how far can one run after a kill shot ?

I wonder at times myself ,seen some drop and some run forever .....
amazingly tough animals for sure to take a large caliber in the chest and run and or walk away ....
anyway this young doe took this hit from my 06 at about a hundred out and went airborne back legs kicked out
hit the ground running and went about 75 yards before slowing down to a walk right past me
I thought for a second I had maybe gut shot it ....
as it started to walk by me it was getting a bit more gimpy every step
I decided to wait and see if it was going to go down
sure enough maybe 15 or so yards gets wobbly and down it goes
then it tries to get back up !
I take a quick moment to put the hairs on her and she lays down
then starts acting like she is going to get up yet again !
finally she quit moving and I sit there thinking yeah gut shot for sure
great just great ...
then I get to her and here is the off side
she was quartering to me slightly
go figure ...
a happy new year to all
and feel free to add your stories as well

First off that's either a big cooler or small deer.. Lol.. Anyway well just so happens most of the deer I've shot have never taken but a few steps and the farthest may have ran 75-80 yards.. Just this past weekend my brother shot a buck at 530 pm and finally found it at 8pm.. In all the deer ran from his feeder and ended up a good 300 plus yards away.. Jumped to fences in the process... Left a blood trail the whole way... Crazy!!.. And no no gut shot

Adrenaline is my thoughts its perfect shot place ment.

the buck i shot 2 days ago was double lung'd, bucked like a bull when i hit him, ran about 50 yards and started wobbling, he went down and got back up and made it about 10-15 more wobbly yards before he went down. he was dead within minutes.

with my rifle i only had one deer run after being hit, my first buck ran about 75 yards after being hit with my 3030, all the does after that with my '06 dropped in their tracks.

OK, let's use a conservative estimate and say a deer that doesn't drop at the shot can run 25 miles per hour (most sources say and uninjured deer can run 30 to 35 mph).

At 25 mph a deer covers 36.66 feet per second (12.2 yards per second).

So, if a deer lives;
5 seconds after the hit it can cover 61 yards.
6 seconds after the hit it can cover 73 yards.
7 seconds after the hit it can cover 85 yards.
8 seconds after the hit it can cover 98 yards.
9 seconds after the hit it can cover 110 yards.
10 seconds after the hit it can cover 122 yards.

I hunt mostly with a muzzleloader and take mid-chest shots like the one in your picture. A few may drop at the shot, but most run. In our thick/brushy piney woods it's "Hooray for a good blood trail".

I double-lung shot a big sika buck a few years ago with my bow. He ran close to 500 yards. The last 200 yards he was running down a muddy ranch-road and he was weaving all over the place (couldn't run in a straight line). We found him within 1.5 hours of the shot, and he was already getting stiff (like rigomortis). I agree that adrenaline can make a wounded deer run a lot farther than we think it should be able to.

I have heart shot a buck that dropped in his tracks at 265 yards. Same season I heart shot a buck at 45 yards that ran over 260 steps and died running. Both with same rifle and bullet. I have rattled in a buck that I had to shoot off-handed at 70 yards that I hit high in the shoulders and he ran close to 300 yards till he died. I think that is longest I have had to trail a deer I shot. For the last 25 yrs now I shoot high-point of the shoulder shots to alleviate that trailing problem.

I've heard a lung shot deer can run at full speed for 10 seconds which equate to a lot of territor but I have no actual clue, only what i have heard

MY recap-

opening morning 11 pt. -- double lung w/ .270WSM ran 100 yards into heavy cover (144 yards )
mid November Doe -- double lung piece of heart w .270WSM ran about 80 yards (138 yards)
Early December Doe -- All heart and some lung w/ .270 WSM ran 50' ( 301 yards)

I have found using Hollow point Ammunition, they will not run, as if a bomb went off inside them upon point of impact.
This year, my hand was forced to shoot soft points

Dad just recovered a buck he shot with a Rage broadhead right through the heart. No blood trail. Nothing. Shot him Sunday evening. Recovered him this morning. Buck ran 250 yds before piling up. Ya just never know.

could fit my wife in it pretty easy ....but she is kinda a small dear ....

