One of the bears we shot this year had a broadhead in the spine from last year and part of the arrow was floating around in his guts. He also must have been raiding someones birg feeder because it appeared that he had been peppeppered with buckshot and what also appeared to be .22 cal. holes in him. I have lost a deer and a bear before and both appeared to be good hits. The deer was with a firearm and the bear with a bow. Both we bleeding out both sides and leaving a good blood trail and then nothing as if the vanished. It happens or will happen to most everyone sooner or later. I have been tracking one for someone and it went into a swamp wher I was walking on a bog until I broke through and went up almost to my waist. That was the end of tracking that deer and I felt bad, But like I said it happens. It is just part of hunting and something you have to accept, But do your best to prevent.

 

You just try to do the level best you can about things like that but no matter how hard you try it is going to happen to everyone sooner or later. I've blown shots and wounded animals and not been able to retrieve them on a couple of occasions. Once I had a relatively easy shot a buck but evidently the bullet deflected off a limb I didn't see. I hit him pretty far back and even though he was leaving a halfway trackable blood trail he hopped a fence in a restricted government installation. I couldn't follow him obviously lest I be subjected to "Deadly Force" that the sign assured me was indeed authorized. I did contact someone at the facility the next morning and received permission (and an escort) to attempt to retrieve the animal but during the night snow had fallen and made tracking next to impossible. We searched for several more hours that AM but the worsening weather made further searching futile.

As long as you did your best to find the animal and hunted it in an ethical manner to begin with you don't have anything to feel guilty about. Just makes us more careful about our shot placement and choice of weapon and ammunition the next time.

Of course I use to live next door to a jackass who insisted on shooting deer with a .22 rimfire and made up for the large percentage of animals he wounded and lost by shooting more. He was a buddy of the local game warden and no matter how many times he was turned in for shooting deer out of season/with a .22 in a shotgun state/over limit/untagged he never seemed to get caught.

 

where are you guys seeing all these 3-legged deer? i've been hunting for 40 years and i've taken more than my share of deer over the years. i spend every minute i can in the woods all year around, scouting and taking pictures. and in all my years, i've never seen a single 3-legged deer, living or dead.

just wondering



-heywood-

 

Heywood,

Go into the woods shortly after a hunt and you'll be surprised. From my experience I think these animals mostly recover from broadheads. I say this because I have personally taken two elk that have had broadheads buried in them. One was in the front shoulder and the second had an entire arrow with the broadhead right next to the spine. The animals grow a cyst around the foreign objects and it doesn't seem to bother them much once this has occurred. Both of the animals I took had no outward evidence of what lied beneath their skins. I've also shot one other elk and one mule deer during hunting seasons because they were limping from a previous hunter. I took them instead of a bigger one just because I saw that they were limping. I don't know how or if animals recover from gunshots because there is nothing like a broadhead for evidence.

 

Hey guys, Sorry it took so long to respond. I have been in Denver with the wife having surgery. ( tummy tuck, she's fine). I wasn't aiming for the spine, CWD area. I was attempting for a vital shot and figured since I was shooting a 300 win mag with a 150 grn bullet at around 375 yrds. It would penetrate fine and do massive internal damage. I have summized through the days that I hit the left rear leg at about where the good muscle starts. Probably a good three legged 4 pointer walking around there now. Since the busk still has his front legs and his antlers to defend himself with, he is probably still around.

"Leg spine whatever, if you can't handle losing deer get your meat at the store"

Where can you get good sage raised venison at? It's not that I can't "handle" losing the deer, I feel like you are obligated to recover an animal that you take, or attempt to.

"Wyo,
Did the vents on your airbox do anything for the Griz. I was going to do the same thing but didn't see the point unless I replaced the pipe. What do you think of those stock tires. "

The vents let in a crap load of air and then I put the billett endcap off ebay on and it sems to run lots better now. Breathes a bunch better.

 

Speaking of such things I observed something quite disturbing today.
I was scouting deer out in a field near my home with my spotting scope and I seen a nice 8 point buck walk out of the woods. I did a double take as something about is head didn't look quite right. I zoomed in with the scope and seen that his lower jaw and much of his nose had been blown off. Part of is jaw was hanging by a thumb sized chunk of flesh. Pretty gross. Some Carlos Hathcock wannabe sniper evidently tried the ill advised head shot on a deer. Too bad. Nice deer.

 

That sucks!!!

 

Wyobullrydr,

I was being sarcastic. I really believe you owe it to the animal to recover it. If you can't I believe you should burn that tag instead of shooting another animal.

I tell you guys, some people should not be allowed to hunt. A friend of mine has a wife who insist on archery hunting. This lady weighs about 105lbs and can barely draw a 50lb bow. She hits elk in the head, butt, jaw, etc. The arrows will never kill those poor animals because her draw weight is so low, and she can't seem to find the vitals. It's a real shame watching these animals suffer due to her lack of skill and strength. If she were a man I would feel the same way. Guys do it too I just don't personally know any.

Animals are tough, but I've made plenty of money in college by going into the woods and picking up antlers of dead bull elk that are wounded during hunting season and die.

I grew up outdoors in a small Arizona town and have hunted my whole life. The messed up animals I've seen could make even a sane person think about joining PETA. Please respect the game you pursue. Things will happen to make us lose an animal, but it should be the rare exception. People who take 800 yard sniper shots and don't want to walk across the canyon to see if they hit something should let me take a follow up shot from where the animal stood back across to the other side.

 

I seen a doe that someone shot the lower jaw off, she was almost dead from starvation and you could walk almost right up to her and she didn't seem to notice that you were even near. She was skin and bones and you could smell her once you got fairly close, it smelled of rotting flesh and death. We called the game warden and got permission to shoot her.

I can't think of a single deer that has gotten away from me once I had shot it, but I've helped many many others track deer they had shot and was unable to find them, and I am a very good tracker and the last one to ever loose a trail. I come later after they have given up and I'll find the trail and track it out, sometimes I'll find them sometimes not. I've probably irritated a few people by devoting too much time to following their trails, they have given up and are ready to hunt more but feel obligated to stay because I'm still tracking their deer for them lol.

I think people probably shouldn't shoot at deer that's on the run at 400 yards away but thats just me. I try to shoot at deer when they are well in range, stopped and broadside and thats probably why they don't get away from me. If your shooting at them as they are running they odds are your gonna wound them and they are on an adrenal rush and will run further, specially if you push them again once you shot at them. Just bide your time and wait for good shots and you'll wound less deer.