Bullet in my bull...

O

Ozzman

Active Member
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LAST EDITED ON Sep-26-11 AT 01:53PM (MST)[p]After I shot my bull, while taking pictures I felt what seemed to be a cyst of sorts in the high shoulder of my bull. Interestingly enough, as we were caping him out this is what we found. It was just below the skin, had not damaged any meat (or if it had, it had since healed) and didn't seem to have any impact on the bull getting around while he was alive.

79imag0083.jpg


Looks to be a Barnes, not sure what caliber. Is this all the bullet is supposed to mushroom? I googled it, and it appears that this is a pretty typical mushroom with their copper loads...

I'm not really a gun/bullet/ballistics guy, I archery hunt, but a couple speculative thoughts I had were things like a really long shot was taken, so it didn't get the penetration it needed? The bullet didn't perform the way it was supposed to? The bullet hit bone and didn't penetrate? Load wasn't heavy enough?

Any thoughts on other things that could have caused this do become an archers odd souvenir, instead of a rifle hunters memory?

Here is the link to my original post....

http://www.monstermuleys.info/cgi-b...ow_thread&om=13612&forum=DCForumID12&archive=
 
Nice Ozzman! So what you are saying is that the old "stick and string" is deadlier than a bullet!! This ought to stir the pot a little. . . Right Bess?

I am still planning on e-mailing you the video. I haven't forgotten about you.
 
Are you sure it was faced with the mushroom going into the shoulder, not coming out of it as if it passed all the way through the bull?

That mushroom looks really good and I would be surprised if it only penetrated the skin (would have to be some sort of combination of small caliber, long distance, bone...). Would you be able to determine the caliber with calipers on the non-mushroomed side?

Interesting find and interesting mystery.
 
The mushroom was laying right up against the meat on the shoulder... I didn't see any damage on the opposite side of the elk, but that could be because everything healed up.

I did look to see if there was any way to identify caliber from the calipers or something, but haven't found anything yet.
 
LAST EDITED ON Sep-26-11 AT 12:46PM (MST)[p]Barnes bullets penetrate very deeply. I have recovered many bullets from game animals. What could have occurred is this bullet was from a pass through on another animal. The type of expansion on the bullet indicates to me it had already penetrated a great deal of something prior to striking this bull.

PS congrats on your bull and your find.
 
I've seen this many times caping out animals. Bullet went all the way through the animal and did not have enough energy to punch through the skin. The skin flexes and the bullet is found just under the skin. This one didn't hit any vitals and the animal healed but I guess his luck ran out!
 
Cool find. I am guessing it penetrated most of the way through the animal stopping in the far side muscle, but didn't hit anything vital causing the elk to recover. It happens.

Could speculate that it was a long range shot, etc. Never heard of any elk being wounded by a rifle and never recovered, only happens to archery guys :p

As far as finding the caliber, just grab some empty casings and see what the back end fits into. A few years back, I killed an small 6x6 in Colorado. It was me and another guy shooting at the bull. It was an angled shot and the bullet ended up near the elks jaw, having traveled from the ribs all the way up to the base of the neck. We were able to find the bullet and match it up to my casings since I was shooting the bigger caliber.
 
This cant be!!!

Just ask B Bopper, bullets kill, not arrows.

I am sure B Bopper has a logical explanation, Right?
 
Very cool. This happens more than you would think on elk. If you have a caliper measure the end of the bullets diameter. If you don't, stick a tape on the end and measure to the closest 1/16th and we will figure out the caliber.

Elkoholic.gif
 
I am sure we will have a very logical explanation here shortly as soon as B-bop gets on. . . Hard to believe he hasn't yet. This is a little out of the norm for him.

Big J, I think his bull was off the Wasatch, pics are on another thread.

"Half of being smart, is knowing what you're dumb about."
 
I'm calling B.S., wounding elk ONLY happens with archery equipment. Stinky made it clear that only rifles are lethal enough to kill elk so that cannot actually be a bullet. We will have to wait for Bess or stinky to explain what really happened.


Traditional >>>------->
 
Nice find. I'd guess that he was shoot high and missed vitals and stopped at the hide on oppisite side, as stated before.
 
Could have been a bullet that passed through another elk, i.e. cow, spike, or different bull. Because the energy was pretty well spent going through the other animal this bullet did not have enough energy to penetrate much past the initial meat.

Plus part of the healing process the body will slowly push the foreign body; bullet, rock whatever towards the surface. That may be why you found near the skin, rather then deeper in the muscle.
 
Good 'Ol Barnes bullets. Nothing but garbage bullets lol....
Poor guy that had them should have just stuck with some premium Core-Lok's!!!

Sorry, I just couldn't resist!
 
That was my immediate thought too, pass through on another elk that lodged in this guys' shoulder. If there's truly no damage to the opposite shoulder and the bullet ended up the way described it seems like the logical conclusion. Interesting find either way though.

