…at dusk and 14 minutes left before legal ceasefire, I was getting nervous waiting for that 6-point Roebuck to turn sidewise 180 m to my left. Light was fading rapidly and he remained too close to the bushes he came out for my liking. If not dropped on the spot, he would no doubt jump back under cover were in wouldn't be an easy task to find him in the darkness (due to the heat, I hadn't taken along Czar, my (blood tracking) Labrador, fearing to leave him in my overheated car).

He went on grazing and it was now or never, a frontal shot or nothing. I waited for his head to lift, so that the crosshairs could center his narrow frontal chest. I closed my left eye, so as not to be completely blinded by the gun flash in the poor light, and, when the head came up, I let fly. I reflexively opened my left eye, just in time to see him go down.

I waited some and slowly went up to retrieve him. I found him dead all right but I couldn't see any wound or blood. Turning him on all sides, I found the small entry wound, where expected, square in the frontal chest but no exit. Night being so close, I started to gut him on the spot. In the open chest cavity, I noticed that aorta and lungs were destroyed, as well as 1/3 of the liver and the body cavity was filled with blood. No more damage, except that all the left ribs had been neatly clipped but still no exit wound. Then I remembered some previous experience and turned the deer to expose his left side. I ran my fingers all over the flanks and, sure enough, there was this hard, marble sized, tumescence on the left flank, behind the ribs and above the belly. I cut it open and a mushroomed bullet fell in my hand. After a square frontal chest shot, the 165 GK from my .30-06 had hit aorta and lungs before following the internal curve of the left ribcage, neatly clipping each rib one by one, before coming to rest, fully expanded and out of steam, in a hide pouch behind the ribs.

This is only the 3rd. bullet I recover, all coming from comparable frontal shots.

59% remaining weight and 256% expansion.

Andre, very interesting. Decent performance I would say from the Gameking.

It is amazing that an animal as delicate as a Roe could retain a 168gr bullet from a 30/06.

We were in Germany in January past at a driven hunt. Londonhunter was next in line to my right. He shot a Roe doe as it came towards him, very similar presentation as you describe, range was more like 30-40m. 286gr bullet (Hornady Interlock I think) from a 9.3x62. It also stopped inside the Roe. There was not a mark on the outside of the deer, just a red spot at the entry point at the base of the throat. Amazing I thought.

Thats the same bullet I USE IN MY 30-06 AND I love it. Actully I use the gamekings in most of my rifles and I've taken game from fox to brown bears and moose with them.
I'm not a fan of some of the new so called primieum bullets. Solid copper just dose not give the kind of preformance like in your photo.

Risky.... pressurised shot, worked out ok for you but many would have declined the shot.(me for one.)

A calculated risk, I would say. I took the second opportunity after skipping the 1st. I had previously aimed at the neck/back junction while he was grazing. However, I feared he might raise his head at the moment i tripped the trigger = head shot + a ruined trophy. I didn't "feel" it, so I engaged the safety, hoping for more favourable conditions. In my circles, I'm reputed for long range and/or difficult shots and so far, I never -knock on wood- lost a cripple ; missed (cleanly) twice though by misjudging distance. My partners attribute my success to my being a former competition shooter. They have it all wrong ! True, I fancy myself as an above average marksman but this is only part of the answer. The main reason is that I'll never take a shot I'm not sure about and for every one taken, I've given up several others previously, just because I didn't feel everything was perfectly right (position, aim, wind, etc.).

Must be great to have so many deer on your patch that you can decline all but perfect broad side shots.

Andre, I think you took a perfectly acceptable shot.

Here you make your own luck. I will take any deer with a 45 deg or better (quartering on or off) presentation.

André

I find it interesting that you did find that bullet, I have shot a few things with the 150 SGK from my little 308 Win,

I have yet to recover one bullet,

still I took a yearling buck, a cull this past thursday, "perfect broadside" or so I thought,

entry just on the top of heart, behind shoulder exit front of shoulder on the off side.

Took a leap and bounds, made it 70 meters before it expired. I was sort of shuffed, I was going for a high lung shot, so in short I missed my mark with about 1 inch, I was low.

Thanks for the story and the report,

best regards Chris

That's quite a long poke for a frontal shot but the only person who can judge whether it was wise is Andre. If he's happy then who are we to judge. I would say neck or head shooting at much shorter range is more of an issue.

I'm not surprised the bullet was recovered. Frontal shots are surprisingly hard on bullets. Generaly a fair bit of bone is encountered immediately (brisket, shoulder or spine) and then there's more resistance than lungs offer, either more ribs (only two on a broadside shot and sometimes none) or organs such as stomach, liver etc.

Weidmansheil Andre - was it the soft point or the hollow point?

Agreed 1894mk2, the only 3 bullets I ever recovered in over 3 decades of hunting came from similar frontal shots. Here they are (all Sierra GK BTSP, by the way...) :

L to R :
-Muntjac (160 GK BTSP from 7x64 at 80 m, bullet retrieved in ham);
- Red Stag (165 GK BTSP from .300 Win Mag at 250 m), bullet found in hide pouch on flank ;
- Roe deer (165 GK BTSP from .30-06 which started our discussion).

Very interesting Andre, thank you for posting your experience sir.

I have only recovered a single bullet so far, a 100 grain 243 from a fallow buck shot through the liver and rumen broadside.

It seems that the stomach contents are the most efficient bullet trap.

Regards,

Amir