 165grn ballistic tip, deer was 165lb 5 point which no longer had an opposite shoulder or chest for that matter, under 200yrd where most people hunt whitetails standard cal will kill them dead all day long with out the mag recoil

[davemuzz]

BHJ makes a valid point with his OP. I know that (when I have help) I will butcher my own deer. As such the best part of the meat is found in the back from the base of the neck to the tail. The "tenderloins" are the two pieces of the backstraps that wrap under the rear of the spine (by the tail) and under the spine. Usually these are about 6" to 8" long and are the best pieces of meat. The hind quarters are next with definite sections of them being good quality meats, and others being tough and good for grinding up and making jerky. The neck's I usually de-bone and toss in an all day crock pot as the neck meat is tough…but with the right seasonings can be a wonderful italian "roast beef" type sandwich meal. (And I do mean wonderful!!) The front shoulders have some decent meat, but not the best cuts.

So, after all of that, the OP's photo shows us that about one-fourth of the quality meat on this doe was lost because of "overkill."

Now, I use my Marlin 45-70 a lot to shoot deer with. Mostly doe, but I've taken a few buck with it. I use an all lead flat nose 405 grain bullet loaded to an MV of about 1600fps. Hardly is that a screaming eagle speed…..and the bullet does virtually no expansion. But, I do my very best to get a broadside lung shot. The bullet will usually exit (I know it doesn't expand as the exit wound is the same size as the entrance wound…even if I take a rib out on the way in and on the way out) any size deer.

Of course, the big plus is….there is no, or very little blood trail. That's because even the big ones just drop right there. The double lung hit seems to cause such a pulmonary shock to 'em that they drop in there tracks. Of course, since I've just hit 'em in the ribs, there is no loss of meat. Unlike a cow, deer have almost no meat on their ribs. Some….a little, but for me, there's no amount of meat there worth the effort of scraping off.

So, there you have it. A big thumping 405 non-expanding bullet will kill 'em right now with no loss of quality meat…..vs a magnum that will expand and Atomic upon exit. Go the mid route with a MV bullet of 2500 to 2700 fps and a ballistic tip or a lead tip. Dead is dead…..but really dead isn't required.

Dave

[blackbart338-06]

I don't think this is the kind of photos we as hunters should post on an open forum! You do realize other people can download that photo and use it in any way they see fit!
Just my 2 cents
Kelly

[rattfink]

I don't think this is the kind of photos we as hunters should post on an open forum! You do realize other people can download that photo and use it in any way they see fit!
Just my 2 cents
Kelly

Maybe. But I disagree. I think its value to educate other hunters has more value to us than it does to the opponents of hunting.

Personally I will always choose to err on the side of the larger cartridge for game but there are obvious limits IMO.

[EFBell]

Looks like some deer I have seen shot with match bullets. Of course that argument will never end either.

[quarterbore]

Not to stir the pot but my stepfather shot 2 deer yesterday in the Michigan opener with his 300rum. The first was an averaged sized 3 point at roughly 100 yards. The second was an average sized doe at about 260 yards. The buck was a spine shot just behind the front shoulders, the doe was a double lung shot. Both had guts that were still intact, no jelly. Neither had an exit hole over 1". He was shooting the Remington ammo 180gr core-lokt power level 2.

[J.Baker]

Not to stir the pot but my stepfather shot 2 deer yesterday in the Michigan opener with his 300rum. The first was an averaged sized 3 point at roughly 100 yards. The second was an average sized doe at about 260 yards. The buck was a spine shot just behind the front shoulders, the doe was a double lung shot. Both had guts that were still intact, no jelly. Neither had an exit hole over 1". He was shooting the Remington ammo 180gr core-lokt power level 2.

What you fail to realize though is that our whitetail deer here in the midwest are 2-3 times the size of the whitetail deer in the southeast. Down south a 150-200 pound buck is a trophy whitetail, up here we'd accuse you of shooting the neighbors dog. I've shot doe here in Ohio that have weighted close to 200 pounds field dressed, and it's not uncommon to have bucks that are approaching 300 pounds on the hoof.

[thermaler]

What you fail to realize though is that our whitetail deer here in the midwest are 2-3 times the size of the whitetail deer in the southeast. Down south a 150-200 pound buck is a trophy whitetail, up here we'd accuse you of shooting the neighbors dog. I've shot doe here in Ohio that have weighted close to 200 pounds field dressed, and it's not uncommon to have bucks that are approaching 300 pounds on the hoof.

What difference does the size of the target make on this bullet's performance?

[davemuzz]

What difference does the size of the target make on this bullet's performance?

For your average 130-LB Pa. anterless (doe) whitetail a 129gr Hornady SST will do the job just fine. OTOH, I doubt if anyone would recommend this same bullet for a large African animal such as Kudu or Elephant, or Wildebeest. You may get the same "bullet performance", but it may not be enough bullet energy to accomplish a clean kill on your animal.

For the most part….the bigger they are, the harder they fall.

Dave

[thermaler]

For your average 130-LB Pa. anterless (doe) whitetail a 129gr Hornady SST will do the job just fine. OTOH, I doubt if anyone would recommend this same bullet for a large African animal such as Kudu or Elephant, or Wildebeest. You may get the same "bullet performance", but it may not be enough bullet energy to accomplish a clean kill on your animal.

For the most part….the bigger they are, the harder they fall.

Dave

Thanks Dave--I get that, I'm just wondering what difference the size of the deer makes on the ballistic impact performance of the 180 gr kore lokt 2 through the RUM as discussed. My understanding is either "it is going to turn to jelly mush" or not. I sincerely do not understand how the relative size of what it hits is going to determine whether or not the bullet becomes a "jellymusher."