blaming bullets or equipment

#1 12-02-2007, 12:10 PM

Another thread reminded me of how bullets often get the blame for poor shot placement,especially when an animal is lost after being wounded.I often hear how someone lost an animal because the bullet did not expand,or did not penetrate.I have tracked animals for considerable distance listening to the shooter tell me how the bullet must have failed,only to find the animal and discover that the bullet placement was very poor.

In some cases,animals were lost,but found a day or two later,because of ravens,but the bullet hole made it evident that the animal was gut shot.Yet other times,an animal had to shot a second time,because of poor bullet placement with the first shot.
And if the animal was missed cleanly,the scope was at fault.

And if the gun is fired and found to be shooting tight groups in the proper location,ruling out a scope problem,it must have been a dud load.

It just seems so much easier for some people to blame their equipment,than to admit that they made a bad shot.

Dick284 · #2 12-02-2007, 12:18 PM

People/shooters have an inate ability to blame inanimate objects for their own short comings. It is much easier than admitting for what ever reason they are at fault.
Human nature I guess.

#3 12-02-2007, 01:22 PM

When you have inflated confidence it happens. I shoot a lot in comparison to the other guys i hunt with. I pride myself in hitting the target at the range everytime out to 400 and even 500 yards. I like to shoot at least 50-100 large centerfire rounds over the summer and a ton more with the 223 and rimfire.
I made my first bad shot ever hunting this fall, luckily it worked out (i found my doe, finished her with a head shot). I actually missed the first shot as i did not pay enough attention to detail and hit a tree in front of her, she didn't run away for reasons still unkown to me. I repositioned and i rushed the shot hitting her too far back (just got edge of one lung). Worst feeling of my hunting career, i would have rather missed than caused the extra 15 minutes or so of suffering.
Later this year I missed a whitetail buck that i should have had (under 200 yards, bedded, head and neck fully exposed). I knew i held on the target, knew nothing could have intercepted the shot, and knew i didn't pull as i had a perfect view through the scope. Stopped hunting and went to the range, sure enough rifle was out by 3'' at the close target, not sure how it happened but it did (probably would have been out by 6'' where the buck was sitting). I never got another shot this fall, next year i will be getting to the range more and arranging several mid season practice sessions (and check zero more often). It sucks when human error and equiptment error both come into factor.
A very experienced friend of mine who hasn't missed a shot since he moved to Alberta (4 or 5 seasons now) missed one last weekend as well, couple hundred yards, mulie doe. I guess no matter how much range time you put in, the excitement of the hunt occasionally can mean a miss. He admitted it right away (i was just talking with him over the phone), we will both be practicing extra hard next summer (main reason we both picked up 223's was a cheaper way for practice). I know i wanted to blame the first mistake on equiptment right away, definetly human nature.

Outdoor_Ed · #4 12-02-2007, 01:55 PM

The interesting thing about missing is the lesson you learn or not. I failed to remeber when you decide to just sit on a cutline to find a couple of steady shooting positions. Such as set up your back pack or park next to a big poplar for a shooting rest. And lastly don't rush the shot.

Ed S.

#5 12-02-2007, 05:35 PM

The one I get a kick out of is when people start expounding the virtues if their calibre or rifle or bullet and claim that everything they've ever shot had dropped right there.....That always leads me to believe they are full of crap or they haven't hunted much. I've seen plenty of perfect heart shots make it 100 yards at a dead run...literally.

Yup, if you kill it you're the hero and if it gets away, something had to have gone wrong with the bullets, scope, rifle or rotation of the earth. You get pretty well any bullet into the vitals and the animal is going down...whether that bullet is a piece of crap or not. Where good bullets start to shine is when you get outside of the perfect broadside hit....

Bullets are quite literally the cheapest part of the hunt. There is no excuse for anyone not to use well constructed bullets and I'd say that any of the better name bullets have sufficient construction to get the job done within their performance envelope.

One place we really started seeing disasters, however, was when we started pushing pure lead bullets in excess of 2,000fps with muzzleloaders. They aren't designed to do it and in that case, I'll gurantee game got away due to poor bullet performance or poor choice of bullet by the hunter...still human error in the long run.

