Shooting through barbed wire fences

J

jf1073

New member
curious how many have taken shots through a fence and not over the top? And, if anyone's ever hit a fence wire what happened.
 
Have hit a fence and a few other things. It happens, Have seen it a couple times on video too.
Depending on the bullet and distance it usually causes a miss.
 
I hit one once with a .17hmr and it saved a feral cats life. It didn't pop the fence in half though. I've seen that happen with bigger calibers while shooting prairie dogs. It just cuts the wire.
 
I've seen barbed wire get in the way a few times. Only once did it get cut completely in two, and that was while shooting prairie dogs.
One of the funniest times was a friend of mine missed a coyote that was standing less than 40 yards from us. I happened to be in my scope at the shot and saw the wire bounce. My friend was dumb founded as to how he missed. We found where his .243 bullet had barely nicked the wire, so it doesn't take much to throw a bullet off.
 
I've hit wire on more than on occasion calling. My rancher buddy simply refers to one of the better stands on his ranch "the barb wire stand" because I shot the wire the first day I ever hunted that ranch. I killed the first half of a pair and was 100% sure the second one was going to fold up. When I shot the wire parted and I figured that was the end of that ranch. All I could hear was that rancher laughing at me because I clipped his fence. We became good friends in part because of that little screw up.
 
I aim AT the wire sometimes with a coyote or whatever centered behind.... Think about it, that eliminates all but one possibility. Your bullet simply doesn't spend enough time on that plain to have a high probability of striking.
 
I have shot them.. Sometimes it split other times it did not.. When I was a kid i hit high line wires with a 22 shooting birds.. Never split one of those;)
 
^^Dont use a shotgun for birds on high lines. No Bueno. I usually aim at the wire to hit what ever is on the other side. No way am I hitting somethin that small.
 
enjoyed the responses thanks. have a set up in mind about 10 yards from a fence with no elevation for me and the action would be on the other side.
 
I try not to shoot things on the other side of a barbed wire fence. Cause that means I have to crawl over and get it. If I shoot something on the other side of one I really question just how badly I need to go pick it up.
 
I try not to.. But someone on a hunting forum once came to AZ.. I took him out and just as we parked the truck, and sat down out on the other side of the clearing was a pair of coyotes..

What luck..

turned on vole, and they came straight in.. The guy, waited and waited, then when they were about 40yrds away he takes the shot. Hits the fence and cuts it in half. two coyotes high tail it to the hills, I couldn't believe it.

Lets just say that it was a weekend of that kind of stuff and not what i could call a good trip.
For that reason if i am near a fence, i will just sit right next to it and then it's not an issue and i use the fence post to hide. It's also the reason that i carry a come-a-long now. It's a whole lot easier to mend the fence with that versus rope and a stick (tie rope to barbwire, put stick into rope and twist to bring wire back together.)
 
Originally Posted By: OKRattlerI try not to shoot things on the other side of a barbed wire fence. Cause that means I have to crawl over and get it. If I shoot something on the other side of one I really question just how badly I need to go pick it up.
For me if the other side is a part of whatever property I'm hunting and depending on my motivation that particular day I'm not at all averse to leaving it lay. I've shot over fences just never through.
 
fence lines are good places to set up, which also makes it easy to point the barrel through the wire, but if you set up too far away from the wire, like my buddy and I did last year, and my 20 cal bullet took out a wire, and saved a coyote that was standing 225 yds out...AND... by the time it stopped, my buddy says...405 yds... so I laid the crosshairs on it's back and spun it around like a top.

Hitting that wire produced my longest kill shot to that date.
 
I hit wires on a woven wire "sheep" fence on several consecutive shots at antelope with my bow and big fixed blade broadheads many years ago. I did a calculation and figured out I had about 40% odds to hit a wire on that shot so stopped setting up to shoot through the fence! No problems since!

We also shot off a bunch of wires on our farm when I was a kid. My brother and I were always fixing them before Dad found them. Varmint rifle bullers cut barbwire at both close and long ranges!
 
I hit a barbed wire fence last year with my 17hmr. It not only cut the line, the force also tore the next half dozen fence posts clear out of the ground and tossed them into the air and the bullet still killed that fox DRT with no pelt damage.

J/K. The hmr bullet deflected and the fox ran off.
 
Originally Posted By: DiRTY DOGI hit a barbed wire fence last year with my 17hmr. It not only cut the line, the force also tore the next half dozen fence posts clear out of the ground and tossed them into the air and the bullet still killed that fox DRT with no pelt damage.

J/K. The hmr bullet deflected and the fox ran off.

haha i was reading & like holy sh*t!!!
 
Originally Posted By: coolbrzeOriginally Posted By: DiRTY DOGI hit a barbed wire fence last year with my 17hmr. It not only cut the line, the force also tore the next half dozen fence posts clear out of the ground and tossed them into the air and the bullet still killed that fox DRT with no pelt damage.

J/K. The hmr bullet deflected and the fox ran off.

haha i was reading & like holy sh*t!!!

...
 
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My dad hit a large electric line once. We were groundhog hunting and a power line cut down this valley. We were shoot from one side to the other. A groundhog pops out around 450 yards and he lines up for the shot with me spotting. I never even gave the power line a thought as it was at about 150 and what I thought was plenty high enough over the groundhog. NOPE. At the shot I heard something weird and noticed the line bouncing and small fray on the top of the line where the shot went through the insulation. We waiting the hog to get a little lower on the hill before we tried again.
 


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