I use 30-06 with 180g silver tips. Overkill yes but they do not run. Drop everytime

I like my 150 grain right out of the box Remington softcore ammo for deer
but I do have some 180 grain I sometimes load up if I am after hogs
one thing for certain every deer seems to react differently when rib shot

I "tracked" a buck my brother-in-law shot yesterday morning. Dropped him in his tracks.....until he got up and ran off leaving ZERO blood. Did a grid pattern for 200 yards in a 180 degree radius...no deer. I followed a dry creek bed looking and found him piled up in a cedar about 400 yards from where he dropped. 165 grain softpoint 308.....right in the gut.

Shoot 'em in the upper neck (near the head, in the white spot if they're lookin' at ya)and they don't run at all unless you miss....most humane shot you can make, they either go down and stay down 'cause you wiped out their spine, or you hit jugular and and they bleed like crazy ON THE OUTSIDE and you can trail them easily, or you only hit them hard enough to cause a flesh wound no worse than they get fightin' and you don't have to worry about them. Only a small amount of blood comes out of a body shot deer, most stays in the cavity until they lay down and then it's too late to help you trail it. Not to mention that everyone says they're trying to hit the heart, which is a 3" target you can't see and theres a whole lot of stuff you can hit if you miss the heart that won't kill them for many hours maybe.. The spine near the head is a target that you can focus on much more accurately with almost no chance of collateral damage(hittin' something that won't put 'em down right now). If you take out the electrical system, they go down. My switch to this M.O. happened many years ago, as I was about to shoot this old doe,when I thought "I'll shoot her in the head". I did. Shot her in the bottom jaw, blew bloody corn all over the place. We trailed blood for 3/4 of a mile. Never found her. I guarantee she died, starvation if nothing else. A shot anyplace else but the upper neck takes too much of a chance for me.. I've missed a couple over the years because of my choice of shot placement, every single other one was DRT. Even the ones where the neck was not broken, the shock to the spine in this area puts them down and they'll bleed to death right there. Easily 30+ deer in the last 30 years,( I haven't been able to hunt every year in the last 30....)

DPSTX

Physics

Take the wheels off a truck and see how that goes also.

stxranchman - what's the difference between the "high in the shoulders" hit that allowed the deer to run almost 300 yards and the "high-point of the shoulder shots" that cause the deer to drop immediately? How far apart are these two points?

I've shot most of my deer behind the shoulders and 1/3 - 1/2 of the way up from the bottom of the chest. The longest run was 70 yards (that particular bullet didn't expand), and a few 50-60 yards, but most 40 yards (so they lived about 4 seconds according to the chart someone posted above). Very few between 0-40 yards. Many dropped immediately, but those that didn't usually went at least 40 yards (but there were exceptions).

I've had to take the frontal shot twice and both deer dropped on the spot.

See the plate? the point has an impact of the shoulder blade and the spine.

I have a tracking dog that we have run on several trails that were well over a mile. A LOT has to do with shot placement but not all of it is shot placement. Some of them are just tough as nails.
Had a doe run 300 yards before she piled up with a 25-06 that smash her heart. Later that year shot a Buck with the same gun that piled up and never moved with the same shot placement.
I tracked one earlier this year that went about 1.5 miles UPHILL found him dead as a hammer with the shot placement just about 3-4" back. 243 just didn't have enough power to do the damage to drop him without perfect shot placement. Luckily for the client Radar was able to stay on trail and get the boy his first deer.

That's why we have a tracking dog

had a spike I was watching for a month show up just like the doe in the picture one day
big hole in the neck ...and not looking to terribly hurt
eating corn like crazy under my feeder .....
seen another deer shot 3 times in the neck to kill it
seen countless deer neck shot that didn't die
got a great video of one as a matter of fact !
hit the ground did a flip or 3 and gone like the wind !
he ended up shooting it AGAIN in the neck after we found it and....
it dang near ran over me leaving and we never seen it again !!!
and we had a tracking party with us btw ....
the guy beside me bout wet himself when it went right between us full tilt tell ya
used to do some guiding back when ....
seen a lot of really easy shots go wrong at the neck and head area of deer .....
clients would insist they could "make" the shot ....
and what I have to say about neck shots is .....
I strongly recommend a chest shot

I shoot them on the leg post....takes out the heart and at least one of their wheels. They drop on top of themselves. If I can't make that shot...they walk.

this is what the post is actually about ....
some deer just have a tuff in them that don't give up easy
I hit a real big 12 inch spike the same exact way at the same distance this year
he went down without so much as flicker of the tail ...go figure

Wife shot a cull this morning with a 270 at 100 yards. double lung shot and he ran 250 yards before he dropped
Glad we had the dog with us cause he ran a lot further to the North than I had him marked.