TangoKilo · #6 12-03-2007, 10:58 AM

I agree totally with the above replies.

I have a good hunting buddy who preaches constantly about how his 300 mag (win or wsm) drops every animal in their tracks. He apparently shot a number of deer early in his hunting carrier with smaller cartridges that got away. Not because of bad shot placement of course, but because the cartridge he was shooting at the time was not powerful enough. He also attributes several wounded animals escaping because he was shooting Sierra Gamekings and even with a perfect shot failed to kill the animal.

This line of thinking is absolute BS!!

Shot placement is exponentially more important then is bullet energy or construction.

This same friend attributes the vast majority of his misses to his scope being knocked out. Perhaps I have been very lucky, but this has never happened to me. Sheep hunting, my rifle takes a TON of abuse and by the end of the season it is still shooting to the same point that it was in August. I have missed my fair share of shots over the years. A couple of them I thought must be the fault of the rifle or scope. Upon putting it on paper it became apparent that the flaw was with me and not with my equipment. This brings me the crux of my argument.

It is much easier to fabricate an equipment malfunction that can be solved simply by taking out the credit card and making a purchase, than it is to identify a deficiency in your own shooting skills and invest the appropriate time and effort to correct it.

I digress,

Tom

aulrich · #7 12-03-2007, 12:13 PM

Last year I was blaming the bullet I had two misses and a dead run on a doe with no blood. I was sick thinking I could not have missed and no decernable blood trail (or hair, mind you I have never had much luck finding hair). Mind you there was fresh snow on the ground for one of the misses.

Fast forward to this year I buy some Hornady Interbonds because thos Seirra's are just too soft, I need something just a bit harder that will give me a blood trail (because I couldn't have missed, right !!). But as luck would have it now time for load development, so I am stuck with the old load, I will say that I was nervious, I am not into wounding stuff.

I almost thougt I had another one of those situations a mulie buck that jumped when he was hit, but again no blood no hair and no dead deer. That was untill the next day when with 90% certanty I shot and killed that same buck about 300 yards away from the previous days location.

All told of the 4 deer that load took this year one ran may be 20 yards 2 were drt and one was anchored but needed a finisher. Now the bullet is on the soft side but still perfectly acceptable for deer. I am not even sure I will bother loading the interbonds yet, I do have a 338 for bigger stuff.

As a philosophy I am not a pure placement sort of guy. I look at proper field shooting as a tripod,

Placement
Power
Construction

A balance combination of all of these is needed for reliable clean kills.

Dick284 · #8 12-03-2007, 06:05 PM

I know for a fact Catnthehat, uses almost exclusively Sierra bullets, and reloads them for what seems like half of Newfoundland, or Ft. MacMurray for that fact.

No complaints, guys are smiling, and happy with their kills.
Hmmm.
Then there is Bobby B who for years shot nothing but Nosler Ballistic Tips on deer, moose and coyotes. Even so called varmint exclusive bullets driven from a souped up 6mm wildcat at just shy of 4000fps, killed deer. Even those explosive 150 gr Ballistic Tips doing nearly 3200fps from is 7mm Rem Mag, killed everything he aimed at.
Again Hmmmm.
The fact remains if you hit what you aim at 99& 44/100% of the time stuff dies.
Like I've said before on this forum "Guchi this that or the other thing does you no good if you can't hit what your shooting at."
I wont go into my theories on why shooters miss what they aim at because, that unto its self is one very long and emotionally charged subject.

AbAngler · #9 12-04-2007, 12:43 PM

I had a interesting one this season. I wish I could blame equipment, but I don't know what to blame....
My hunting loads ended up being too hot for my gun (7mm RM) after using two different scales (another story). I didn't have time to load up more before heading out, so I used factory ammo. Sighted in, took me 4 shots and I was happy.

At the end of a long day, I lined up on a small WT buck along a fence line at about 150yrds broadside. I was kneeling and was steady enough. Took the shot, he bucked like he'd been hit good, jumped over a fence, then ran over a ridge(maybe 20yrds). I was sure my shot was good and all indications were pointing to a good shot.

