Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Deer Hunting Oddest thing after shot

A shot a little spike one year. He walked out with three doe. I shot and the doe took off back the way they had come. The buck bolted about 15 yards and went back to rooting for acorns. He worked his way down hill towards me for about half an hour. Figured I missed him. Finally came back out to where I had a shoulder shot. Bang flop. When I pulled the skin off, the first shot hit a little high and back. Cut one back strap in half but missed the spine. He just kept feeding, guess he thought he got stung by a bee.

Many years ago I had a non hunter friend call me to come get a deer. He was a dumpster diver, scrounger. Coming home he felt a hard thump on his truck. He stopped and got out, but didn't see anything, at first. Then he saw blood on the road and started freaking out. Thought he hit a drunk on the side of the road. As he was walking back to the truck he saw blood dripping out of his tailgate. A deer jumped off the bank and impaled itself on 2X4's he pulled out of a dumpster for firewood, Joe.

The funniest I've heard was a friend's deer getting caught in a fence while running off in a way that looked like he was still standing. It took a few more rounds before he realized he was dead lol.

I'd say the oddest for me was a big 8pt WT I shot with a Marlin 30-30 when I was a kid. At the shot the buck fell down and a sapling fell over about 10' from the deer toward me. The bullet had cut the small tree down and still stayed on path to kill the deer. Blind luck.

Another was on a very spooky doe while bow hunting. See turned inside out at the shot and I thought it was a clean miss as I could see my arrow sticking in the ground and she bounded away as if nothing happened. She ran about 75yds and stopped just looking around, then started swaying and toppled over. I was kind of shocked she fell over. Got down and the arrow was fairly clean, with just a little hair. After a few yards there was a ridiculous blood trail and where she laid it looked like a horror flick. The arrow had slit her throat.

Also had a doe snap her head up to look at me as I released an arrow. It went through her left cheek before hitting the vitals.

Standing on the old railroad bed one time...A doe came out about 50 yards away, crossed the tracks and made a half circle around me. At this point she was at about 40 yards. She stopped and I hit her with the 30-30...Aiming behind the shoulder, broadside.

She began to take a step as I fired and I ended up hitting the upper leg, right above the elbow. Smashed the leg, took out the top of the heart and exited behind the other shoulder.

That deer leaped forward and up...way up and came back down in the "Y" of a tree that was right in front of her. She got herself wedged in there for a few seconds but after some judicious kicking with the back legs, she managed to topple out of the tree and landed on the ground. Another kick or two and she was done.

She only went 5 feet forward but for a little bit there, she was about 6 1/2 feet up.

When I was young and naïve, I bought my first gun for deer hunting. It was a Marlin 336C in the 30/30. I asked the Gunsmith if the 30/30 was a good cartridge for deer. He said "It will knock a deer on its azz." The following year I had a buck walk out of the brush, he was facing me about 80 yards. So I shot him in the chest. Because of the recoil I didn't see the bucks reaction. But my buddy said "Wow, you flip him over backwards."

So I literally knocked a deer on its azz!

I had a cousin that shot a doe one afternoon in the woods adjacent to a large cotton field. At the shot, the doe ran out into the field and disappeared. He expected her to go a short distance and fall. When he walked into the field, she was nowhere to be found. He backed up and started the blood trail, followed for 100-150 yards and realized it was headed straight for his Honda 110 3 wheeler (this was 20+ yrs ago). As he approached the 3 wheeler, he saw the deer piled up just on the other side of the bike. Apparently her last leap was over the bike leaving a bloody streak on the seat and handlebars.

My dad shot his biggest buck ever when I was only 4. He knocked it down as it was running past him at full sprint only 30 yards away. While it was flopping around, he put another bullet in the chest for insurance and it was over. When they cleaned the deer, they realized the hole in the chest was the only bullet hole. After investigation, they saw his first shot had hit the base of the antler, leaving a chip in the antler and knocking down the deer.

I've shot a doe with a bow and then had her run headlong into a tree.

I watched a doe run headlong into a barbed wire fence and break her neck during a man drive. Never fired a shot.

The last deer I shot about 6-7 years ago, was a neck shot at around 50 yards. The deer reared up on its hind legs like a horse and collapsed dead.
A friend in PENN lung shot a buck at roughly 175 with a 35 REM.
The deer was feeding in an open field and at the shot, appeared to be unharmed and slowly walked into the forest. He found it dead just inside the tree line.

- shot an older doe with my bow, right through the ribs. She jumped forward, stopped, looked around for a second or two, then went back to eating. I went for a second arrow, thinking I'd missed. I got the arrow knocked and took aim. At that point, she just fell over.

- My Dad spooked a spike towards me and it was running belly to the ground as hard as he could. I shot and he rolled for a good 30-40 yards, then got up and ran another 10 yards and piled up.

- loaned a friend my 25-06 to shoot a doe, she was facing us so he shot her in the white patch on her neck. She was about 75 yards away and on the shot she did a complete back flip.

- Always heard stories about this and thought they really were just that, stories. I watched my Dad shoot a doe just as she was jumping the fence. He clipped her right behind the ribs and ripped a hole about 5" long and 4" wide. Her 'innards' slipped out, caught on the barb wire fence and nearly completely cleaned her out right there.

The same guy I know in PENN shot a large buck at dusk in archery season on a very cold night. He tracked it for awhile with a flashlight and came back the next morning, picked up the blood trail and followed it. The deer had made a circle back to his stand and he found it dead not far from where he originally hit it at.