Good thread. Anyone that says every deer they shoot is "DRT" automatically pegs them as inexperienced, full of , or both. Deer are tough creatures, shot results are unpredictable (even with perfect shot placement). It does not go according to Hoyle every time.

This one went 150 yds. Shot her at 130 yds with a 7mm Mag.

One thing I haven't seen anyone bring up is the range + bullet construction + speed at impact combination. I have shot several deer w/ several calibers at several different ranges. Close-in shots with a 'tougher' bullet at high speed seems to just zip through without doing significant damage. Add another 100 yards and that same deer hit with the same bullet in the same place drops in their tracks or barely covers any distance after the shot.
I shot a doe earlier this year at 30 yards with my 7mm-08 loaded w/ 140 gr NBT. The exit wound on the deer was barely a 30 caliber hole. The deer ran about 80 yards before piling up. I shot a doe this morning at 180 with the same load in nearly the same spot and the deer fell, got up and fell for good 5' away. Exit wound was nearly an inch in diameter. Same load, same bullet, same muzzle velocity different results.

I know several folks that swear by the neck shot, and that's great for you and them. I've seen several of then drop big deer where they stood with the perfect placed neck shot, but to call a heart shot trying to hit a 3" target you can't see is not really what is happening. If you shoot for the heart/lung area you have much more than 3" of target. You have the area of a paper plate to hit a vital organ that will kill them quickly. I am not saying that every deer hit in that area will drop where it stood, but if you have a quality bullet that hits that area (preferably a rib on entry) then it will do massive damage to the lungs and maybe the heart also.

That is a long ways to go with that type of wound.

Yep. Shot a small doe last season with a .270 using 130 gr. Hornady SST handloads @ 3000 FPS at 200 yds. She ran approx. 225 yds. despite having a baseball-sized exit wound and large chunks of lung spewed several feet beyond the impact point. When we picked her up, you could see all the way through her. I had pics but they were pretty gruesome and I deleted them.

I had to shoot my deer in the neck remember.....

Every shot is different

I went on a shooting spree at a buddies place earlier in the year with my .270 and hornady softpoints.

With this combo I've killed 50+ deer not counting the 6 I killed that day

I was shooting does in the neck and dropping them. Shot two in the lungs and dumped them

One doe came out that was partially hidden by some trees at the edge of a field in the road. Due to the obstruction I put the crosshairs behind the shoulder and let one rip. I see dust fly and she starts running into the field just fine. I'm thinking I missed and keep the gun on her. She angles off slightly and I see blood pouring out her side from a silver dollar sized hole.

She made it well over 100 yards before piling up

I typically shoot for the high shoulder when I can get it to break the shoulders and hit the spine. This is a DRT shot. What most people think is a shoulder shot actually hits the heart/lungs.


Bullet contruction absolutely makes a difference I've had more deer run far distances using a .300
And 7mm and Barnes bullets than any other type of load.

Partitions are the second.

I believe in using softpoints for deer unless your shooting a very fast gun or a light caliber

In all the deer I've shot or seen shot (well into the mid 100's on body count) the most consistent producer of DRT or short tracking jobs with body shots have been with standard calibers and softpoints

Think you may have got some things mixed up there.

Deer and hogs are tuff critters, they can cover some ground after being hit no doubt. I also think there are far fewer perfect heart and double lung shots than are reported on the internet. And no im not calling myself perfect either, occasionally the bullet doesn't go where my mind wills it go.

I agree with Nogalus, I shot a buck like this doe, almost exactly, in the snow, and tracked it nearly 3 miles over 5 hours...

I agree with tth85 on the softpoints. They are by far the best choice for thin-skinned medium sized game IMO. There is a bullet for every task, and they are the best for that task.

I used a 150 grain Winchester PowerPoint on my sheep.

Again, in a standard caliber. If you just must use an itty-bitty cartridge, a tougher bullet is the way to go.

I have had good success on deer using soft points in my .243 (kids) and it has not failed to kill a deer yet, but that tells my inexperience or lack of experience hunting.

I shot one buck with a 30-06 180gr silvertip and it was perfect double lung shot that completely obliterated both lungs and he still made it 30-40 yards, fortunately we watching him drop in the brush (wouldn't have been a hard track job at that place but spots on that ranch would have been terrible to go 30-40 yards into).

