Home Forums Hunting & Shooting Deer Hunting First blood, possession or it depends?

When I was around 16 or 17, I was sitting on my stand when I heard a single rifle shot quite a ways off. About 20 minutes later, a buck came running down the fence line in front of me about 150 yards out. It was going hard, but it had been hit in the front left leg. I put one 6mm rem in the boiler maker and down it went. Let it sit for about 10 min then walked over to the fence line to get it. Just as I got to it, a man and his 10-11 year old son walked up on me. The dad didn’t have a gun and the son had a brand new marlin 336 30-30. The man said his son had shot the deer about a mile away and they had been driving around looking for it. He was honest and said he knew it wasn’t a lethal shot. But he asked if his son could tag it. I didn’t care, so I said yes and started walking back to my stand. The dad stopped me and asked, “what do we do now?” I said, I usually gut it and I started walking again. He asked, can you show us how? I was in a little disbelief at the time, but I did it and they both watched with intent. It was clear neither one of them could have done it. That was over 35 years ago and to this day, I wonder what the hell they would have done if I hadn’t bee there. I was happy to help that kid tag his first deer but when he thinks about it, he has to wonder why I was so helpful.