Wow What an interesting read! I really liked alot of points brought up in the OP's article that i never considered as well as many great points by all the other posters here. I am really enjoying this thread and would like to ad my two cents as well as ask a couple questions because it sounds like i am among some real intelligent people who can give me some great answers.
As for the 22 bullet killing the cop after 4 357 magnum shots into his assailant. Unfortunate and very very rare. The odds are extremely in favour of the 357 winning in a gun fight. I own both and would much rather take a 22 shot any day. But we have all had some seriously tough game that may have taken 3 or 4 well placed shots to the chest/neck and still wouldn't die for 5 or 10 minutes while it bled out. I experienced 2 of these this year as I absolutely shattered a deers neck/spine/throat and the poor doe still needed a finisher after 3 or 4 minutes of my waiting for her to expire. My uncles buck also took 5 or 6 shots to the chest and neck and after having its throat cut from jugluar to vertabra still lived another 15 minutes, its rare and unfortunate but it happens.
Just like the fat man who took 4 357 bullets and lived. We have all also had one shot kills which the bullets seemed to have entered the exact same place. We cannot plan the exact destruction of tissue, only try to maximize it to our liking.
I have had many one shot drops where i hit no bones, no spine, , no brain but heart/lungs and the deer/moose dropped stone dead and was lights out before it hit the ground. How is that so if i hit nothing but vital organs that should have needed to bleed out? I dont understand how an animal doesnt need to bleed out to be dead if not for some value on this hydrostatic shock or energy transfer myth, or maybe just plain shock. If anyone has some answers for me please explain, im all ears. I also like how deer can be knocked unconsious from many different shots(antler,head,neck,backbone but then come back and start fighting 3 or 4 minutes later. Every deer will be different.
I butcher my own and after 20 or so big game i have decided my bullet and weapon of choice should be fast, expand fast, shrapnelize and pray to god to hit a rib to cause many multiple damage paths through the vitals... My buck this year i hit and shattered 4 inches of 3 ribs each and pushed them through the vitals and created about 40 wound channels that i could count. I also found the bullet in the oppsing shoulders hide. That deer from a full run was dead on the ground in five ft and 0 seconds. That was not hydrastatic shock but im assuming pure plain shock. I dont think it was from the full energy transferred from the bullet but from so many wounds and so much tissue damage. Like a grenade went off inside its chest. In my opinion the best kill i have ever made. The fact is a 22 could never do that... but anything above a 223 cal should be able to no problem. Speed kills. And its the only constant I can really trust when arming myself for a day out hunting. Sure a 22 right behind the ear could take out a moose or a buffalo but its not reliable or ethical. It also has no long distance potential. For some 300 yards is the longest shot they will ever take and they can really use any gun 243 or up to ethically kill any big game but if you get the skill and a chance up to 600m, you really need something of a bigger cartride just to keep that penetration damage up.
Variance betweeen experience is whats great and builds us all to trust different weapons but bullet type or cal or all other things aside we all know its bullet placement after a certain speed or energy req is met. gives the most reliable and repeatable results. A 300WM to the guts is never going to kill a deer as fast as a 243 to the chest.
Just like that 22 bullet that killed the cop was the perfect shot, those 4 357 bullets were obviously not as good of shots.
To answer why I think 1000ft Lbs of energy is deemed the ethical amount because to attain that amount of energy a small bullet must be zooming into the animal and hence will rip it apart or a big bullet can be going slower will have the weight to still penetrate very far inside the vitals. If we didnt have that amount, our bullets may not make it far enough inside or do enough damage to make repeatable kills. Sure many would still happen but alot more game would be lost if we were hurling 243 bullets at elk/moose 700m away. To me its a good formula for repeatable ethical kills. A good guideline to trust.
We know animals and people can die from 22's but we cannot trust our aim that we will always hit something vital with the shallow penetration of a 22, we need something that causes alot of collateral damage to fall back on.
And the answer to me is a nice combination of bullet size and speed. Big bullets make big holes and can push through the animal, but speed rips and tears which greatly increases the chance of injuring vital tissue. Thats why arrows kill animals just fine(broadheads make big holes) but to me i dont think it will ever be as effective as a bullet a quarter of an inch in diameter travelling 3000fps that can rip a 4 to 5 inch hole out the back of an animal and leave a wound channel 10 inches in diameter inside the chest. (Just talking about the weapons here, not skill of the hunters)
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