Have shot 3 deer with 25-06 with 117gr Hornaday SST (first year with this gun) and with two heart shots and a chest shot it created a 5 yard track 70 yard shot), a 60 yard track (85 yard shot), and a 15 yard track (185-200+ yard shot).

However, shooting same bullet at 4 coyotes has created one dead coyote at 70 yards, one wounded with good blood trail to the fence at approx 100 yards, one wounded with scant blood at 150 yards and one wounded from 175 yards but didn't look for blood as we watched him run off over hundreds of yards. Couldn't believe the coyotes didn't drop, two of the shots spun the coyote around and down, but they both got up and ran off. The one with good blood trail had pieces of meat and big fur at impact site but he ran off as well.

Being involved in medicine and seeing the trauma of war on human bodies, it is amazing what a human can withstand as far as gun shots as well. The drive to survive is a strong instinct in most animals. Some never have it and they are obvious, but so far haven't seen a non-human animal that didn't have it.

I have had very few run after the shot with a rifle and the majority dropped right where they were hit unless it was a poor shot. I have shot them in the head, neck, base of the neck, high point of the shoulder and behind the shoulder. 30 yards max...after reading this thread, think I will stick with high point of the shoulder

The third shot.....

He forced my hand

My BIL just purchased a .257 Mag and dropped several grand with a Nightforce scope, some sort of baked coating, a machined muzzle break, and 85 grain ballistic tip handloads. I laughed at him saying my Rem 700 .270 with Prostaff 5 scope would drop just as many deer (probably a little truth to it) than that little bitty 85 grain bullet. He did shoot a cull and doe this year at 100 yards with the very gun and both dropped straight down to my surprise. Anyways what I really found interesting is that neither bullet made a pass thru. When cleaning the deer it seemed the bullet just exploded inside the animals. We found one of the plastic (or whatever material) tips inside, but never any fragments. It did it's job I suppose, but still too fancy for me.

Sorry, I'm late getting back to this thread....

My point about the neck shots, is that they greatly reduce the chance of wounding and having to chase down the deer after you shoot it. Sorry about about borrowing the "DRT" phrase from other folks, but, I can say, my family has been hunting our property since 1976 killing an average of 10 to 15 deer (takes that many to keep us in sausage and ground meat all year) every year on 75 acres. We "outlawed" anything but neck shots on our property, sometime back in the 80's, because anything else messed too much meat and left us chasing wounded deer, (which would often jump fences into neighbors property and we'd have to go through that hassle). Our 75 acres is over a 1/4mile long, meaning that a deer never has to go more than 100yds to find a fence.... Needless to say, the math puts us at hundreds of deer over the last 30 years. You may have a "pie plate" sized target with the chest shot, if you include the lungs, but you have a much greater chance the deer will need to be trailed, because, even a heart shot deer can run and if you miss that heart, chances are you did hit something that will kill the deer,...eventually, whether it's lungs, stomach, shoulder or any number of other things. A spine shot deer cannot run, it takes out all 4 wheels, which will give it time to die where it falls. It greatly increases your chance for a miss, but I'd rather miss one than shoot one I can't find after it ran off. If you neckshoot the deer and don't shock the spine sufficiently to drop it right there, the chances are very good you didn't hit it hard enough to kill it, and it is essentially a miss. Note, I'm suggesting only the upper neck, that's the only area which has the concentrated target, the lower neck spreads out the important stuff too much.

Most powerful rifle used on this property is my brother's 6.5x55, the rest being a 250Savage, a 222 and a passel of 243s. I use the Berger 95gr Classic Hunter in my 243(around 2960fps), and my dad uses whatever 100gr soft point he can find for his 243. My Mom, with her 222, has yet to miss or have one run off.

I know I'm not gonna change the majority of you to being neck shooters, but if you feel that you're a good enough shot to take that gamble, you'll be rewarded with a critter that drops where you shot it, or you didn't make a good enough shot,and the critter will be OK and you don't have to worry about it.

I will say, that on our property, it's difficult to get a shot over 100yds due to the blind placement and lots of brush, but the end result is the same even at longer ranges. If you can make the shot, a high neck shot will put the deer down where you shot it, with a much higher percentage than shots placed elsewhere, If you need more rifle or better skills to get out there, then so be it. Shot placement is the key, and the most likely shot to make them drop where they stand is the upper neck. If you miss that, you'll get air, but most likely, only your pride will suffer.

