stone points and turkeys

[Ryan_Gill_HuntPrimitive]

Just thought I would post this for those it may apply too.   Hope Eddie will chime in i know he shot one a coupl eyears ago and i want to know where he hit it.....    but anyways.  most of you all know I hunt with 60+ pound bows and my stone points and 500-600 grain arrows.  enough I am getting good pass through shots on deer in the last couple years.

  giving some info I have found on shooting a turkey..  twice now I have shot a turkey on the shoulder with stone with a 60+ bow at 10 yards!!!  and the arrow will not penetrate the wing for me.  twice the wing as stopped my screaming arrow cold.   not sure how its so capable of stopping one...  but twice now Ive drilled one square in the shoulder and... nothin...lol    so im sure its possible to sneak one in there and killem, but statistically from my experiences now, Im thinking the wing shot is a bad idea for stone..lol   folks are sendin steel through em there with less pounds than im shooting....  and I have tried 1 each, really sharp serrated point and one non serrated point and both small 70 grainers.  penetration really shouldnt be an issue....so i dont get it.   same set up gave me 3 pass through's on deer in the last 2 years and a hog pass through as well.     anyone else ever bounce one off a turkey??   Ive bounced a few in years past off deer shoulders....but thats a deer.....lol not a 15-20# bird..lol   guess i have to hold out for a back shot or quartering away hip shot or even head\neck...   just tough enough to get a shot off on an open ground bird when your not using pop-up blinds, without having to wait for him to stand still and offer the "perfect shot"

[Pat B]

Ryan, I've never shot a turkey nor have I shot an animal with stone(although I've tryed). A few years ago my wife bought me a bow built by a guy named Vernon Brown, a Peuble Indian from Taos. Vernon used very small stone points for turkey hunting. He said that larger points get hung up on the fearthers but smaller points have an easier time finding their way between them. His reasoning sounded pretty good to me.

[Ryan_Gill_HuntPrimitive]

yeah i have been a fan of the smaller points for sure.  maybe i need to go a little smaller yet on birds..lol  i dunno.  just hard to believe 66# at 10 yards wont punch em through....but getting good results on deer consistently took some time and trial and error.

[Pat B]

Maybe a longer but narrower BH would work better. Sort of an Ishi type.

[PEARL DRUMS]

I think the problem lies in the fact the bird weighs so little in comparison to the energy stored in the arrow it "pushes" the bird rather than slice through. Eddie said his was a coral point. My best guess is a materila razor sharp and not serrated would be needed. Something that requires less energy to push through or in to.

[mullet]

Ryan;

The bird I shot was with a 60# osage and a coral point. It was about 3/4" at the base and about 2" long. I hit it straight on a little below the base of the neck, dead center. The arrow did not even slow down and flew about 20 yds after passing through. The bird was with five more and they all flew about 20 yards and started walking around like nothing happened, I thought I had missed, and took another shot and clearly missed at 20 yds.

 They all started to walk off and then the one I shot  stumbled and then fell straight forward. After I cleaned it, it looked like I cut the heart in half like a razor had done it.

By the way, got one Saturday, Opening morning. :)Good Luck!

[Ryan_Gill_HuntPrimitive]

yeahi think the light weight of the bird has something to do with it....bout knock it down..lol   im shooting pretty small points overall..but i make a few "bird" point....pun intended ofcourse.

   congrats on your bird eddie.  if woulda been shotgunning it i woulda busted it.....lol    i gotta get one stoned this year..lol   so you didnt shoot through the wing then right?  not many accounts of folks killing turkeys with stone nowadays..lol   Im going to keep after it though.  smaller flake like point and opt for a "better" shot if possible

[gstoneberg]

I've hit a couple with steel points (got 1) and get waaaay less penetration on a turkey than I do a deer.  I agree with Pearlie, but also the silly things are nearly always moving and usually moving away from you by the time the arrow arrives.  It saps some energy.  I prefer to shoot them in the pelvis.  If I can I take the shot when they're strutting and the head is blocked by the fan.  Makes the butt of the bird a good target...fatal too.

They're not a real smart bird.  I shot all 4 of my arrows at one up in Nebraska.  Couple yelps after a bow shot and he'd come right back.  On the last arrow he watched it in flight and then dodged it when it got close.  My shooting wasn't too awesome that day.  I raised them for several years.  My hens got numerous visits from wild toms that never could figure out how to do the deed through the fence...but were sure willing.

George

[Ryan_Gill_HuntPrimitive]

thanks George, glad to her someone else say they are tougher to penetrate than a deer....  thats the results I am seeing.  even with a needle sharp tip i dont get good penetration even on the cartilage pad of a deers shoulder.  stone really has a harder time penetrating anything tough.  soft materials allow it to really cut and glide, but hard spots slow em down way too much compared to steel.  i think i am going to resort back to some of my cane shafts with the really skinny footed hardwood shaft on the end.  bout the diameter of a pencil and tip it with a little 3\4 wide x 1 1\4 long chert point  and flake thin.   ol gobbler will break the crap outa it, but i bet that will slip through...but if i get the chance, i want to hit the base of the neck, or the back or up the bung.  these Oceola birds dont strutt nearly as much as those merriams on MT

[Dazv]

My teachers friend had the same thing happen to a turkey and if I remember the advise he was given was to use a thinner points.

[mullet]

Ryan, I think the bird I shot is still in Shooting and Hunting, I think the last year that is still up. There is a picture with the point on there somewhere. The point wasn't serrated. I do not think you get the penetration on a turkey with a serrated point. I believe the feathers pile up on the jagged edges and the point was also not notched. It was a triangle with the shaft wrapped behind the point with sinew.

Yea, It's the 2007 post, second page.

[Ryan_Gill_HuntPrimitive]

thats what i have mounted on my arrows now..just as you described.  little flake point, non serrated and no notches, just wrapped a little behind the point.  point is small.  not as sharp as i normally like them..but no serrations, but still decently sharp.   they are way thinner and narrower than the one that didnt go in

[mullet]

Also, when you look at the large wing bone that attaches to the shoulder, it is one of the biggest and thickest bones they have along with the Primary feathers that are thick and tough. The same reason that when newbies shotgunning their first bird don't recover it when they make a body shot instead of a head shot. I don't know how many birds I've cleaned that had an assortment of different size shot under the skin that wasn't what I was shooting.

[Dazv]

thats what i have mounted on my arrows now..just as you described.  little flake point, non serrated and no notches, just wrapped a little behind the point.  point is small.  not as sharp as i normally like them..but no serrations, but still decently sharp.   they are way thinner and narrower than the one that didnt go in

how do you go about making a non serrated stone point??? Every flake you take off with a pressure flaker will create a small serrateion? How do you do it? Thanks allot

[Ryan_Gill_HuntPrimitive]

well i rekon technically it is still serrated, just very finely.  but you gotta almost chip the serrations off to even it out