12-09-2022, 03:14 AM
Finally connected with a couple of does his morning and the grendel did a good job. I was shooting 123 grain SSTs that chronoed at 2400FPS and shooting at 4500 feet elevation. I shot two does out of a herd:
- Doe #1 was about 350 yards out and was moving into a 20ish MPH wind. I had a hard time judging the lead and hit her in the knee of the rear leg. Didn't know it at the time, I just saw her hit the dirt and figured she would lay down and die. After a few minutes she got up. I missed and then she turned to face me at 325 yards. I hit her in the skin of the front leg and the bullet went into the chest cavity. She went down on the spot and didn't move. I found a baseball sized hole in the heart, damage to the lungs, and a hole in the liver. The bullet went into the stomach, and didn't appear to exit. Very minimal meat loss and damage considering the immediate death. This was a really big white tail doe, easy 150 pounds on the hoof. I had to play leverage games to get the carcass into the truck, as I couldn't just lift her in.
- Doe #2 was about 125 yards away. She never really stopped, but at that modest distance I hit her and she immediately went down. Turned out the bullet hit the spine so she couldn't run off, but she wasn't dieing too quick. I put another bullet in her head and that was all she wrote. The headshot hit the skull and the bullet clearly blew up, not much left of the skull. The bullet that hit the spine blew the spine up, but didn't make a huge mess of the deer. This was probably last year's fawn, under 100 pounds on the hoof.
Overall I am quite impressed with the grendel. I don't normally like taking shots like these but I was getting to the point of do or die given my tags expiring soon. The minimal recoil meant that I could get a quick follow up shot when I missed. I had trouble figuring the windage on the far doe, but that is on me. Terminal performance was very good even at a pretty good bit of distance, but very importantly didn't do too much damage. What's not to like? Terminal performance is very similar to 35 Remington or my cast loads in 30-06 (198 grains doing 1900 FPS), but with much better ballistics and real fast follow up shots.
- Doe #1 was about 350 yards out and was moving into a 20ish MPH wind. I had a hard time judging the lead and hit her in the knee of the rear leg. Didn't know it at the time, I just saw her hit the dirt and figured she would lay down and die. After a few minutes she got up. I missed and then she turned to face me at 325 yards. I hit her in the skin of the front leg and the bullet went into the chest cavity. She went down on the spot and didn't move. I found a baseball sized hole in the heart, damage to the lungs, and a hole in the liver. The bullet went into the stomach, and didn't appear to exit. Very minimal meat loss and damage considering the immediate death. This was a really big white tail doe, easy 150 pounds on the hoof. I had to play leverage games to get the carcass into the truck, as I couldn't just lift her in.
- Doe #2 was about 125 yards away. She never really stopped, but at that modest distance I hit her and she immediately went down. Turned out the bullet hit the spine so she couldn't run off, but she wasn't dieing too quick. I put another bullet in her head and that was all she wrote. The headshot hit the skull and the bullet clearly blew up, not much left of the skull. The bullet that hit the spine blew the spine up, but didn't make a huge mess of the deer. This was probably last year's fawn, under 100 pounds on the hoof.
Overall I am quite impressed with the grendel. I don't normally like taking shots like these but I was getting to the point of do or die given my tags expiring soon. The minimal recoil meant that I could get a quick follow up shot when I missed. I had trouble figuring the windage on the far doe, but that is on me. Terminal performance was very good even at a pretty good bit of distance, but very importantly didn't do too much damage. What's not to like? Terminal performance is very similar to 35 Remington or my cast loads in 30-06 (198 grains doing 1900 FPS), but with much better ballistics and real fast follow up shots.
