Kreyzhorse
New member
Just wanted to share my story from last weekend.
I've been taking a new hunter out the last two deer seasons and until this past weekend, he had never taken a shot at a deer. About 8am I heard his rifle report and via text he confirmed he shot but did not think he hit the deer. I told him to sit tight and I'd make my way over. I also told him to memorize where the deer was when he fired.
After reaching him, about 30 minutes after his shot, I had him show me where the deer was. There was zero blood or hair and he assured me he missed. I of course widened my search area and found a few tufts of white deer hair. There was no blood by the hair at all.
At this point I mentioned he might have just grazed the deer but we needed to be sure. I widened my search area and still found no blood. During this search, I even got down on all fours to make sure I didn't miss any blood sign.
After searching a 30' circle centered around the deer hair and finding nothing, I just couldn't convince myself that he just grazed the deer but the lack of any type of spore left me uncertain.
I then attempted to mimic what the deer would have done had I been shot at. Would I have ran down hill along this path? Yes, but my partner said he didn't go that way. Would I have ran up hill? Not likely. That left one area that I was sure our deer headed off towards. I then started my search into the thicker woods and about 20' outside of where I ended my search circle, I found one drop of what I call serum. It wasn't blood, but a mixture of clear liquid with a little blood mixed in.
Anyway, about 10' after that first sign, I found the first drop of blood. The trail at that point was very easy to follow. The deer wasn't bleeding a lot, but he was leaving an easy track.
Eventually, we bumped him in a thicket and he took off running like he wasnt injuried at all. After the bump though, I noticed his blood trail was getting a little thicker.
We slowly kept on the trail and eventually caught up to him laying down in an open area. He didnt see us and we were about 25 yards behind him so we sat down in a small depression to give him a bit more time. After close to 30 minutes, he was alert and and didn't appear that he was going to pass on his own so I set up a shot for my buddy and he made a nice finishing shot on the wounded deer. At this point it was about 2 hours after his original shot and a dam far sight from my pick up.
When we rolled the deer over, I saw the original shot had gut shot the small buck. I don't believe however that the bullet did any more than open a small cut into stomach cavity. It did not appear to nick any of the intestines. As the deer ran off after the shot, I think the action of running then forced a billiard ball size clump of intestines outside the body. When we cleaned the deer, I actually had to slit the hide to make the opening large enough to pull the guts back through.
I know this is a rather long tale, but I wanted to share what we went through to find this deer. My young hunter was ready to give up the search but I kept telling him that you don't give up until you are sure that the deer was either not wounded or was dead.
He felt terrible his first deer wasn't a clean kill but I told him that he should be proud of what we went through to find the deer and put it down because if we didn't the deer would have died a slow death.
I tried to teach him that if you are willing to shoot an animal, you should be willing to do whatever you can to finish it as humanely as possible, no matter what it takes.
I hope no matter what, that he learned a valuable lesson that he keeps with him for the rest of his life.
Anyway, sorry for the long post, but I thought I'd pass it along for any other new hunters.
Good luck.
I've been taking a new hunter out the last two deer seasons and until this past weekend, he had never taken a shot at a deer. About 8am I heard his rifle report and via text he confirmed he shot but did not think he hit the deer. I told him to sit tight and I'd make my way over. I also told him to memorize where the deer was when he fired.
After reaching him, about 30 minutes after his shot, I had him show me where the deer was. There was zero blood or hair and he assured me he missed. I of course widened my search area and found a few tufts of white deer hair. There was no blood by the hair at all.
At this point I mentioned he might have just grazed the deer but we needed to be sure. I widened my search area and still found no blood. During this search, I even got down on all fours to make sure I didn't miss any blood sign.
After searching a 30' circle centered around the deer hair and finding nothing, I just couldn't convince myself that he just grazed the deer but the lack of any type of spore left me uncertain.
I then attempted to mimic what the deer would have done had I been shot at. Would I have ran down hill along this path? Yes, but my partner said he didn't go that way. Would I have ran up hill? Not likely. That left one area that I was sure our deer headed off towards. I then started my search into the thicker woods and about 20' outside of where I ended my search circle, I found one drop of what I call serum. It wasn't blood, but a mixture of clear liquid with a little blood mixed in.
Anyway, about 10' after that first sign, I found the first drop of blood. The trail at that point was very easy to follow. The deer wasn't bleeding a lot, but he was leaving an easy track.
Eventually, we bumped him in a thicket and he took off running like he wasnt injuried at all. After the bump though, I noticed his blood trail was getting a little thicker.
We slowly kept on the trail and eventually caught up to him laying down in an open area. He didnt see us and we were about 25 yards behind him so we sat down in a small depression to give him a bit more time. After close to 30 minutes, he was alert and and didn't appear that he was going to pass on his own so I set up a shot for my buddy and he made a nice finishing shot on the wounded deer. At this point it was about 2 hours after his original shot and a dam far sight from my pick up.
When we rolled the deer over, I saw the original shot had gut shot the small buck. I don't believe however that the bullet did any more than open a small cut into stomach cavity. It did not appear to nick any of the intestines. As the deer ran off after the shot, I think the action of running then forced a billiard ball size clump of intestines outside the body. When we cleaned the deer, I actually had to slit the hide to make the opening large enough to pull the guts back through.
I know this is a rather long tale, but I wanted to share what we went through to find this deer. My young hunter was ready to give up the search but I kept telling him that you don't give up until you are sure that the deer was either not wounded or was dead.
He felt terrible his first deer wasn't a clean kill but I told him that he should be proud of what we went through to find the deer and put it down because if we didn't the deer would have died a slow death.
I tried to teach him that if you are willing to shoot an animal, you should be willing to do whatever you can to finish it as humanely as possible, no matter what it takes.
I hope no matter what, that he learned a valuable lesson that he keeps with him for the rest of his life.
Anyway, sorry for the long post, but I thought I'd pass it along for any other new hunters.
Good luck.
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