Got over the ridge expecting to see him piled up. Here's where it got interesting. He was lying on the ground trying to get up, but his back legs weren't working. I though, wow, spine shot. I wasn't as steady as I had though. So I hurry up to him and finish him off. The weird thing was that there was no blood from my first shot. No bullet hole, no blood, no nothing.
It was the strangest thing we had ever seen since he ran AFTER the shot.

The next morning at the butchers, I asked if he could find any sign of my first shot. He reached inside and pulled out a vertebrae!! Still no bullet hole or any sign of it being hit even after skinning.

I've talked to lots of guys with a hell of alot more experience then me and no one can explain it. I fired off a couple shots the next day to see where I was hitting and to my surprise, it was shooting high and to the right almost two feet!! Don't know how that happened either..... Must have banged it at some point. Still doesn't explain the first shot paralyzing him AFTER he jumped over a fence and ran.

I guess that was the magic delayed back breaking bullet.

Suka · #10 12-04-2007, 03:37 PM

Stack newspaper in a cardboard box; not as dense as a phone book, but not loose. You can get 4 tests out of this(sorta 4 corners). Shoot into it, dig through and see how your bullet performed.(careful, HOT)
I read about this a few yrs ago, tried it.
For decades I had used one make of spitzer bullet, always with great kills. After reading what a bullet is Supposed to do, and checking, I've switched to another manufacturer.
The only reason I had good kills was very accurate shot placement. The bullet did not perform as intended, in fact they failed miserably in both repeated tests, and comparing all the spent leads I've saved from animals.(no weight retention)
It always comes down to shot placement, but that doesn't mean the bullet is doing it's job. It's worth checking, I was amazed.

BC7stw · #11 03-19-2008, 10:01 AM

I have seen some bullet performance, scope issues over the years, when it gets down to it it's still your fault. Almost without fail the scope issues were because they took it out of the closet and didn't go to the range before hunting, the bullet issues were usually avoidable. Stuff happens, just seems to happen to the same guys more often, hmm. If you hunt long enough you WILL eventually make a mistake, most of us will beat ourselves up, likely more than ness. and then learn from it. The key is to do your research, use your equipment enought to know it well AND know your limits ( and they are your limits) If you haven't practiced at long range you shouldn't be shooting long range at game. If you aren't that comfortable with running shots, don't take them, There is no shame in passing on a shot, there will be others.

Sorry for preaching, had another bad experience with a hunter recently.

nekred · #12 03-19-2008, 10:48 AM

If it is a shooting problem it is my fault

If it is an equipment problem it is again me... I did not test it, did not check it, or did not care for it, did not inspect it enough!....

People never want to take responsibility for their own actions....or inactions

A story is never as good when one says I missed the 250 class whitetail because i was a *******!...

I marke every bolt, screw, locking device to always be ab

nekred · #13 03-19-2008, 10:49 AM

If it is a shooting problem it is my fault

If it is an equipment problem it is again me... I did not test it, did not check it, or did not care for it, did not inspect it enough!....

People never want to take responsibility for their own actions....or inactions

A story is never as good when one says I missed the 250 class whitetail because i was a *******!...

I marke every bolt, screw, locking device to always be able to visually verify everything is copasetic... each and every time by equipment comes out of the case.

This is even more critical in archery!.... i have had some stupid equipment failues that were a result of me not being careful enough!...

Rusty P. Bucket · #14 03-19-2008, 12:43 PM

Well, I am gonna chime in and say my beloved No. 1 has dropped 8 consecutive deer with one shot and anchored them in place. The mercy shot was only a formality when they were required.

Mind you, I only shoot to my capabilities and all my shots have been 200 yards or less (I got a nice little whitetail buck at 50 last year!). After all the range work I do such shots are ridiculously easy.

I have never recovered any bullets or done any expansion measurements or fired bullets into ballistic gelatin or anything like that. My motto is if it works, smile and use it. The same goes for excuses.

