absolute minimum KE for deer, caribou?

[deermaster1]

i'm not talking about minimum to start with at the "muzzle", but absolute minimum you would feel comfortable with downrange.  3:1 3 blade head, thin carbon shafts 450 gr with a perfect tune.  what would your minimum amount be for deer, and then caribou? thanks for any info!

[beachbowhunter]

If you've already go the shaft flying well, your minimum would depend on the minimum legal draw weight and the efficiency of your bow.

[LKH]

If you're shooting a bow of Legal draw weight you have enough for bou.  They are not heavy boned and if you stay away from the shoulders you have plenty.

[Bjorn]

I don't want to get into the arrow weight issue here, it gets so overdone, so I'll just recommend against the 3 blade coming out of a light set up. You want to penetrate both lungs and a three blade offers a lot more resistance.
Getting in close will have a lot to do with success or failure. An arrow coming from a 40# bow at 12 feet can be a monster, and at 70 feet barely cut through the skin with a 3 blade.

[Biggie Hoffman]

Iiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiii don't know about that

An arrow is just as deadly at 70 feet as it is at 12.

[ChuckC]

I am thinking that you should hold off going unless you are shooting 80 - 90 pounds with at least a 1,000 grain arrow,  just to be sure.
   
ChuckC

[LKH]

said the man, facetiously. Anyone know how to spell that word??

[returntoarchery]

According to my reading of Dr Ashby's reports, KE is not a predictor of arrow penetration / lethality. Other factors as mentioned above such as 2 blade broadhead, broadhead sharpness, single bevel broadheads, tuned arrow flight, arrow mass, arrow FOC, arrow shaft diameter to broadhead ferrule diameter ratio, etc. are better predictors of arrow penetration / lethality and therefore should be the focus of arrow building and selection for game.

From what I gather Dr. Ashy's reports can spark some heated debates but at least you've got someone trying to empirically quantify arrow lethality whether you agree/disagree with his methods. IMHO worth considering his findings regardless of which side of the fence you're on.

[returntoarchery]

What you'll really need is enough KE to have an arrow trajectory sufficient to hit the game and not the ground 2 feet in front of them.    

[James Wrenn]

I have no idea what the min for deer would really be.I know with as little as 25lbs and an arrow on the heavy side I have shot though them and broken offside legs at 30yds.That same arrow that weighed just over 500gns would have done the same thing on the same hit at 70yds.If you shoot a medium weight arrow it is pretty deadly much farther than I can hit something. :)I don't know squat about caribou except it is some of the best eating critter I have had.  :D

[Rico]

with as little as 25lbs and an arrow on the heavy side I have shot though them and broken offside legs at 30yds.

Thats the most minimum I've heard so far.

[DW]

This is gonna get interesting!!!!

[James Wrenn]

Rico that is a 500gn arrow traveling 150fps.There are many all wood bows killing deer each year with specs like that.Most people just don't worry about it or break it down into numbers.The lowest that I have personaly used was a wood bow shooting a 480gn cedar at 145.That is onlt 22lbs.I hit the buck as he ran under the stand going away at about 16 yards and caught him almost between the hips up high.The intercepter got liver and one lung but did not exit his chest.Many guys that don't have long draws and like primitive bows kill animals with a lot less energy than many think is required. jmo

[Widowbender]

KE, IMHO is something that has more relevance when dealing with ballistics, not archery. M.O.I. or momentum is a more appropriate application for the bowhunter. I think a good place to start to look for a minimum poundage would be to check the regulations for the area you are hunting. If I were hunting with  the minimum poundage, I might use a two blade head instead of three. Conventional Wisdom is that a two blade head will out penetrate a three blade head, but that doesn't always turn out to be the case in the field. Personally, I like the three blade head for deer. I like to make a big hole in 'em!! Find the poundage you are comfortable with and go from there.

[Tree man]

Trying to quantify a minimum adequate kinetic energy level or a minimum momentum level is futile in my opinion. Likewise minimum drawweights mean little aside from legal requirements for the jurisdiction one is hunting in. There always sems to be a story of some lesser perfomance level that performed just fine.

I'm going to mention something that I have noticed and wonder how it squares with other hunters' experiences----While penetration can vary from shot to shot on similar game, overall I have noticed that average penetration seems to be about the same when similar traditional 2 blade heads are shot from bows from 40-60 lbs on arrows from 400-600+ grains. While my preference has been toward arrows on the "heavy" side in terms of grains per pound I really haven't noticed a great deal of difference in actual performance between arrow weights or even kinetic energy and momentum levels on light big game.

[Rico]

Rico that is a 500gn arrow traveling 150fps.There are many all wood bows killing deer each year with specs like that.Most people just don't worry about it or break it down into numbers.

  You're right Never thought of it that way. Thanks might give it a try I do have a 25# bow.

[James Wrenn]

Well if you have a 25lb bow that will move a 500gn arrow 150fps you got a darn good one or some mighty long arms.  

[T-Bone]

Rico, 25 lbs of ke is typical of a 40-42# bow.
On Peteward.com Shannon Kuzik killed a large Canadian bull moose with only 23 lbs of KE. That was from a 40# recurve.  You may have been thinking bow poundage and not foot lbs of ke.

[Rico]

Yes thats right T-Bone I was thinking bow weight my bad I was thinking it was you James with the hell of a bow. No need testing that old 25lber now I guess.

[Tree man]

James, I don't think everyone picked up on the lbs you were referring to being foot pounds of energy. As you clearly know, a 500grain arrow at 150 fps would be typical performance for a 50 lb selfbow with moderate stringfollow.
Just to mess with everyone's heads.... My Dad got asked to rework a bow for higher performance several years ago. Dad said that he would see what he could do. The owner had what he thought was a 35lb bow which he had used to kill a couple of deer and had used to finish many coyotes and other animals in his years as a professional trapper. When Dad received the bow he checked it over, verified moisture content and cautiously weighed it. It was  an old lemonwood youth bow-60 inches long that had withstood years of being drawn to 27 inches, had over 3 inches of stringfollow and weighed a whopping 27 lbs at 27 inches. The owner said that the arrows stayed in the deer but the broadheads exited the off side... he just wanted a little more oomph to flatten trajectory and make it better if he tried to shoot a bigger animal! Dad sinewbacked it and retillered it to 40 lbs @27 with a bit of reflex upping performance substancially.
Ron Pittsley has a story about his little grandson burying a field tip into a 2x4 in the garage playing with Ron's 6 lb draw drawcheck bow. We'll debate what constitutes "enough" forever but think about it...Would you let anyone shoot a sharp broadhead at you from ANY bow? A broadhead flying has the potential to cause dying.