Well, I can say that DRT means a lot to me and always has. In NM and MT, where I hunted most of my life, an animal running very far meant packing them out of some steep azz canyon.
Here in WI, public land is small and full of other hunters. I hunted 2 areas last Saturday for opener and saw 25 other hunters that morning on 1 sq mi of public land. That afternoon I saw 7 on 120 acres. Saw 1 deer way down in a ravine at 7:00 am. Didn't shoot cause there was no shot, only movement in the thick trees. Not even sure if it was a doe or buck.
Thursday I hunted a private 40 acres consisting of mature woods with a deep ravine through the middle from one corner to the other. Sat on a stool against a big oak just far enough down the hill to see into the ravine in both directions.
Right after legal shooting, heard a shot from my left about a quarter mile away, figured it was on the neighboring 40, which sports a house. 10 minutes later a 4 pt buck (the first deer I saw that I could get a shot on) walked into sight from behind the shoulder of the hill to my left. I shot him, DRT. In at the base of the neck, out behind the far shoulder. I never moved after the shot, hoping a doe or two might come in. Ten or fifteen minutes later, a hunter walked through on the opposite hill, left to right, about 2/3 of the way across the 40. He stopped and stood for a while, then crossed the ravine and headed back uphill toward the road. As far as I knew he was trespassing, but I was the only one on the place and had no right to challenge him. Besides, I would have followed a deer I wounded as well. The funny thing is, I never saw or heard a deer move through there ahead of him. It must have done so, the blood was very fresh, but I never heard it and I heard my buck coming a few steps at a time for a full minute or more before he appeared.
I tagged my buck and dragged him to the gully bordering the other road, gutted him, and headed out.
I came back later and found the spot the other guy had stopped. Sure enough, he lost a blood trail there. I backtracked it up the hill to the neighboring 40, went back and picked it up 50 yards or so from where he gave up, and followed it down to the corner of the lot into some big oak and tall grass, hoping it had gone in there to hole up.
No such luck. The deer crossed the road and went onto private land I had no permission to hunt, so I shook my head and left.
If he had broken bone, that deer would be hanging in his yard or someone's cooler right now, instead of feeding coyotes after finally bleeding out and expiring. I might have even gotten it, was hoping to in fact. Better that than waste it on coyotes. If my deer had run, I would have found myself arguing with the guy over it, since he naturally would have assumed it was the same deer he was trailing.
DRT rules IMHO, no matter where one hunts. That's my take, YMMV.