DPSTX

To me, that shot looks too far back. Billibob's placement looks better. Or you can flat shot them through both shoulders; it's hard to walk without legs, a heart, and lungs. As to meat loss; will not be much as fronts are used for grind usually.

Um, I always make bone-in roasts out of the front shoulders and that would be a lot of meat to lose.

The internet has made everyone fall in love with acronyms and we see the use of DRT a lot, but a behind-the-shoulder impact will often produce a run of 40 yards, which is good enough for most folks. Sometimes, though, they do drop on the spot, but I would say that's maybe 25% of the time.

As for those two photos, I am shocked at how far those deer ran -- I would have predicted the first one down within 100 yards and the second one down within 40 yards. Just goes to show we're always learning.

The shoulder shot only breaks bone if you hit low -- or high. The middle of the shoulder has no bone because of the way a deer's legs and shoulder are constructed.

Yep, low or high, and no front legs.

interesting reads yawl
I do know the will to survive takes over in many cases
no matter the shot placement
watched a many a deer over the years with various different wounds from rifles
run a terribly long distance when they were obviously not going to survive
we had a huge 3 legged doe on a place a while back
she even raised a fawn minus that front leg
the ranch manager wanted her gone
so my bud shot her low in the chest one evening
it took out her other front leg
she still went 50 yards into the brush and buried herself like a gopher under a log pile
I was amazed at the amount of blood and people looking for her including me that were baffled by her ability to hide so well and make it so far on 2 legs

I've seen deer hit in the neck recover, jump up and run away. Head shots that blew the bottom jaw off leaving the animal to die a slow grisly death. Shoulder shots only for me, with the exception of the 'Texas heart shot' I had to take a couple of seasons ago. And most of the shoulder/heart shots taken, the deer do run a good 20-40 yards. I've never lost one though. Yet.

Yip, I agree, done it myself. I shot one, he fell down, laid there for 5min while I was getting out my tag and stuff and then he got up and ran off. I went over to where he laid, and there was NO blood to be found, just the flattened grass. This is my point about neck shots, if you miss, or don't hit them hard enough to make them stay down, then they'll likely live. I would rather miss or completely "not kill" the deer than shoot him and have him die hours or days later. Upper neck shots have more concentrated put-down-stay-down stuff to hit with little stuff to hit that will kill them without putting them down to stay.

DPSTX

let me tell yawl a story .....
2 of us rode one 4 wheeler into a place ...
bud dropped me at my blind and went to his
late in the evening a doe came in acting spooked
following her was broken racked big 8 point
several tines broke off and looking like a bully he was
we hunted a multiple buck tag area and we agreed big buck or big doe before the hunt
well the buck fit the criteria and when they passed by the feed pen he stopped a second broadside
right when I squeezed the trigger he stepped forward ...not good !
she bolted and he started to follow ...I chambered up to finish him and he stopped in some thick brush
she continued on and he watched her leave ....never left the brush ,just stood there
couldn't get a shot so I waited for him to exit ....he never did ...he just kept standing there
minute or 2 later he very calmly laid down with his head up
watched him for a few minutes and decided I could make a neck on him thru a tiny opening
took the shot he went down like he was stoned ....I called my bud
got out of the blind walked over to tag him and as I stood there behind him
I noticed his chest moving like he was breathing
I unslung my rifle just in case and when I clicked the safety off
he was up and running like a bullet ....
missed him on the 3rd round and finally ...
out of pure luck for sure hit him AGAIN on the 4th round right behind the shoulder
he still made it about 75 yards and over the fence before he was done !
bud showed up and was like WT heck ?
sounded like world war 3 started he says ...
and I told him the story as we looked at that swiss cheese buck

On the downside only seen once .Involved in tracking neck shot once.They said it was miss but we found hair skin and pieces of flesh,little blood .As we followed he kept hearing this wheezing and coughing..It was easy tracking just listen.Finally caught up and finished it off..The original shot took out windpipe,and I guess blood running down into damaged windpipe caused the coughing and wheezing..That would been a miserable way to die...Just something I was involved in and made me think...No doubt if you hit neck Bone/Juggler Vein its Lights out..Not against Neck shots just saying it ain't 100% or clean miss