neck shot yes or no

[jamesthomas]

Same here, I'm not so desperate for venison that I'll take a neck shot. Only heart or lung shots for me.

 

[gjr902]

I'm a no on the neck shot too. Only once have I seen a neck shot pay off immediately. A buddy took a bear at 30 yards with a slug from a shotgun. Dropped him instantly, but he also got both jugular veins. I've seen and heard lots of guys doing lots of tracking with a neck shot for deer.

 

[mooman76]

I'm a no neck guy too. There is allot of good meat in the neck and you waist less meat with a heart lung shot which is a bigger target. I've seen neck shots go bad and the animal was never found that probably died eventually. I don't really understand the whole neck shot thing myself.

 

[broknaero]

Nope, I'll pass.

 

[Moose Guide]

I usually pass on a neck shot, although my biggest elk and my last mulie fell to neck shots I prefer a bigger target.

 

[VEARL]

I prefer heart/lung shots myself. I did drop one with my bow thru the neck while she stood looking straight at me. Severed her spine and dropped right there.
But, as others have said...prefer a good sideshot thru the vitals.

 

[larry wv]

No for me also. Larry

 

[Robby]

No
Robby

 

[Rat Trapper]

I'll take a head shot over a neck shot any day and then only if it is close. I can put a bullet in the ear cause I can see the ear. On the neck shot I can't see the spine and it is too small. In fact I seldom even take a head shot, cause I almost always go for a double lung shot. Now I might shoot some does in the head if I need some skins to tan with out holes in them, but that would be about the only time.

 

[hoochiepapa]

To qualify my answer, if no other shot presents itself, I WILL take a neck shot. AT CLOSE RANGE. I consider myself a fairly good shot, ( although my targets for forum competition don't show it) I have taken two pronghorn through the neck on a dead run, numerous deer and elk at close range when no other shot presented itself. I'll not apologize for those shots, I have never wounded any animal under those circumstances. And please understand, none of this was with black powder.
I think a person should do what he or she feels comfortable with, and I do.

 

[hanshi]

I've killed two deer with muzzleloaders that were shot in the neck - the deer, not the rifles. Okay, here's the punchline; both were by accident. One was moving and I over lead him, the other twitched as I touched the trigger. they were both close shots, too, and died in their tracks. The only deer (1) I ever shot in the neck on purpose was shot with a modern rifle.

I always aim for the heart/lung area but in an emergency would go for the liver (haven't had to do that yet). If a deer were really close, say, not over 15 yards, I would shoot the neck if it were the only chance I'd get (hasn't happened yet). So then, except for a couple of accidents, I've yet to aim and shoot the neck.

 

[gjr902]

I alwys felt the neck roast from a black bear was the best piece of meat on the bear. IMHO

 

[S.Kenton]

I have taken a couple of deer with neck shots..but I'd surely rather wait for a nice shot at the ol' boiler room. Too much of a chance for a bad shot, which could end up in a day of tracking..

 

[Spikebuck]

Maybe it's my bowhunting background, but I never try for neck shots. If that's all that's offered, I pass vs take the chance of only wounding. I know I'll feel a lot better walking out of the woods knowing I made the right decision than I will shooting something when I shouldn't have and then not getting it.

 

[James Stella]

I would never take a neck or head shot instead of a heart lung shot!!

A friend we use to hunt with was quail hunting one time and came across a deer trying to drink water. It would put its mouth in the water and make this weird slurping sound. After watching it for a few minutes he realized its bottom jaw was broken. He put it out of its misery. It had been shot in the jaw with a bullet. This was about a week after deer season had closed and the jaw was all infected. I can not imagine how that deer was suffering.

My dad was hunting in Wyoming on some public land near a ranch. As he was driving back to camp the rancher flagged him down and asked him if he had a deer tag and would kill a deer for him. It was just standing in one of his fields and he knew something was wrong with it. He showed it to my dad and it was a very nice mule deer 4 point. My dad shot it. Upon examination its bottom jaw was broken by a bullet.

