The Infamous Shoulder Shot Question

[Mountain Goat]

This has probably been debated more than Presidential primaries, but here it goes. What exactly is meant when someone mentions, "breaking both shoulders" or, "broke both shoulders" on a big bull elk? To me, if you are breaking shoulders, then you are missing vitals, and your shot is nothing to brag about. I understand the high shoulder shot, which is actually a shoulder-blade/spine shot combo. What is it that you are breaking down, and why not shoot for the heart and lung area?

 

[Guest]

I can't speak for elk hunting, as I've not done it yet, but I can tell you that I've shot with the intent to "break the shoulders" on a white-tail before. Why? Well, two reasons. First off, there are plenty of large vessels in and between the shoulders, and you can do fatal damage shooting there. But the primary reason to shoot through the shoulders is to anchor the game and keep it from running down into a deep draw or canyon, or off of the property you're hunting on and onto other property where recovery would not be as likely. The big advantage is that if you break the shoulders, you'll invariably drop the animal right there, and you can almost always follow up with a second shot into the vitals on a target that's not going anywhere, so tracking and recovery are much easier. Of course, the sacrifice is that you ruin some meat, and sometimes a lot of it.

 

[longwinters]

I've never shot an animal with the intent of breaking both shoulders. On broadside shots I aim for tight behind the near shoulder about 1/3 of the way up the body. But if I can take a quartering towards shot I'll take that shoulder everytime.

No tracking, the animal is down with no arguments.

Long

 

[Elkman]

When you drive a good stout bullet through "both" front shoulders (low or near the center) you will typically break one or both of them and the animal will immediatley fall to the ground. As said below the high shoulder shot will go thru the tops of the shoulder blades and break or shock the spine. The low shoulder shot usually wastes a fair amount of meat but is dependable if you have to have the animal lay down immediately. The high shoulder shot is iffy because you can overshoot, or you can be low and miss or fail to shock the spine and not kill the animal directly. I have done all three and prefer to shoot behind the shoulders whenever possible. I recommend to all that ask, shoot behind the shoulder whenever possible.
Really a cool elk picture I have never seen one like that. :grin:

 

[Mountain Goat]

So where exactly are you hitting the animal to break both shoulders? What bones are hit? Let's keep it simple and use the picture I posted in the initial thread. Where do you hit this elk to break both shoulders? I'm really not seeing a shot at that angle that would take out bone and get the vitals.

 

[JD338]

A high shoulder shot will take out the shoulder blades and spine, DRT. Bone splinters and bullet fragments will cause trauma to the lungs. I like the high lung shot. The bullet will usually hit a rib going in or out and it shocks the nervous system putting the animal down right now. The lungs take trauma from the bullet and they die pretty quick while never getting back up. I aim tight behind the crease of the shoulder a couple inches aboe the body center line. This shot also has the bigest margin of error. If you go high, spine. Go low into lungd and or heart. Go back and its still a solid lung shot. Go too far forward and you break the shoulder.

JD338

 

[Guest]

If you're going to aim for the shoulder, you're aiming a little in front of the vitals. You'll try to hit the shoulder blade just above the joint, and it will take out the leg on that side. Get both, and no way is the animal moving more than a foot or two. Get one, and they likely drop right there, and then you can take a measured shot through the boiler room with no tracking. I've shot several deer through the "shoulder" (shoulder blade just above the joint) and it works for dropping them in their tracks. With this shot, you won't get much lung, and you won't get the heart, but you can get major vessels, as I said prior, and you can insure your tracking job is short.

After my recent experience of having to "sleep" on a buck in the woods, I will shoot the shoulder and then shoot again, as a matter of course, when presented with that shot. I like tracking them to where they fell when I shot. It's easy.

 

[super-7]

So where exactly are you hitting the animal to break both shoulders? What bones are hit? Let's keep it simple and use the picture I posted in the initial thread. Where do you hit this elk to break both shoulders? I'm really not seeing a shot at that angle that would take out bone and get the vitals.

