over-penetration

[aaronpigeonplucker 32]

hi,

today i was doing some decoying after school and i settup up a hide and lofted some pigeons in a tree covered in ivy. before long, a pigeon landed very close to me about 5 metres away. i gave it some holdunder and took the shot off. it went down and even though the pellet had gone straight through its neck its was still blinking and its head wasnt loose, it was tucked into its crop and upright. i wrung its neck and it immeadietly went slack. the pellet went striaght through its cheek. is this what over penetration is, when a pellet travels straight through and dose not do a lot of damage? its .177 and AA diablo field by the way.

Aaron.

[JackReid 35]

Yeh man sounds like a case of over pentration and maybe just off the kill zone. Shows howsmall it actually is. Was it the neck or the cheek? Maybe needed to be a bit higher if it was the cheek. With the neck you want to fairly central aswell to try take out the spine. Bad luck but you learn from it! Over penetration takes away some of the force of the blow, but saying that if you got the brain bang on it should die there and then. Sometimes you get freak things happen you know? You see it with humans sometimes e.g screw driver through head but still alive and completley fine (saw on a documentary) etc

 

Jack

[pest hunter 151 15]

i dont realy class the neck as part of the kill zone and i use a .177 with logan penitrators and never had a prob with over penitration so i dont think it was the cal or your pellets. hope this helps and happy hunting

[Phantom 631]

Yep, over penetration.

 

And from that range Aaron, there was no chance of you not getting over penetration unless you were using a low power gun.

 

If the pellet leaves the animal, then it takes whats left of the kinetic energy with it. If it stays in the animal then it transferes all its remaining energy into the animal as a shockwave.

 

I have seen a bunny get a .177 Biz Mag straight through the brain and it still ran off.

A second shot from a greater distance with the point of impact a little lower than the brain and the Biz Mag stayed inside the head is what killed it. My friend who did this went back to using his usual pellets that were light enough to kill at close range as well as 40 yards.

 

So as you can see a 'Brain' shot is not an absolute guarentee if over penetration occurs although 99 times out of 100 it will.

 

For very close range some people will put the pellet in backwards to shoot.

In theory this will actually work as the pellet will (because of aerodynamics) leave the barrel slower and move through the air slower therefore the momentum will be decreased and (in theory) depending of the power of the gun will transfere more kinetic energy to the quarry.

 

Phantom

[clubshot 22]

Kneck is Not a Kill Zone

 

Head or Heart

 

Needs to hit Brain or Heart to Stop it

 

9.50 Pentrator / Exterminators will go through Flesh

 

I have shot them throught the eyes and brought out Brain @ Back on way out

In a Sub 12FP Rifle

 

I have Stopped Jack Rabbits with a 7.50 Grain Defiant

Yet hit a small Rabbit with a 30 Grain .25 and Still had it jump all over the placed

With half it's Skull missing

 

Got to hit a vital Blood flow

 

At least it did not fly off injured

 

BOB/R

[festa 206]

totally agree with tony on this one it doesnt take much to go through a pigeon anyway but at 5mtrs you wouldnt expect anything else mate

 

atb gary

[Marksman 934]

totally agree with tony on this one it doesnt take much to go through a pigeon anyway but at 5mtrs you wouldnt expect anything else mate

 

atb gary

 

 

agree!!

 

 

Darryl

[Phantom 631]

I've only ever been accused of over penartation once

 

It did shut her up though

 

Phantom

 

Sorry Aaron, your too young for a full explanation on that one

Edited March 6, 2010 by Phantom

[aaronpigeonplucker 32]

i knew you'd make a joke about this subject tony.

[Phantom 631]

But at least I put the sensible stuff up first for a change