How bad does the roundball deflect on brush?

[Black Jaque Janaviac]

Just curious if anyone has knowledge of experiments with roundball deflection in brushy situations.

Is a roundball as vulnerable as an arrow? or more like a high power bullet?

I recently took what I thought was a decent broadside shot at a deer that ended up hitting it in the back knee. An honest assessment of my skill level could account for a liver shot or somewhere else on the margins os the boiler room. But there's no way I threw the shot so bad as to hit the knee when aiming at the chest.

Could the deer have leaped forward sometime between my pan flash and the ball arriving? Seems odd to move that far. I did not notice any particlarly large branches crossing the aim zone. There were some that surrounded the trajectory "pipe" but I should have been OK. The only thing I can think of is a small twig that woild be imperceptable at 50 yds.

... I did get the deer by the way. Just not a very proud kill-job.

 

[oletymepreacher]

I tested my rifles at close range down by the creek. Brush was willows. The 50 and 54 didn't hit the target, a 2'X2' piece of cardboard at about 5 yards. Thinking the 72 would plow through because of caliber. Missed with it too.

The result was to not shoot through brush. I agree, you probably hit a branch you couldn't see.

 

[Shifty]

I don't think any bullet is a so called brush buster, I found that out as a kid with a 35 Rem,I missed a big buck 3 times at about 60yds ,hit small brush each shot, so that is why I have passed on so many not clear shots because even with a clear shot there cans till be small twiggs i can't see.

 

[Sean Gadhar]

How bad does the roundball deflect on brush?

Just bad enough to ruin your whole hunt

 

[Patocazador]

It deflects more the closer the obstacle is to the shooter. If the brush is right in front of the deer, it still deflects but can probably hit the lethal area. Bad idea regardless.

 

[JeffG]

With modern bullets looking like formula 1 race cars, prb's are VW Beetles. Both operate in their own velocity range, and neither want to be shot through brush. :v

 

[coloradoclyde]

There was an article in Outdoor life in the late 70's early 80's and another in muzzleblasts in the mid 80's ...I think. anyway to make a long story short all projectiles will ricochet but the important factor is the proximity of the brush in relation to the target. The closer the brush is to you and the further it is from the target the greater the deflection.

 

[nhmoose]

IMHO nothing bucks brush

 

[nwtradegun]

in 98 I shot a spick buck at 65 yds. it was with a 20 ga. french tulle de chase. I hit a 2 in sapling. tree went down and so did the deer . it was behind the tree about 12 yards.

 

[tenngun]

I was shooting in to a hill side with some brus in front of it and my targets in front of the brush. I was shooting a .62 and having traveled through the paper almost all hit a branch or trunk. You could follow the path of one right in to the ground, but all took different paths.In the 10 yards or so of brush. the shot spread from less then 6 inchs on the target to better then 3 feet. The ball I dug up were badly mishapen.

 

[Black Jaque Janaviac]

http://www.outdoorlife.com/blogs/hunting/2014/05/how-much-does-brush-deflect-rifle-bullet

if you check out this article it has a conclusion that is not necessarily supported by the data. After traveling through brush the group sizes were easily tight enough to be on the kill zone.

 

[Eric Krewson]

I shot two deer in the last couple of years that were hit nowhere near where I was aiming at them.

The first was a 7 point at about 35 yards, dusk,54 cal Beck rifle it looked like a clear broadside shot in the fading light. I shot, heard the deer go down, went after it and it got up kept going, I backed off.

I came back at daylight the next day, found a little blood and trailed it, the deer got up again. I ran it to ground in a creek bottom and finished it off with a modern gun.

The ball had deflected from a broadside hit to a stem to stern hit, it entered the back of the front leg where it joins the body and came out the front. I was surprised I could find this deer as the damage wasn't extensive.

I went back to where I shot the deer and couldn't believe the tangle of 1" saplings I had shot through that were invisible at dusk.

The next; I shot a 4 point at about 40 yards with a super accurate .44 flintlock. At the shot the deer did a nose dive and took a dirt nap.

Deer always run off when I shoot them with the .44 so I knew something was amiss when this deer collapsed.

I aimed at its chest and hit it just below the jaw in the neck. Next I noticed a chunk out of a small dogwood in front of my stand. I was so focused on trying to see the sights with my 66 year old eyes I completely missed the fact that there was a small sapling between me and the deer when I pulled the trigger.

Yep, round balls deflect pretty easily.

