Arrow placement on a Big Buck

[seymourslayer]

Question for you, I have a buddy that has lost two nice bucks this year. He was wondering if your arrow placment for at Big Buck is different then on a smaller buck. I said that the older bucks chest is deeper and you need to aim lower then normal and their shoulders are bigger so aim a little more behind the shoulder then you would on a smaller buck. What do you guys and girls think?

[fasteddie]

First of all , is he shooting at a buck that is facing him ? You mentioned the deer's chest .
Lungs ang other organs are located the same so I don't see any difference other than a larger buck would probably have larger lungs .

[MI_bowhunter]

He's lost two nice bucks?  Dang.  Where was he aiming and where did he hit?  Shouldn't be any different.  Vitals are vitals.
 
 
 
 

[seymourslayer]

No these are broadside shoots and with a range finder. The first he knows he pulled off a little. He had a lot of blood but it went about 120 yards then nothing. The second shoot was at 25 yards and he said he felt that he did everything right. But the arrow did not show any blood. It had hair and skin. I think he hit it high and just under the spine. He is a really good shoot but has lost his confidance. I did not know anything else to tell him but to aim lower and about a inch behind the shoulder. He is shooting the rage so he should be able to bring something down.

[Swandog09]

I agree the aiming point isn't different.  Sounds like your friend is not hitting where he is aiming. 

[MI_bowhunter]

Maybe it's not his shooting that needs some practice but tracking.  No offense to your friend, it's not an easy thing to be good at.  If I shoot a buiser, I will only track with my father and my brother....no more...no less.  I've spent countless hours on my hands and knees just trying to find a pin-drop of blood to keep the trail alive.  The best advice I could give is to never give up....and to never get ahead of yourself (by moving to fast). 
 
Best of luck to your friend. 

[Goose]

The vitals are the same, if anything larger.
The second one sounds like it was above the spine...
Obviously just a guess though.

[JOEL]

big bucks have a thick layer of fat that could have plugged up the holes,could have missed the vitals and hit elsewhere ,coulda.....lots of stuff coulda happened.on the vital info DVD they have a deer hair chart that would have been helpful to identify where the arrow actually hit

[drdaven]

I agree with MI_bowhunter.  Your buddy needs to exhaust all efforts of finding these wounded deer.  Sometimes a deer just flat out cannot be found.  In my 30 years of hunting I have only experienced this once and it was a marginal shot that I regretted taking it as soon as it left the string.  I spent the next two days following the scant blood trail over a 2 mile range.  We determined the wound to be a muscle hit and hypothesized that the arrow passed between the shoulder blade and the rib cage without penetrating the lung.  The last few hundred yards of blood trail led across a cut bean field and the deer appeared to be browsing.  The deer, a six point mainframe with a drop tine, was shot during the gun season by a neighbor and the wound channel findings confirmed our suspicions.  The quarting too shot, from a high stand, never should have been attempted and I learned a lot from the tedious 2 days of tracking.

[buckhunter21]

As has been said, vitals on a deer are vitals, and probably even a little bigger on a larger animal.  Sometimes this doesn't hold true though for some organs...If you are of the same species, and you are bigger than someone else, it doesn't mean that you all your organs are bigger.  I'm not sure if the lungs and heart would fall in this category or not....I would assume they would be a little bigger but not sure by how much?