Crocodile Shot Placement

Hunting Crocodile Shot Placement

Post your questions, comments or pictures relating to hunting shot placement.

Hunting Crocodile


Hunting Crocodile

Hunting Crocodile Head & Neck Shot Placement

Post your questions, comments or pictures relating to hunting shot placement.

Hunting Crocodile


Hunting Crocodile

Afrique chasse points vitaux du gibier africain - Crocodile
Placement de balle pour un tir efficace

Thank you so much Jerome shall be very help ful taking my first African Croc this year.

Monish

Jerome and anyone with intel please advise.

While in Vegas I talked with many people about proper caliber and shot placement on crocs. I was told only calibers 375 and up with heavy bullets. Supposedly there is some sort of gelatin mass that really protects the crocs brain and spine????? I was originally planning on shooting that croc with a 180gr 30 cal tsx at 3500 fps but was told its not enough. I have a hard time believing that. In addition I am worried about my wife hitting that very small brain target. I've seen a lot of people on youtube speak about making a mid neck shot as it takes out the spine and renders the croc useless for a water retreat. On your croc shot placement guide you highlight the brain and brain stem on the croc. What about the mid section of the neck running the entire length of the neck? wouldn't that also be a great spot to place a bullet as you have more room for error to the left and right and would take out the spine?

Thanks in advance

Tony

Tony

I thought i read where the 338 Win Mag was caliber you can use for croc's...

But of course every country is different...

Zimbabwe Professional Hunters and Guides Association - Country Information and Firearms

Minimum Equipment Requirement for Rifle Hunting in Zimbabwe

A caliber of no less than 7mm in diameter with a muzzle energy of no less than 3 kilojoules is required for Crocodile, Hyena, Kudu, Leopard, Nyala, Sable, Waterbuck, Wildebeest, Zebra etc.

May be the law but that is a pricey critter to lose in the water.

Opinions on shot placement:

"Only two shots are effective in anchoring your Croc; a shot placed into his golf ball sized brain or one that hits the spinal column just behind the head."


"Art Wheaton used the spine shot on that big croc in Tanzania and executed it perfectly. Just possibly this shot offers a bit more margin for error since you have some latitude left and right (not much up and down). "


Hard to find credible info on Crocs.

Tony, The closest I have gotten to taken a Croc are the few hours spent stalking them, a few failed approaches and a second away from pulling the trigger on one... This is going to sound much like a rhetoric, but again it is more about shot placement than anything else and this could not be more true when talking about Crocodile as the first shot is needed to kill it on the spot. Crocs have a very small brain in comparison to their body size, a 3.5 meter (11.5 feet) in length Croc has a brain the same size of a walnut and as you said so well a "very small brain target"... As you know the key is to be on target, a good rest is crucial and the closer that you are to it, the more accurate the shot should be. I certainly like to take neck shots on game as it is very effective, however I have seen more larger game wounded and lost with such shot... as the exact placement of the spine can be a guess work at times, an uncertainty and can easily be missed. This is especially true the further you aim from the stem of the skull. The neck shot placement on the Croc is actually aimed at the base of the skull where the spine meets the stem of the skull... This neck shot is also very well defined by being a couple of inches after the smile of the mouth opening to ensure proper shot placement. I think that hitting the spine as you mentioned in the mid section of the neck would certainly do it however it would not give you more room for error and to the contrary it could very well be to your detriment as gauging the exact location of the spine may very well be a guess work instead of having a solid point to aim at on the body such as the brain. Some hunters are certainly better than others at visualizing an animal skeleton and organs but the Croc is so particular in every way, a reptile which most hunters have only seen on a few occasions, more than likely at a zoo and never thinking that they would ever take a shot at one... So taking this into consideration and adding the many aspects of a Crocodile hunt; environment, time being of the essence, distances, various shooting angles, size of Croc, posture of Croc, etc... after all that if you can help a bit by removing some of the guess work for the hunter I think that it will add to their success. I believe that your .30 caliber with a good softpoint premium bullet will be well suited to take that Croc of yours in the brain at a reasonable distance. Countless Crocs have been taken with this, smaller and similar caliber. I have also heard about the .30 caliber being on the lighter side when it came to huge Crocs but honestly this would not deter me one bit from pulling the trigger on one with such caliber. What feedback did you get from your PH? Did he promise you one over 16 feet? Let us know how things turn out...