 

[Jim Vatt]

All I've got for this one is that on more than one occasion I've still hunted into areas with bedded deer that "appeared" to be in the open. Only to fire and, literally, hear the PRB bouncing through the forest as the deer flagged off laughing at me! My two "most memorable deflections" were two does no more than 25 yards away bedded in the snow and looking away...I hit a 3/8 inch sapling that my tunnel vision apparently missed. The other was a large six point with no brow tines I'd been targeting. He stood up less than 35 yards away and I touched one off right as he looked my way...again, hit a sapling not even 3/8 inch diameter...He rubbed salt in the wound by stopping not more than 75 yards off in the brush for what seemed an eternity. Of course he stood there looking my way "with a smile on his face."

Both were .50 cal. PRB. One was 75 grains FFFg and the other 80 grains FFg.

IMHO, these tests are very dubious.

I used to believe BP conicals cured this ill while deer hunting. I probably have witnessed or heard of more instances of their deflections than PRB, but I believe this is largely due to those guys taking more risks at questionable shots because of a false belief in the bullet type "breaking brush."

 

[daniel collums]

i read it and if i remember the 30-30 done the best of the center fire but as the bullet traveled through the dowels it moved either right or left about 3 inches. 12ga. slugs out done all that was tested. seems like they shot through two or three rows of wood dowels. i didnt see the test done on the black powder rifles but i do know that grass alone will pull a round ball down let alone tree limbs and vines.

 

[Black Jaque Janaviac]

Perhaps part of the difficulty is that a muzzleloader has a longer reach than an arrow. So at typical archery distances your eyes can pick out the brush, but at 50 to 75 yards you are more likely not to notice 1/2-inch twigs.

Another part of my difficulty is that in the last 20 years the vast majority of deer I have taken has been with PRB. As my memory of high powered rifle failures fades I get more critical of PRBs.

 

[peter hawbaker]

No projectile fired from small arms can be counted on to continue in a straight line after encountering brush, twigs, trees, etc but round balls are probably as bad as it gets. The projectiles that tend to fare the best are those with a high length to width ratio (high sectional density) and a fast rate of twist (gyroscopic effect), something that is rotating fast is harder to push off course. Round balls are at the very bottom of the scale for both, they are as wide as they are long, and with slow rates of twist at best and smoothbore at worst, they do not have much gyroscopic stabilization. One of my first flintlock deer, shot about 25 years ago was similar to the original posters account. Held on chest with a steady kneeling shot at about 40 yards, broke back leg. Was able to track and kill deer with a second shot. Went back and found that I had shot off a small sapling about 10 yards in front of the deer, causing ball to deflect.

 

[jethro224]

I've missed two deer due to RB deflecting off of unseen brush. Both were @ 30 yard shots. Thankfully, both resulted in a clean miss.
One was a doe I shot at with a .62 rifle. I heard the whine as the ball ricocheted off course and she just pranced away. When I went to look for signs of a hit I found a small tree about 3 feet in front of where she had stood that had a fresh gouge out of the wood.
The other was a nice buck that I shot at with a .54 rifle. He jumped a little at the shot and then trotted off with no signs of being hit even tho the shot felt good. I couldn't find any hair or blood where he was standing and I trailed him a good ways with still no sign of blood before I went back to where he was when I shot. On closer inspection I finally found a shot-off 1/2 inch stick 3 or 4 yards in front of where he was.
Then there was a coyote that was saved by a 2" sapling that sprung up between me and him just as I pulled the trigger. That shot was maybe 20 feet and the tree was maybe 3 feet in front of the coyote. He ran up over a creek bank right in front of me and I swung and fired. Wished I'd had a smoothbore with a buckshot load...

 

[Skychief]

A friend and I have been known to place deer silhouettes cut from cardboard throughout the woods for practice.

We have also purposely placed them with brush between us and the targets. The results are revealing.

Let's just say, it will have a guy waiting for as long as necessary for a wide open opportunity.

 

[Wes/Tex]

Last season I had a ricochet off a small branch or limb. The shot was from a .62 smoothbore at about a 15 degree down angle. The 4-point was about 60 yards away and refused to step from behind small 4 to 4&1/2 foot high oak covered with brown leaves still. I finally took the shot since I figured a .600 ball would penetrated through anything in that small a tree. Silly me, at the shot Lil Bambi jumps straight up about 4 feet and looked like he'd stepped on a landmine since there was a fountain of debris from below him. Later looked and found a hole about the size of a 1 pound coffee can below him and perfectly centered between his 4 hoof prints dug in. I"d cut a small limb about the diameter of a little finger and the ball deflected at least 45 degrees or more downwards. He got a belly slap of mud and leaf debris and may still be running! I spent over two hours tracking him just to be sure I'd made a clean miss but found not one hair or drop of blood...for which I'm still thankful. Just shows what can happen if you take the chance.

 

[mooman76]

There is no magic bullet that does not deflect off brush. It has been proven even a high powered heavy bullet center fire rifle will still deflect off brush.