Stxranchman gave you solid advice on shot placement to anchor any south texas buck you encounter with your 308. All you need is a good cup and core hunting bullet. Go practice with the same setup you will be shooting the buck from. Cap your yardage at whatever range you can put it where you want it every time. Wait for the right shot and lay it down. If you don’t have the right shot let it walk if your not willing to track it into the brush. If you can reliably execute the head shot to the brain, I expect you already have some shooting skills.

.308 Factory Sierra Game King loads in 168 gr. Just as accurate as the Sierra Match King factory loads.

High shoulder shot placement with your 308 and SSTs and you won't get all scratched up chasin him down!

Although I have not shot as many deer as a lot of people on here that do the High Shoulder shots. I shoot a 270 with a 130 grain Remington Core-Lokt.
I always go for the heart and every deer I have shot has either folded right there or maybe struggled for 10 yards before collapsing. Below is where I like my shot placement.

For deer I (and my kids) still mainly use a 243, 22-250, or 25-06 depending. Center of neck, base of neck, or high shoulder always works.

Good pics!!!

The only one I'd change is the last one and I'd simply move forward on his shoulder about 3" and send it through both of them.

The first pic will break em down every time in their tracks, even with my 243 with 100gr hand loads

Hunting with Donger, we have learned to always carry gloves, orange tape and have fresh batteries in the flashlight. The gloves really help.

No NA native herbivores require something like a .338 Lapua, so I wouldn't worry about it. Good shot placement is key with any round but your .308 should be plenty to quickly and cleanly take out any deer or large hog you may encounter in South Texas, and will limit the damage to the meat that you could experience with a larger animal.

I'm not an advocate of head shots on any deer, too much room for error especially at longer distances and then you have a badly wounded animal to track in very unforgiving territory. Just my humble $0.02, I'm sure there are many snipers here that will disagree but I've seen too many mistakes over 30 years of hunting to change my mind now.

Good luck on your hunt, I love hunting those senderos, it's great to see them coming out of terrain that I'm sure I can't squeeze myself through!

Funny i was going to recomend gloves lol. When your crawling on your hands and knees it sure is nice.

Also even if its 80 degrees out... which is not uncommon in south texas hunting a nice heavy carhart jacket with hood will keep a lot of thorns off of you. Cat claw is the devil, the harder you pull the more it digs in.

...and the telephone number of a good handler with deer dog(s).

30 yards was an exaggeration but I would certainly like to do everything I possibly can keep the deer out of the bush.


The dialogue has been great and really changed my outlook on shot placement.

I admit I am not a gun or ammo or ballistics expert.

What I think I do have going for me is 60 plus years of shooting animals in many different areas and situations and countries.

We are on a LF, highly managed ranch. I admit I am old school. When hunting a trophy buck that can book I am all about killing the animal no matter what.

So I use a 300 Win Mag with 180 grain Winchester XPS 3 shell. Not made anymore but I bought plenty of them - there are similar loads out there.

Overkill??? Damn right it is. Could care less about losing meat when bearing down on a 170-200 plus buck. My objective and goal is to lay the buck down where he stands period so I do not care how big a hole I put into his shoulder.

I know there are faster, flatter, and smaller loads to shoot but I am not convinced they have the same results. Hill country bucks? They will work. 250 plus pound South Texas mature bucks? Not so much.

I will also add this - world class buck in my scope? I will do all in my power to get as close as I can to that deer. Will never take a 300 yard plus shot at a buck that is a buck of a lifetime - I have shot bucks that were at 200 yards when I first saw them but I got out of the stand and got to within 100 yards just to make sure there were no mistakes.

For me, I come straight up the front leg to mid shoulder - have had to track very few deer over my six decades of hunting. So if it ain't broke don't fix it. My 2 cents

Why do you want to track a deer at all? If they are standing still and you have a rest there is no reason not to shoot one wherever you want to, drive up and not have to drag the son of a bitch.

There isn't a whitetail ever been born that a .308 Win won't kill. I feel more comfortable with a double lung shot than the slightly risky high shoulder. They'll go 40 yards with a good blood trail.

just shoot your most accurate bullet, if that is the 175smk, fear not it will decimate all it comes into contact with

Im just not that good anymore, maybe i never was but i practiced a lot more and shot better.

I have shot the vast majority of my deer in the neck/head and love the ease of clean up and DRT kill, but if you cant put that bullet exactly in that spot then lots of missed or wounded deer will follow. When i did my part and put in the time to make sure i could pull of that shot i was very comfortable with it. Currently my long time go to hunting rifle lives at the ranch and I haven't shot it other than hunting in over 5 years. I no longer feel that level of proficiency with it.

Maybe just me being lucky, but I have shot many WT deer with my .308 and I've never had one go more than 10' to 20', and the VAST majority were DRT. These include a few neck shots, but my preferred aim is like others have noted, the spot where lungs/heart/spine all come together. 30 caliber ammo carries a terrific amount of momentum and the shock to the system is pretty dramatic - especially when collecting tissue/bone mass along the way.

And hey, if you have to track, it adds to the story.

Keep the 308. Use Hornady 178 gr ELDX if you can find them. Its hammered hogs to elk from 100 to 522 yds. Its all about shot placement. You've got enough gun just make sure your comfort level is where it should be with your toy cannon!

While not shooting the big deer that stx does, my son shot a deer on Don K's place last fall with a 100 grain Core-lokt out if a .243. Shot went through both shoulders and the spine and convinced me of 2 things: shoulder shots are good and Core-lokts do a great job. Of course, I have only shot Core-lokts for over 20 years but that was a first time seeing a shoulder shot i person.

A pic of the deer, the inside showing the shoulders and spine, and the slug found under the fur on the far side. Slug is mangled but mostly intact.

BTW, here are some bonded .308 Win loads right here.

MidwayUSA