I once watched a friend of mine shoot a deer in the neck with a 55 lb compound bow. The deer was facing right at him at about 30 yards. The arrow actually stuck in his spine. We tracked that deer all day and never found it. About 400 yards from where he shot it we did find ¾ of the arrow where the deer put it to the ground and snapped it off leaving the braodhead stuck in its neck.
I shot a deer once with a 30-06 and knocked it down. I went up to it and it jumped up and started to run away from me at about 40 yards. I tried to put a bullet right where the back of the head and the spine meet. I missed the spine by about half an inch to the right. The bullet went through the neck meet and shattered the deer’s jaw. A very none fatal hit, if it did not already have a bullet in the chest I would have lost that deer.

I did shoot one deer in the neck. I was shooting a 280 and had stalked the deer in its bed. It was facing straight away from me at about 90 yards. It had no idea I was there. I had plenty of time. I held the 6 power scope right on the dark hair line that runs up the spine and severed its neck. It never moved.

I consider myself a pretty good shot. I have 25 years of military and police marksmanship and sniper training. 40 years of hunting experience. But I can’t say that I am good enough to always put a bullet into an area that is 2” wide under field conditions, so I will take the heart lung shot every time.

 

[hoochiepapa]

See the hole? The only elk I have ever killed with a ml that was a head shot. I completely missed him the first shot because it was a hang fire and he ducked down, the shot going over his back. I was so close to the fence of an anti rancher that I was afraid if I did a double lung he would go over the fence. And that guy is such a jerk he would never let me recover the animal. The shot was about 30-40 yards, Cabela's Hawken, .54, Hornady Great Plains bullet, 100 grains pyrodex.
These huge racks are nice, but I'm a meat hunter.

 

[Stumpkiller]

An Elk's head is still a fairly good sized target at 50 yards. A whitetail's head, on the other hand, is 1/5 the size, lighter and more maneuverable, and able to move considerably in a fraction of a second. I have taken head shots at very close range (when they peek around a tree, for instance), but the last one I did I wished afterwards I had not. Took out half the brain and skull, but apparantly the wrong half.

H.P.Lovecraft type horror story involved but not necessary to relate. THE ADMIRAL arrived before it had ended and she never went hunting again.

The food chain is neither cruel nor kind, but this was not a dignified death for a magnificent animal. Certainly head shots should be a quick death, but I wouldn't take one with a bow and I don't plan on taking another with a muzzleloader. Certainly this was a freak occurance and I had prior successes with close head shots. Just changed my point of view on them.

 

[hoochiepapa]

This is the only one I have ever taken, I had hunted hard for three days and was the first elk I saw. He was with a forky that was bigger, and I would rather have shot him, but he ran back into the timber when I raised my rifle. We had a soft rule in our family camp that you don't pass up a shot, it might be the only one you get, and there would always be sommeone there to help you get it out. I guess I forgot I was hunting alone. It was four miles back to camp, and thankfully I had my hauler. By the time I walked back to camp to get the hauler, took it to where this spike was, and hauled him back to camp, it was dark, and I had gone about twelve miles. :shocked2: Best elk I ever ate. :grin:

 

[Bill Hall]

An Elk's head is still a fairly good sized target at 50 yards.

Oh, but that brain doesn't make a very big target. I knocked down a mature 5x5 elk with a perfect shot right between the eyes. He was standing about 50 yards away, rubbing his antlers on a tree, then looked right at me. His head was all that was not being blocked by the tree, so I took the shot. He dropped straight down, then rolled over twice and bounced right back up on his feet. He danced around like he was drunk until I dropped him with a lung shot.

Turns out an elk's brain is right at the top of his skull, and I shot just under it. I would definitely take a head shot again, but only under perfect conditions, and very close. But if I have a good chest shot, there's no question where that ball is going, LUNGS. Bill

 

[hoochiepapa]

+++1