How to Choose Small Game Hunting Arrow Tips

Hunting small game with a bow is an outstanding way to extend your season and sharpen your archery skills. However, regardless of how high-tech your bow's sighting system is, using the wrong arrow tips — like field points or standard-sized broadheads — is a recipe for wounded game and lost arrows. 

Selecting the right small game hunting arrow tips will improve your odds of clean, ethical kills while protecting those expensive arrows from damage or getting buried in the ground.

How can you be sure you have the right arrows for hunting small game? Keep reading! We cover that today.

What Are Small Game Arrow Tips?

Broadheads are flying scalpels designed to kill big game like deer and elk through rapid blood loss. They create a wound channel that maximizes hemorrhaging. 

Using the same broadhead on small game, like a rabbit, would slice through the animal and still miss the tiny vital area. 

Small game tips are designed to transfer the arrow’s dynamic energy into blunt force trauma instead of penetration. This tip design leads to more humane harvests without excessively damaging the meat. It also prevents arrows from traveling too far and minimizes the chances of them getting lost. 

What to Keep in Mind When Choosing Arrows

When you’re selecting a small game tip for your arrow, here are a few considerations to keep in mind: 

• Type of game (birds vs. rabbits vs. squirrels)
• Terrain (rocky field vs dense forest)
• Arrow recovery (tips that prevent deep penetration)
• Arrow speed (kinetic energy at target)
• Hunting environment (open field vs. dense forest)

What Are the Best Small Game Hunting Arrow Tips?

Before you take your bow or crossbow out for a small game hunt, you’ll need to match the right arrow tip for your quarry. You should also consider your bow’s draw weight.

Generally, anything over 60 pounds in a compound will send an arrow through a small animal, no matter what tip you use. You can typically use the same small game broadheads for crossbow.

Judo Points

Judo points continue to be a favorite arrow tip for rabbits, squirrels, and all-around stump shooting. These points have four spring arms that act like claws, grabbing vegetation to keep the arrow from burrowing into the ground.

The judo’s tip is blunted to deliver sufficient impact force without excessive penetration.

Blunt Tips with Shock Collars

A blunt tip with a collar behind the tip delivers a powerful shock to the animal while minimizing penetration. The collar also helps prevent the arrow from getting buried in the ground if you miss the animal. 

You can make a DIY collar by placing a metal washer behind a field point or standard blunt tip. Another option is to drill a hole in a bottle cap.

Experiment with different sizes and weights to determine which works best with your bow. 

Hex Heads

My favorite small game head is the hex head. It has a blunt tip with a hexagonal cut on the face and is designed to cut and crush small game on impact.

These hard-hitting heads are popular with traditional archers who shoot at lower speeds but still want to maximize energy transfer. I don’t know how this design keeps arrows from burrowing into the dirt, but it somehow does. I have yet to lose an arrow with a hex head tip.

Fixed-Blade Broadheads

Small fixed-blade broadheads tend to work best for larger small game species like raccoons and coyotes. These airborne razor blades have 2-4 sharpened edges that create large wound channels and quick kills.

However, they will most likely over-penetrate and damage the meat of smaller animals like rabbits and squirrels. 

Mechanical Broadheads

The blades of a mechanical broadhead stay closed in flight and expand upon impact, creating a large diameter hole in the target. This feature makes mechanicals great for large games but not for small animals.

This type of broadhead is likely to over-penetrate and cause excessive damage. Plus, if you miss, they are an expensive head to lose on the turf or smash against a rock.

Best Bird Hunting Arrow Tips

Hunting feathered game with a bow and arrow is difficult. Still, it is fantastic fun and an excellent way to improve accuracy and timing.

After all, you need to hit small, moving targets and use specialized arrow tips for bird hunting to maximize your success and recovery. Here are some of the best tips to consider for bowhunting birds.

Blunt Tips 

The blunt tip’s ability to deliver devastating impact force without deep penetration makes it ideal for ground birds like pheasants and grouse.

Blunts come in a variety of shapes, from cylindrical to mushroom-shaped. Some are threaded and can replace your existing threaded arrowhead. Others are made from plastic that can slip over an existing field point. 

“Guillotine” Broadheads

Guillotine broadheads feature an extra-wide cutting diameter (up to 4 inches) and long, extended blades. These broadheads are specifically designed to immediately kill a turkey with a clean head or neck shot, often instantly decapitating the bird.

With this type of tip, you get a clean, ethical shot or miss completely without wounding the turkey. 

Snaro Tips 

Snaro Tips have large wire loops in a clover-shaped pattern behind a blunt tip. These tips are designed to expand the arrow’s impact area and are used for wing-shooting more “delicate” birds like doves or quail. 

Flu-Flu Arrows with Judo Points

Flu-flu Arrows with Judo Points might be the perfect combo for shooting birds in flight or perched in trees. Flu-flu fletching is extra large and creates more drag, so the arrow won’t travel as far but can still deliver enough lethal force.

Choosing the Right Arrow Tip for Your Hunting Style

Now that you better understand the types of small game hunting arrow tips, you’ll have to consider how these tips will align with your hunting style, gear, and game you’re pursuing. 

For example, if you love to do spot-and-stalk hunting, you may want to rely on judo and blunt tips. Since you’ll be shooting at closer distances, your arrow will still have plenty of impact energy with these tips.

But you’ll also want to recover your arrow if you miss. I’d recommend Judo tips if you’re hunting in thick vegetation and blunt tips if you’re in rocky or desert terrain.

For treestand, ground blind, or still hunting, where you may need to take longer and more deliberate shots, go with a fixed-blade broadhead for coyotes, hex head for squirrels and rabbits, or a guillotine broadhead for turkeys. These tips give you a slightly improved precision while making arrow recovery relatively easy.

You can’t go wrong with a good flu-flu arrow paired with a Judo point or Snaro when you're trying to shoot fast-moving birds out of the air. The tip’s broad striking surface and the arrow’s limited flight distance improve your chances of success while mitigating the safety risks of the arrow flying too far. 

Final Thoughts on Choosing Arrow Tips for Small Game

Choosing the right small game hunting arrow tip is only part of successful archery hunting. Use a hunting tip that matches the weight of your regular field points or broadheads.

Slight differences in weight can dramatically affect the arrow’s flight and accuracy. Also, practice with your small game tips to evaluate their flight characteristics. 

Wildlife officials do not view all arrow tips equally. Check local regulations on what types of arrow tips you can use on specific small game species to ensure you comply with your state’s laws. 

Put Safety First When Hunting Small Game With a Bow

As with every hunt, practice good safety habits in the field. Keep your surroundings and your arrow's flight path in front of and behind your target in mind. 

To increase your knowledge about archery hunting, gear, field safety, and ethical hunting practices, make sure you've taken an online hunter education course through ilearntohunt. Each course is tailored to a state’s unique requirements and can help you build the foundation for responsible and successful small-game hunting with a bow or crossbow.

Plus, our courses are fun and help you meet your state's requirements for hunter education!
Take the course for your state, then have a safe and successful small game hunt!