LBR
 
that was most likely a long shot. If you don't have at least 1500 ft-lbs of energy at the target i don't shoot. That puts my 338 lapua's range at about 1200 yards. However those best of the west guys recomend 7mm and they won't do past 800 on big critters and most guns are underpowered past 600. Most guys have no clue of ballistics and don't care. Its like the friggin archery guys who keep making that same shoulder shot on bulls. They never learn what their weapon is capable of or how to shoot it. Crap like that pisses me off. Its just plain ignorance!
 
LOL.

Probably another "really good" shot made a couple years ago.

Cool find though and congrats on an effective hunt! ;)
 
I know Barnes has a minimum velocity needed for expansion so it looks like it hit something going fast enough for that. If it was a body shot that didn't exit, the scar tissue would look odd compared to the meat around it otherwise I'd say it hit another animal first.
 
Put a nickel next to it for comparison,prob .284 or .300.That bullet passed through another elk if you didnt find evidence of pass through damage.
 
LAST EDITED ON Sep-26-11 AT 06:58PM (MST)[p]Looking at the picture and taking all the facts into consideration there is only one logical explanation....

Some wise old stick flipper figured out a way to launch that bullet out of his bow! .... that is the only logical reason for the poor penetration!
 
I too would agree that the bullet passed through something else before it hit the animal. I was thinking more along the lines of a tree limb or something like that between the shooter and the elk? It is easy to get elk blinders on and miss something in the way. That or a pass through another animal gets my vote.
 
I'm thinking on the lines of probably a small quaking aspen tree got in the way of this bullet, it passed through the tree and struck the elk with what energy it had left. I have shot through quaking aspens almost a foot in diameter with a 300 win mag years ago and they make a clean pass through. Just a thought on what happened.
 
Crazy! My NM bull from last year had a muzzle loader ball lodge just under the skin in his front shoulder. Just like you described, no damage to the muscle and right under the skin. I still have it in my trucks change cup. Its flattened out like a nickle.
 
Probably a 1900 yard shot,I hit him,I hit him,I stung him like a Mosquito Bite.



>I'm calling B.S., wounding elk ONLY
>happens with archery equipment. Stinky
>made it clear that only
>rifles are lethal enough to
>kill elk so that cannot
>actually be a bullet. We
>will have to wait for
>Bess or stinky to explain
>what really happened.
>
>
>Traditional >>>------->


http://www.monstermuleys.info/photos/use
r_photos/5308pimpin2darker.jpg
 
Funny stuff here.

MANY bullets from most big game calibers may or may not pass thru elk and deer, even at reasonable ranges.

Our game processor has a coffee can full of them. We find them all the time lodged up against the hide, on the off shot side of the animal.

Depends on what/where they hit and distance CAN certainly be a factor. I'm not all that impressed with the bullet performance in this pic.

Being guilty of killing 2 elk with one shot, I won't dispute the possibility of a pass thru either.

My bull was a thru and thru lung shot, at 250 yds, that killed a bedded cow, 30 yards beyond and thru 10 yards of willows. 165 grain Hornady, '06, went thru the cows skull also. I didn't hit bone on the bull ...1 rib.

Chit happens.

"If God did not intend for man to hunt animals, he would have made broccoli more fun to shoot"
 
Good thing it wasn't a lead bullet... The bull may have died of lead poisoning. If not, you from eating the lead sick guy after a year or more of it absorbing into the body... :)
 
LAST EDITED ON Sep-27-11 AT 07:09AM (MST)[p]Well guys isn't it obvious someone screwed on a barnes bullet on their arrow!!!!! Thats the only reasonable explanation that the elk was injured not killed if it had been from a rifle it most definiately would have killed the poor sucker.

sorry at work didn't see VTmons post

7mm wsm 600yrd. and closer checkmate
 
It's all about the bullet or arrow placement!

The bullet performance appears to be just about perfect but to know what happened will continue to elude us.

If you hunt enough you'll find all kinds of junk in a big buck or bull. My daughters bull, from a few years ago on Diamond Mtn, had an arrow in the high shoulder. A bull I killed, years ago, had an arrow stuck in the face. A buck, another daughter killed, had an old bullet in the butt.

I won't speculate on the ethics of the shot or the hunter since I will never really know what happened,

Zeke
 
If your going to shoot a TSX you better be sure of whats BEHIND your target,odds are its going to pass through if its a behind the shoulder shot.
 
Like Nickman and others have said, passed through and lodged in the offside hide. I would say it happens more often than not on elk. When taking care of a clients bull I nearly always give them the slug because it is against the hide on the offside. If the shot didn't break bone or hit anything vital it's a flesh wound that could easily heal from last year.
 
Be careful, DWR is gonna accuse you of shooting the bull with a rifle first. After all you have the evidence. Wouldn't be the first time either.

Mocking aside, that is one cool find!
 

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