About 10 years ago I was hunting a field sitting on the edge of a wood line partition just before the sun was coming up. At daylight, I spotted 2 heavy antlered 8pt bucks in the distance that had been bedded next to a pond about 220yds away. I watched them for a few minutes deciding which one to shoot and tried to control my breathing as I didn't have much of a shooting window since they were headed towards some thick woods.

I carefully aimed the Ruger model 77 (30-06) I had borrowed from Dad just behind the shoulders on the larger of the 2 and fired but to my surprise neither of them even flinched. How could that be since I had just zeroed this rifle? Did I flinch? Did I miss low with the Federal 165gr loads? I chambered another round and aimed for the same spot but a tad higher in case I missed low but again neither deer moved after the shot. So, I chambered another and fired which finally got their attention and they started heading towards the woods at a faster rate and would soon disappear. So, I chambered the final round and shot once more but the bucks just disappeared into the dense trees.

I couldn't understand what had happened and was sure I had hit the buck I was aiming at. I waited a few minutes and walked over to where the bucks had been and found some promising sign of blood and hair which confirmed the hit. I was too eager though and ended up walking up into the woods where they were last seen and I spooked the wounded buck pushing him out further. I waited for about 45minutes and begin following the large bright red and bubbly blood trail which ended at a road crossing. The buck had crossed and moved onto a neighbor's property.. Great.

I knocked on the neighbor's door to get permission to search for my buck but there was all kinds of activity going on at his farm. There were kids zooming around on 4 wheelers and some others working in the field. I was able to find a few more trickles of blood but lost the trail. There was just too much cow, truck, and atv traffic to figure out which direction the buck had went. One of the kids on an ATV road up and said he had seen a big buck limping across the field and he had chased him around with the 4wheeler. I asked which direction but he could not remember and I could not find any more blood. I searched until dark before finally calling it a night. I searched some more the next day but without success.

It was the most depressing hunting experience I've ever had. I've had multiple dream since then where I'm shooting but my bullets don't ever have any effect. I haven't used my Dad's Model 77 since and to this day I can't understand why I pushed the deer and didn't wait. I haven't missed another one since but I also take a little extra time to insure better shot placement and I don't push deer right after the shot.

A couple of years ago I was hunting after a snowstorm from my climber. I was only there for about 20 minutes before a small doe came up. She turned giving me the perfect heart and lung shot with my 12ga 870. She took off running after the shot spraying blood all over the fresh snow like a can of paint. She made a big loop almost back to my stand and when she crashed I could still see the blood squirting out from my scope. It was gruesome seeing the 3-4ft high streams of blood. It looked like a murder scene where she went down. My buddy and I had never seen one bleed completely out. There was only a small tip piece of heart left and it was the cleanest field dressing\processing job ever thanks to the Hornady SST. It was also the best tasting and tender venison we ever had.

Hope your scope recovered.



I simply hate the no reaction what so ever. Makes one think he has missed and can result in additional holes and more blood shot groceries.

Fortunately in most instances as I'm settling in for a second round, they tip over.

I was way up in a tree but the deer was only about 40yds from me. The snow looked like a blood slushy or something. I've never had one bleed completely out like that and it wasn't a large gaping exit wound either.

The no reaction are the worse. Especially during muzzleloader when you have to take your eyes off the deer for a reload. I shot 2 spikes one year with muzzleloader. I shot one and the other just froze and went back to eating giving me time to reload.

LOL. That is AWESOME!

Crazy!

Long ago I shot a dandy little 6 point with a BR-78 Browning .30-06. Load was a 165 Sierra HPBT Gameking driven as fast as I could (young and dumb, thinking I needed a murderously heavy load for killing whitetails). At 50 yards I hit him in the spine at the base of the neck whereupon his front legs buckled as his rear legs kicked straight back. That flipped him on his back, with his four hooves up in the air quivering. I swear when I walked up to him there was steam coming out of the wound. I told everybody back then that the wound was "smoking" of course! (By the way that bullet didn't exit, rather exploded in there like a mini hand grenade. Several other violent meat wasting experiences with that bullet/velocity taught me to tone things down a bit.)

Mine was with a bow.... Shot a buck on a really cold day, quartering away, zipped a broadhead right through the boiler room. Deer jumped up and looked around and just stood there like nothing had happened, I could see blood poring out both holes. After about 10 seconds he took 1 step and fell over.

The shot was really close, like maybe 10 yards, probly closer to 8.

I've said before that they can go into shock from a sudden drop in blood pressure. This is a list of common symptoms in humans. Obviously, it's impossible to tell if a deer has most of these but the 1st one is telltale when you have one just stand there after you know you had a good shot.
.................
Some of the typical signs and symptoms of shock usually include at least two or more of the following:

Confusion or lack of alertness
Loss of consciousness
A sudden and ongoing rapid heartbeat
Sweating
Pale skin
A weak pulse
Rapid breathing
Decreased or no urine output
Cool hands and feet

Any of these alone is unlikely to be a sign or symptom of shock.

i shot a 6pt in a very steep hollow that we named 'the hell hole' because its so hard to get a deer up out of. i shot him he took a giant leap and landed dead. i could see him laying spread out flat so i start going down in the hell hole to get him. well i get to the steep bank where i shot him look down the hill and no deer. i stand there amazed. i look and look and i can't find him. this bank is full of downed trees and vines.i just sat down on a log wondering where the heck he could have gone. i just happened to look up and 10ft from me was the deers tail hanging straight down from a mat of vines that grew between 3 trees. the deer had jumped off the bank and was laying 6ft off the ground on the vines. when i walked under him i could barely reach him to pull him off of the vines.

Talk about freezer training a deer!