lungbuster12point06

I think this is somewhat of a loaded question, in that it is realative to the set up you shoot.............if let's say you are a woman or young kid shooting a 35lbs. bow @190fps. any bone will present an obstacle,regardless of the head you are using, but especially so if your shooting a mechanical...........same would apply for someone shooting a 50lbs. bow with a 26" draw length at 210fps. and using a BIG mechanical, chances are it may get through the facing rib, but would stop dead in the opposing rib.

If you are limiting your question to bows shooting 250 ft.lbs. of KE or more,using modern broadheads,I would say no the rib bones of a whitetail deer would not pose a problem............but what exactly would anyone learn from this post? you simply cannot shoot between the ribs,because you normally cannot see them. So from 10 yards to 40 what is the difference? Or are you trying to make the statemant that some archers shooting lower KE should limit thier shots to a certain yardage or less, that would be something to learn from a discussion such as this............but other than that what value does this question have?

Not trying to be a smarta$$ just trying to understand the logic behind the question.

JoshKeller

when you gut your deer, do you cut up through the breast bone to make ite asier to pull out the lungs/heart/cut the windpipe? I can do this fairly easy with just a knife, so I have no fears about my broadheads NOT going through the ribs.

GMMAT

I just keep hearing people talk about mechanicals asking...."but what if you hit bone?" and I had to ask.

If your setup isn't producing enough KE to shoot mechanicals (like you described)....then it becomes a little dumbass-ish to blame those issues on your BH.

So yeah.....using mocern compounds shot by people using ethical setups.....I wanted to know what the big deal was with the ribs......OR....if people keep citing other "bone" as the "real" obstacles for today's BH's.

Glad we all agree that this bone is no issue.

buckmaster

"something" happened when i shot my deer, the rage expanded and caught 3 ribs and lodged in the opposing side of the ribs, makes me wonder jeff if those rages had been shot before....[&:](like you mentioned)

Schultzy

I hear this too often and I don't think its a good thing at all! Not just this particular question buckmaster asked but other questions as well on why they did what they did.

djschuett

If you can intentionally hit a deer between the ribs from more than 10 feet away, you're a much better shot than I am!

IMHO if you don't think the arrow you're shooting with the bow you're shooting can make it through a rib and still have kill power, I gotta wonder if your set-up is worthy of using for deer hunting.

neb

I shot a mule deer this year on a hard quartering way and broke a rib and went through the bone of the shoulder on the opposite leg. It was a pass through but but did break the arrow. It just crushed that front shoulder bone.

WTW_Wyatt

I shoot the G5 Montec broadheads and have nothing but good things to say about them vs. a rib. I shot 3 deer with the same Montec before finally dulling the tip on a pass through by hitting a rock. They hit like jackhammers!

JoeRE

Of course ribs are obstacles, but not one that cannot be overcome in every decent bow setup. Yes, every. Show me a hunter that has fears of hitting ribs when he shoots and I will show you an unethical(to me) hunter. What person in their right mind would wander into the deer woods knowing that if they caught a rib they might not get adiquite penitration? Where are they going to aim, the neck or the paunch?

Now for my personal experiance. I have seen deer ribs deflect arrows. It has happened to me in each of the past two seasons. The following picture is of a 3.5 year old buck from fall 2006. As can be seen, the rib is split where the arrow first impacted at a significant downward angle. The arrow then slid up the rib 3-4" without quite enough energy to break through untill next to the spine. I beleive this is when the weakened rib finally split and the arrow continued on. It makes no sence for the rib to have split prior to the arrow sliding up it, the arrow would have penitrated then right away. The head then continued on through the lower part of one vertibra and out the other side.

Something similar happened to me last year as well. In both cases I was shooting a replacable blade chisel tip head, but rather than blaming my BH I am quite certain the fault lies in my setup, inadiquite FOC. I place the blame for this entirely on my own shoulders and am very greatful I recovered each deer. In my ignorance I now realise what I was caring the past two seasons was totally unethical(for me).

There is something major that I cannot overlook in this thread either, and that is deer size. Here a big buck 3.5+ years old has a massive bone structure, it needs to carry 250-300 lb when he is fat and bulking up in Sept/Oct. I would love to see a representation of mature buck's ribs from around the country. I bet they vary a LOT. (I am not blaming my occurances just on tough ribs tho[8D])






Come on, nobody here would ask a loaded question.[8D]

marcusjb

Last year's elk had my arrow go right througha rib. Cut it in half. The elk was broadside, but the rib definitely slowed the arrow; it did not penetrate through the other side. However the elk only went 50 yards.