2023 Closure at Last…

Got the phone call I had been waiting for since rifle opener this morning…. Long story short I wounded the biggest buck I have seen in a long, long, time…it was opening morning and we were doing a slow push we do every year… he came blasting out of the push and was doubling back when he almost ran me over…I have a hard time not shooting when I see a big buck up close, even if he’s running…(working on it) he was within 10 yards when he saw me and whirled broadside for a second and then quartered away from me…he was in a fairly open bowl and I took 3 shots as he bounded away…my youngest son was about 30 yards away and watched it all unfold…he was close enough to see hair fly at my second and third shots…he left an enormous blood trail where he took off and headed back behind us…we continued on to fishing the drive, me ready to call the taxidermist after we quickly grabbed him on the way back through…needless to say, we followed a heavy blood trail for about 150 yards before it slowly trickled down…we bumped him out of a slough and one of my sons got two shots at him before he was galloping across my sisters yard and within feet of her and her dog…we searched for days and weeks for him…knowing his general direction of travel but never finding him…I enlisted a neighbor to help and he ran a creek bottom with his drone where we thought he most likely headed…he also spent time watching for birds, and searching as well…
This morning one of his neighbors found him and called him asking if he had wounded a nice buck last fall…he said he hadn’t but knew who had…also asked if it would be ok to return it to me, which is happily happening! Can’t wait to get my hands on him tomorrow…lots of sick feelings and sleepless nights can finally end…

Curious how close his final resting place was to somewhere you searched for him. Looks like a great buck and would’ve been cool to find him fresh.

I had a big one I never found also. Great shot with a bow. I thought it was perfect arrow placement. Well, 500 yards of blood and 3 neighbors helping never revealed anything. Still can’t quite picture the rack as I was extremely focused on my shot. All I remember is that it was big.

We were within 100 yards of him…unfortunately that 100 yards was 8’ tall cattails and 5’ of muck under them…ready to see him in person tomorrow…

Thats a dandy for sure!

Would you be willing to share what firearm you were using and the cartridge/bullets used.

Any guesses why you had a good blood trail for 150 yards and then it shut down?

Are you allowed to use blood tracking dogs where you shot the deer and did you consider this option?

Thanks in advance

Buffalo Fishhead

I’m not sure about the blood trail drying up…I’m guessing he was hit either back in the mid section or hindquarter…I was using a Howa 30-06 with 180 grain Hornady bullets… I don’t blame any of it on my gun or bullets…I shot at a running deer…got the fever at the time…we are allowed to use dogs but the time and terrain didn’t really make it a viable option at the time…second pic is the trail initially…first pic is the bed we kicked him out of…he left virtually zero blood after that bed..

Approximately 1300 yards traveled total…

This year, I heard a shot from my neighbor’s on Thursday morning during firearms. Approx 30 minutes later, a small forkhorn was slowly crunching through the brush 50 yards behind me. I really didn’t pay much attention once I saw what it was, I had a few other unidentified deer 100 yards through the woods in front of me. Anyhow I heard him pass behind and walk to my right. Then I heard him cough. When I looked he was 50-60 yards to my back/right and nearly all his guts were hanging out and some were touching the ground. He went another 25 yards before I got my rifle down off the hook and he was over the hill and down to the another neighbors. I watched him with the binos and he disappeared after another 100 yards. Well, 30-40 minutes later the neighbors from the west were the shot came from showed up looking for blood near the property line. I climbed down and told them I know which way he went. We found all kinds of blood and pieces of “parts” on the trail he took. Then I text the next neighbor to explain and ask if they could look. Anyhow, the little buck made it no less than 1500 yards after he passed me. Over a mile after he’d been shot and spilt. And he jumped from a bed still full of life and had to get shot yet. It’s crazy how far they can go on anything less than a perfect shot somedays.

Jackfish wrote:

Approximately 1300 yards traveled total…

They never cease to amaze me, such tough animals! Thanks for sharing, glad you got your hands on it eventually even if it wasn’t when you hoped.

It’s unfortunate, but I believe the day mankind discovered how to throw a rock or stick at all those animals running around, he also discovered the bitter disappointment of wounded game lost. Our weapons may be better than his, but we are always going to share that disappointment as long as there is hunting.

We’ve all been there or if not, then someday you will. Nothing is a sure thing or they would call it shooting, not hunting.

2 years ago, my oldest son took his first shot ever at a deer and I thought he missed. After an extensive search, my father found a single drop of blood. That was it. I was really worried that this was going to be a lost animal as the blood “trai” was literally one drop about every 10 yards. We were following more of a general direction than a blood trail. 100 yards later, there lays the deer stone dead. He couldn’t have lost a quarter cup of blood between where he was hit and where he tipped over. Clean double lung shot, but somehow the bleeding was almost all internal. You just never know, even a good hit can lead to a bad tracking situation and I can easily see how we could have gotten off track and never even saw that deer.

Jackfish, it’s too bad, but you fought the good fight and next time it’ll go your way.

oh….how i can relate to this story!!!!! it wasnt a huge buck….but it was nice. the amount of blood it lost then just like that it stopped….. and guys that i know that hunt in the area never found it either!!!!!

I had the same thing happen to me but we were within 20-30 yards of him and when I did find him a month and half later it was by dumb luck. My avatar pic is of him when I found him and this is him after a donor cape from the taxidermist.

I feel the pain expressed here. This has happened to many deer hunters who have been at it awhile. I am 60 years old and have had this experience twice out of many deer shot and recovered. One was an average 9 pointer I found about week later. The other was a huge bodied wide-racked 10 point that I found 2 days later by raven squawking within a half mile of the main search area.

Both of these losses were while still hunting on our hunting grounds less than 20 miles from the Canadian border. I sawed off the racks, but it is just not the same as recovering the animal while still being able to use the meat. It is hard, but has to be accepted and learned from..but they are extremely tough animals and it is a reality of deer hunting.

Within our hunting party this has happened to our son, my cousin, and my brother-in-law. My hunting buddy going back to high school days came within a whisker of this happening to him after breaking a front leg up high on a big boy, but he was able to keep after him among other deer tracks due to the drag marks in the snow from his broken leg.

He shot him at about 8 am and it ended up being an all day affair through some of the nastiest brush in the country with all kinds of twist and turns, circling, doubling back, jumping him a few times, then finally finishing him with a neck shot several miles from where it initially shot. We got back to the kill sight after dinner, quartered him up by headlights, and back to camp near midnight.