Hello, Got a question that I thought someone may have some insight on. I have a whitetail cape that has about eight buckshot holes in the neck. A number of the holes have noticeable slippage around it (1/2" to 1"). I don't have a problem fixing it, but I was wondering why this happened? Is this normal for buckshot or did I not get enough salt in and around the holes while salting? There is no noticeable slippage any where else on the animal just around the holes. The deer was killed at 10:00am. and was caped and in my freezer by 10:00pm. The cape was split, turned, salted, and pickeled as normal. I first noticed the slippage when I took the skin out of the pickel. Thanks! JP
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You mentioned that 12 hours after it was killed it was in your freezer, but what you DON'T mention is where it was before it got to you. Was it paraded around town in the back of a pickup bed on an unseasonably warm day? Sounds a lot like that.
wherever the buckshot put a hole through the hide, there was leakage of bodily fluids - lymph, blood, perhaps gut or thorasic chamber contents etc. These fluids increase the ability for surface bacteria to live, or WAS the source for the bacteria that was found in higher concentration around the holes. The Ten hour period when the deer was shot and caped is certainly sufficient to allow bacterial growth and its' resultant slippage.
was the slippage around the holes of a circular nature? Kind of like
the buck shot hole being a bull's eye and the slippage area the next circle? Did the slippage cause a sloughing of both the epidermis and
hair? Or were the slippage areas of an irregular shape?
Being a biology teacher, I was going to tell you the reason. After reading the replies, there was no need. Stephen took the words right out of my mouth. Great job.
I have shot deer with buckshot,at a close range 15 to 20 yards and immidiatly notice slippage around the shot holes,this is due to the high impact burning off the hair roots not very common but it happens.I also shot a deer with my 30/06 last year and when skinning it I notice a very large bulge where the shot entered ,when I investigated the bulge further I realized the epidermis had splitt from the dermis and created the bulge all the hair slipped from that area immidiatley,although the animal was skinned in under an hour of been shot,the impact was so great by that 30/06 round "federal Premium partition tip"that the shock splitt the skin in that area.
That's why I had asked about the slippage pattern around the holes.
Yeah the slippage was uniform around the holes, and to have eight pellets so close together would suggest that the deer was shot at close range.
Huh!?! What does that have to do with hair slipping?
The athelete's foot fungus is an oportunistic feeder at the microbial
level. It will not have a uniform pattern of infestation, but random.
If a person has an athlete's foot infection on both feet, it will not be symmetrical from foot to foot.
Now if a person has symmetrical patterns on each foot displaying
clinical symptoms of athlete's foot, the probability is shoe dermatitis.
The uniformity will probably be caused by an allergic reaction to the skin brought on by sweaty feet creating compounds with the adhesives used to glue down the inner soles. This leaves the skin open for secondary infections, producing the same visual and physical symptoms as the athlete's foot fungus.
I would have to look at the concentric slipping pattern as not being of a microbial nature, but having been produced by hydraulic pressures created by projectile impact.
The 30/06 observation that Alex shared in his above post is an example of shock waves in a fluid.
Lead rounds will quickly absorb a lot of heat from the powder explosion. This is super easy to demonstrate to yourself. If you
shoot lead rounds through cellophane sheet, you will see that they
burn through at closer ranges. This amount of heat is enough to cauterize skin and burn hair at close range. The skin is in essence
"cooked" at point of entry also.
This is slug gun country here. From personal experience, a buck shot
in the sternocephlacus muscle of the neck that is coming out of rut
will show the same hair and epidermal slippage coming out of the pickle. It usually takes a two inch by four inch football incision to
produce a good repair. I am not the only one in this locale to make
that observation.
A few years ago I was working up long range in-line muzzle loader loads. At that time I was talking back and forth with the ballistics
guys at Traditions, Knight, and Remington. I remember one of those guys being a really sharp cookie. I think it may have been the guy at Traditions. He KNEW ballistics and beyond. He could go into great
detail in regards to skin, muscle and bone damage. I will try to locate this guy again. I might be able to talk him into a written
article if I can find him. I am sure a lot of us would find this of great interest.
Thanks for the observations, guys!
Glen