"It's not my fault!" Rusty snivelled, "My scope mount was loose...!!!"

catnthehat · #15 03-19-2008, 06:00 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Suka

Stack newspaper in a cardboard box; not as dense as a phone book, but not loose. You can get 4 tests out of this(sorta 4 corners). Shoot into it, dig through and see how your bullet performed.(careful, HOT)
I read about this a few yrs ago, tried it.
For decades I had used one make of spitzer bullet, always with great kills. After reading what a bullet is Supposed to do, and checking, I've switched to another manufacturer.
The only reason I had good kills was very accurate shot placement. The bullet did not perform as intended, in fact they failed miserably in both repeated tests, and comparing all the spent leads I've saved from animals.(no weight retention)
It always comes down to shot placement, but that doesn't mean the bullet is doing it's job. It's worth checking, I was amazed.

Cup and core bullets sometimes break up, yes, but that doesn't mean they don't work.
There was an extensive test done a while back on CGN with 6.5 bullets.
The only bullets that fiared well as far as weight retention goes were the all copper jobs or super expensive bonded core/Hmantel types, and not even those soemtimes.
This test would tell you that most of the bullets on the market that have killed millions of animals reliably are NO GOOD!!
However, weight retention is not the end all and be all, and i have also recovered cup and core bullets that expanded wonderfully with minimul weight loss.

I have used cup and core bullets all my life , and am not worried about them losing weight after they hit an animal, because they kill reliably.
FWIW, TSX's and X's have been known not to expand at all, and in fact have deflected OFF animals.
This all goes to show that NOTHING is perfect in life as far as bullets go....
Cat

archdlx · #16 03-19-2008, 10:40 PM

"I never miss, I can put three shots in one hole, at two hundred yards.....with open sights."

archdlx.....yeah....right....

Rob Miskosky · #17 03-19-2008, 10:55 PM

Well I never put much thought into bullet construction in my younger years and purchased the cheapest bullets I could find for the longest time - couldn't afford much better.

Recently me and a hunting partner both purchased a couple of new 30.06s, bought four different boxes of shells and hit the range looking to see what shot best. One of our four boxes of shells was the Federal MatchKings - a bullet designed for target shooting.

At any rate, the MatchKings shot by far better than any of the others. I managed to put a 3 shot group within 1/2-inch at 100 yards. In fact, both my 2nd and 3rd shots were half in the 1st shot hole. I was absolutely impressed with the accuracy of these bullets. Unfortunately the trade off is accuracy versus killing performance, but damn those MatchKings shot well!

roger · #18 03-20-2008, 07:27 AM

buying a discount bin scope and cheezy mounts is a sure sign that you are inline to see a 200 typical,
at -20C its like looking through a glass of water...and its the equipments' fault?!?!?
good equipment invariably ends up as a expensive equipment...how much quality($) do you spend (or not spend) before you acheive success.
spending copious amounts of money 'may' eliminate some of the mechanical failures, but doesnt mean that the gong gets rung.
buying entry level equipment equates to entry level performance.

duffy4 · #19 03-20-2008, 12:33 PM

No doubt some people blame the equipment when the falt is their's. But there are times when the equipment lets one down. I guess you could say if you chose to use poor equipment then you diserve to be let down.

Robin

LB 270 · #20 03-20-2008, 02:49 PM

I agree. Last year had a wt doe at about 40 yards. Pulled the shot, hit her too far back and couldn't find her. I use the Hornady Interbond Light Magnums in 130 gr. for my 270. As I was cursing for the rest of the afternoon looking for any sign of her, I knew it wasn't the bullet, or the gun. I still can feel the pull to the left when I think back. Still kickin myself over that one. Oh and the disappointment on my son's face.

LB

Tredeb · #21 03-20-2008, 03:50 PM

My buddy is the local Gun fanatic in our home town and people are always coming to him with firearm deals. He has at least three scopes that he has bought from people because they wouldn't hold zero. they are currently mounted on three of his guns.

Most notably is his 6.5x55 which has a nice Bushnell scope he bought for 50.00 after it would not hold zero on another guys .308 I used that rifle for 4 years running we never touched the scope. He would shoot a couple to make sure it hit, then I would shoot a few more(usually 8-10, but a few sounds better) to make sure I could hit and away we went.