Looking forward to reading what members have to say on this subject.

Jerome, you are correct with your statement that a croc's brain is extremely small in comparison to the rest of the body.
Crocodile is probably a misnomer.
They should have called them Politicians

Tony, whoever told you that a .30 cal slug in the brain would not anchor your croc is full of croc !

Keep in mind though that what we call the "match-box" (brain-pan as viewed from the side) is relatively fragile and will be severely blown apart from the strike of a very high velocity round.
Sure, your croc will be dead but make sure your on very good terms with your taxidermist as he will have one heck of a "repair" job.

The thing about crocs is that they are never really dead.
As stupid as that may sound, the point I'm trying to make is that even a profoundly mutilated head-shot croc will still wrigle, tail-flap, kick etc. You DONT want them getting into the water, even if they ARE dead, cause that's where all their cousins are !

In my opinion.. the shot to the end of the "smile" is the best option but you must train yourself well to be able to pin-point the location out in the field.
This shot delivers the shot energy to the C.N.S and ensures the best chance for recovery.


Take this for what-ever it is worth.

The Crocodile is a fully protected reptile in Australian waters therefore my views on all of this are purely theoretical

Originally Posted by PaulT

The thing about crocs is that they are never really dead. As stupid as that may sound, the point I'm trying to make is that even a profoundly mutilated head-shot croc will still wrigle, tail-flap, kick etc. You DONT want them getting into the water, even if they ARE dead, cause that's where all their cousins are !

Paul, you could not be more on target with your above statement... Have not had much experience with crocs but lots with snakes... reptiles! A head shot is surely effective, it will drop your game brain dead on the spot, but it will take most antelopes some time to die, most Gemsbok take upward of 10 minutes to die, not brain dead but heart dead. I have shot lots of snakes in the head and these will keep on moving for hours... and more hours. Just incredible, astonishing and hard to beleive sometimes... Reptiles surely have a different constitutions!

your a funny man jerome. my ph said we have a good chance at a 13 foot croc but anything over that is a very unexpected bonus. however the guy trying to sell me mozambique crocs told us we would definitely be shooting 16 foot crocs weighing 2000 pounds plus. i ran from that ph fast. i am glad to hear that the croc arent that difficult to penetrate with a 300 wsm. my wife loves that gun and i have it shooting 1/2" groups at 100 yards. she is a very good shot so i know she will get him. if not i will be sitting backup with my 460 wby just in case. wish us luck.

Sounds like fun, good luck to you!

Here is a good post by bowhunter Steve Kobrine on shooting Crocs though the lungs: Bowhunting Crocodile Shot Placement

A 14 ft 2inch croc I saw shot in Mozambique by a friend of mine with a .308 last year.

Neck / spine shot and it didn't move a muscle on receipt of the round.

Having said that, my pal was under a bush and some trees and couldn't get an inch closer, so had to shoot at 100+ yds.

I was waiting about 50 yds back behind an ant hill. Heard the first shot, then a delay of a few seconds followed by a 2nd and 3rd, which were purely for insurance.

It turned out that the delay between 1st and 2nd shot was caused by a big Legovaan that fell out of the tree on shot one and landed about six inches from the hunter's his left ear !

All turned out well though as you can see............

14 ft should be a minimum expectancy here. We counted 36 Crocs out of the water in this small lagoon in one day and estimated some at 16ft +

two photos of an 8 or 9 footer shot from behind and above with a 9.3x62 rws 293grn brenneke torpedo bullet. as has been stated you can mess up the skull quite a lot!