Bullet deflection by grass?

[Doodlebugger45]

I know we have all heard of light bullets being deflected by a bit of grass, but has anyone actually tried it?

This evening I went out shooting, still trying to decide which rifle/bullet combo I have the most confidence in this fall for elk hunting comparing my 270 WSM and the 7 mm Mag. As normal, I don't shoot at a real range, simply out on the prairie nearby. Also, as I normally do, I take my .223 Rem along, mainly to just give me more practice behind a scope and rifle and also let the 2 big guys cool a little more.

So tonight I find a great place and pace off 100 yards to put my cardboard boxes down to attach the targets. When I get to the spot I had chosen, I notice it had a few clumps of longish prairie grass a few feet in front of the target boxes. I found a couple spots that looked pretty clear and put the big rifles' targets there. I wasn't so concerned about the .223 accuracy though so just kind of plop it down in a decent spot I thought.

When I walked back up to my shooting position though and looked through the spotting scope, I thought I saw a few blades of grass about 2' in front of the .223 target. No big deal. I shoot all 3 and walk down and look at the targets. Turns out the .223 is the best of the bunch. Of course. So I change the paper and while I'm at it I change the location of the .223 target where I hope it's not obstructed by any grass. Then I walk back up to the shooting station.

Now though as I look down, I see ANOTHER small clump of grass a couple feet further away from the .223 target in my scope. Funny how I don't notice stuff like that when I am close! I can still kind of make out the target behind the dry grass, so I go ahead and shoot the 5 rounds and then the other rifles.

When I got down to the target though, I am surprised! The 7 mm mag and .270 WSM have very nice groups but the .223 is AWFUL!!. Instead of a 1" group, they are 6-8". All over the place. I'm pretty sure it wasn't me. The grass was very light and about 3' or so in front of the target.


Just curious. Has anyone done any rigorous testing on similar circumstances? It got me to wondering if I would have seen similar results if the light grass had been in front of the 7 mm mag. Yeah, that bullet is heavier than the .223, but it's about the same velocity. None of them were a .45-70 though. I think it would be hard to do a definitive test though. I can only imagine if the grass were 40 yards in front of an antelope though. Instead of deflecting the bullets 4", I would have been lucky to hit in the same time zone.

[Old Grump]

Didn't see your area and wasn't there obviously but that doesn't sound right. Are you shooting from a prone position on the ground?

If you are then a clump pf grass or a woody weed may be obstructing your projectiles before it gets very far from your muzzle. I could be something below the line of sight of your scope so you aren't seeing it. A 3"-4" deflection in 3' of travel for a high speed round like that seems to be a bit much. Early deflection would be more likely.

Have had it happen to me where my bullet was deflected by a finger sized twig 6' from my blind at a 60 yard shot. I never touched the deer and I couldn't see where I had hit the branch till I was walking back to the blind after looking in vain for a blood trail. That was a 180 gr bullet from a 308.

[Skan21]

Check out the Box 'O Truth.com They did a test on this using wooden dowels.

[Scorch]

Any material that interferes with a spinning object will deflect it. Paper, wood, grass, rain, etc. The amount of deflection depends on many things, but yes, it happens.

[phil mcwilliam]

I once took a shot at a fallow deer with my 22-250 at around 100 yards using a rest. The deer took off like it wasn't hit. It stopped and had a look back at me around 200 yards & I dropped it where it stood. It wasn't until we were dressing it out & removed the skin that you could see up to 20 small needle size holes that were freshly bleeding under the skin. The initial 22-250 shot hadn't been just deflected by light twigs, it had fragmented before hitting the target.

[Dutchmano1]

I've heard of .223 bullets being easily deflected by grass since vietnam. I found this post very interesting.

[GeauxTide]

A friend of mine was using my 7mmRM with my loads and was fussing about missing a deer, blaming the gun, caliber, ammo, ecetera. I got up in his stand and had him stand where the deer was and looked through the 'nocs. Noticed a small branch with a smaller broken limb just 10 feet from him. We looked around and found where the bullet (145Speer @3130) deflected into the ground, five feet away from the deer.

[30Cal]

I shot some 168's through a couple blades of grass one time and it was an eye opening deal.

Think about a blade of grass doing 2800fps which hits a stationary bullet. The bullet WILL move.

[Come and take it.]

What about huge slugs from 240 grains and up to 2 ounces?

[overkill556x45]

I've seen it on my ARs before. I've seen grass cause keyholing at 50yds. I was shooting Wolf 62gr JHP out of a Bushmaster National Match with a 4x scope, shooting at a Shoot-n-see bull. Five rounds went right in the middle, and three more went to the 12 o'clock, obviously completely sideways. Kinda made me think twice about using my AR for running 'yotes in the brush. The Box O Truth showed that 12ga slugs shrugged off obstructions the best, so if I'm in thick stuff I now carry the Benelli Nova slugger.

[ENC]

I know for a fact that if you set up several potato chips in a row a few inches apart and shoot them with a .22lr, the bullet can be keyholing by the time it hits the second chip. I'm not gonna say that it happens every time but more often than not keyholing.

You can try it yourself the hardest part is not having the chips shatter like a clay pigeon.

Evan

[csmsss]

It would be interesting to see tests of this done cross referencing variables like twist rate, velocity, and sectional density of the bullet. My suspicion is that this phenomenon is especially pronounced in bullets with poor sectional density, high velocity and fast twist.

[Come and take it.]

It is probably related mostly to the Inertia of the projectile.

[Doodlebugger45]

I agree with your suspicions. It's why I asked the question to see if there was a more scientific test with different calibers and bullets. Mostly for my own self assurance. If it were to happen shooting at a coyote or woodchuck with my .223, well that's no big deal. But if a blade of grass deflected my 7 mm mag in front of a nice bull elk, then that's a different deal.

I know there were no obstacles in the immediate vicinity of my shooting position because I was elevated over any weeds, grass and brush. The only possibility was the grass a few feet in front of the target. It could have been that I got an extreme case of jitters for only those 5 shots, but I seem to have been shooting fairly consistently last night.

I know there are no true brush busters out there. Even a 1/4" strand of sage brush will deflect a 45-70. But this was pretty remarkable. It was just prairie grass about 2' tall.

[Swampghost]

When the Mini-14 was first introduced we all thought that it was going to be the ultimate swamp rifle for our smallish deer. I ordered mine 6 mos. before the first one came off of the line.

It didn't take long to figure out that a trip through sawgrass would send them all over the swamp. The exit wounds were substantial which would be consistant with a round that was de-stabilized. The round quickly fell out of favor for deer hunting.