The high shoulder shot while breaking both shoulders also will rip apart the diaphram muscle making it virtually impossible for the lungs to keep working while sending a tremendous amount of shock thru the spine and nervous system. On the picture you have I would proably opt for a good clean boiler room shot, but the shoulder shot could be taken at aporox 6" to 8 " down from the shoulder hump, and center of the shoulder blade in the picture, so 6" to 8" from where the black part of the main meets the tan color.

 

[FOTIS]

. On broadside shots I aim for tight behind the near shoulder about 1/3 of the way up the body. But if I can take a quartering towards shot I'll take that shoulder everytime.

No tracking, the animal is down with no arguments.

Long

Roger that!

 

[Scott Spencer]

I'd be aiming about where those two black spots are....just behind the shoulder blade.

 

[Greg Nolan]

As you said,"infamous".
The shoulder shot on an elk is supposidly to knock the elk down right there by eliminating his front legs ability to run and also do collateral damage to the lung area with bone fragments and bullet.
There is always more to the story. The shoulder bone on an elk is very much like the bone of a cow. They are big and strong and covered with big tough muscle, especialy on a bull. The idea of breaking down the shoulders to anchor the animal sounds good and works real well on deer and other thin skined smaller boned ungulates. This is often passed on as sage advice to elk hunters because it was read in a magazine or experienced with deer. The problems start when someone shooting a deer caliber with deer bullets trys it and the bullet blows up some muscle and doesn't penetrate to break the shoulder or penetrate and destroy organs. I discovered this first hand the hard way. A 300 Weatherby shooting 180 Hornady interlocks. 50 yard shot right in the shoulder on a cow elk. The largest piece of bullet I fould was the size of my little finger nail and it was lodged in the back hip. The elk ran off and I had a heck of a time finding her in the alder thickets. She wedged in the fork of an alder and bled out or I would have lost her.
I became a customer of Nosler and loaded nothing but partitions and Swift A-frames after that point.
In other words it takes a powerful, well constructed bullet to take out the shoulders dependably in my experience. It also ruins a lot of meat. An elk can run for miles on 3 legs. The heart lung shot with a big,well constructed bullet in a big powerful caliber at fairly high velocity. Say 225 to 260 grain at about 3100 fps. with a hit square in the heart/lung area will take the elk down within 200 yards. A 450 Marlin or hot 45-70 load with 325 to 400 grain bullets will do about the same . A premium bullet from most calibers to the heart/lung area will take a elk down also but not necessairily as quickly.
I believe the biggest mistake a new elk hunter can make is making a shoulder shot with a lightly constructed high velocity deer bullet, especially in under 30 caliber.
The heart/lung shot is the most consistantly successful.
This is just my opinion but it was formed by quite a bit of experience with elk.
Greg

 

[Mountain Goat]

Greg, that's a good answer and a good reason for using the premiums on large game.

I just don't like the sound of a plan that starts off by requiring a second shot because the first one is known not to do the job as another poster mentioned as his tactic. And the two black dots are just inches away from missing anything vital! Why use that as the primary focus?

I think we all agree that the high shoulder shot is actually a CNS shot, nothing new there. It is fair to say that on a broad-side shot, similar to the photo, that there really isn't a "breaking both shoulders" shot involving vitals, given from the responses thus far.

I understand that there are arteries behind the 3" of bone, but I would rather that shot be the lucky exception for when the lungs are missed rather than the norm of intentionally not aiming for them. :shock: Heck, if we just relied on arteries, we could hit them just about anywhere. Why not the femural in the rear leg, the hamstring to stop them, or the flat out hip displacement?

Thanks for the responses guys! But I'll stick with the heart/lung shot on a broad-side animal. My knowledge of anatomy was in question, by myself, because I just couldn't picture this shoulder breaker shot through the lungs. I still can't.

 

[Guest]

Mountain Goat, since I'm pretty sure you're referring to me, I'll reiterate what I said. When presented with a "through the shoulder" shot, I'll take it, but follow it with a second shot if there is any doubt. If I were given the broadside shot you presented in your original post, I'd shoot through the boiler room, unless circumstances dictate a shoulder shot. But that's not what you asked. Feel free to shoot however you like, for certain. Just don't question my shot choice when you ask a "how to" question. Maybe ask a "would you?" instead.

 

[SJB358]

This is a hard to answer question by me, cause rarely in my hunting life have I been presented with near perfect broadside shots, more than often it is slightly quartering and in that instance, I ALWAYS shoot for the offside leg! I have however had some good broadside shots where I wanted the animal to not move out of its tracks, as packing them back up the mountain was not in my best interests. In all cases, the animals were killed with 4 stiff legs straight in the air and NO movement other than a little rolling down the hill. I do use premium bullets and heavier bullets at that, just for that reason. I wouldn't fear putting a 270WSM 150gr PT into an elks shoulder all the way up to the 35 Whelen 250's. I know they are going to get through and are likely to exit.

Again, rarely do I get a chance for a pure shoulder shot, even trees blocking the shoulder preclude me sometimes, but when given that chance, I will take the shot. Scotty

 

[Greg Nolan]

There's nothing wrong with a shoulder shot with controlled expansion bullets with enough power behind them as you mentioned. I was just sharing my experience with a 180 gr. interlock at 3150 fps on a shoulder shot at 30 yards. I believe most folks on this forum know exactly what their bullet and load will do and shoot accordingly. I don't mean to criticize anyone's hunting methods.
Greg

 

[Elkman]

Greg
My experience is similar to yours !
The first elk I "saw" killed was a "large" Roosevelt Bull in the coast range of Oregon, probably near 700 lbs live weight. The bull took "two" 180 grain Sierra's out of a 06 at about 200 yards in the near shoulder. After a brisk 4 mile chase (downhill in the old growth) and a couple of more shots (6 I believe) he was on the ground. When those first two bullets were recovered they were a perfect mushroom right against the shoulder blade. The year was 1957. After that we switched to the 180 grain Partition and have never had that problem again.
In or around 1980 or so I made the exact same shot on a large standing mule deer buck with a 22-250 shooting 55 grain Remington Pointed Soft Points, with exactly the same results. Me and that deer jogged across the desert for a couple of hours. You are dead on when you stress the bullet makes a big difference.
As I said in my ealier post I recommend to anyone who asks, that behind the shoulders is the shot of choice. As scotty says that opportunity doesn't come along often, but like him my shot of choice when available is through the vitals at some angle or another. I know the country he hunts in and sometimes putting the elk down as it stands will save a thousand or so feet vertical climb back up with meat on your back. The picture shown is a slam dunk for a heart lung shot or thru the shoulders or even the high shoulder (which is not a high percentage shot). As the picture shows with the shoulder shot you have an area at least 9 or more inches wide and 14 or more inches high to place the bullet. If you waver to the left you can multiply those figures by two. There is a "large" kill zone in the front end of an elk.
I have hunted these animals my entire adult life.

 

[Antelope_Sniper]

After that we switched to the 180 grain Partition and have never had that problem again.

Funny how that works!

 

[SJB358]

There's nothing wrong with a shoulder shot with controlled expansion bullets with enough power behind them as you mentioned. I was just sharing my experience with a 180 gr. interlock at 3150 fps on a shoulder shot at 30 yards. I believe most folks on this forum know exactly what their bullet and load will do and shoot accordingly. I don't mean to criticize anyone's hunting methods.
Greg

No worries Greg, I am not sure if that was directed at me or not, but I knew what you were saying! Scotty

 

[jmad_81]

I'm with a lot of people here. I mostly agree with scotty. If I can get through the boiler room and have enough bulllet to break the off side shoulder that is what I prefer to do. Most of the country out west is pretty big, and most landowners wave no problem letting a guy go after a wounded critter. I can see the logic behind the high shoulder shot, but it takes a bigger gun, and more bulllet IMO. A lung shot elk with a .243 has a better chance of being recovered than one shot in the shoulder (the new 6mm Etip changes that a bit). Usually I'll take what I can get if it is not to questionable. I shoot enough gun to make sure I can get any ethical shot done.

 

[Mountain Goat]

jmad- one of the better hunting regulations in Oregon is that land owners are required to let you track a wounded game animal onto their property. Of course, you should knock on the door first, and make damn sure that you have proof that the animal was initially shot in a location which you had permission to be hunting. This happens frequently with private lands that are adjacent to BLM lands. The biggest problem are the jackasses that will hunt the private property and claim that they tracked or are tracking a wounded animal.