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So my brother is not a deer hunter, but decided to take his 16 yo son out for our youth season. He called last night right at dark and said my nephew had shot one and they were starting to track it. He said it had been about 15 minutes since the shot, and after discussing the situation I advised him to leave and wait because it sounded like a possible gut shot. He said that he deer hunched up slightly, and walked but didn’t run away. I met him there an hour later. We followed a good blood trail over a fence and across a railroad track. The deer then went about 30 yards before jumping another fence. There was no pool of blood to indicate he hesitated before crossing the fence. At that point the deer entered a small tilled field. We were probably a little more than 100 yards from the start. As the deer entered the field the blood trail got pretty sparse. We followed tacks and blood drops 70 yards across the field and marked where he entered the next patch of brush before I told them we should stop. We found the deer this morning about 40 yards from where we stopped. Here is the pic of what we found. What do you all think, did I go in too fast and too far, and got lucky to find him at all? Or did I mess up by stopping last night and lost the meat as a result? ![[Linked Image]](https://www.24hourcampfire.com/ubbthreads/ubbthreads.php/ubb/download/Number/137762/filename/9BE26094-7B7D-44D8-97E6-5CE829482D88.jpeg)
Last edited by crc1514; 09/12/20.
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So my brother is not a deer hunter, but decided to take his 16 yo son out for our youth season. He called last night right at dark and said my nephew had shot one and they were starting to track it. He said it had been about 15 minutes since the shot, and after discussing the situation I advised him to leave and wait because it sounded like a possible gut shot. He said that he deer hunched up slightly, and walked but didn’t run away. I met him there an hour later. We followed a good blood trail over a fence and across a railroad track. The deer then went about 30 yards before jumping another fence. There was no pool of blood to indicate he hesitated before crossing the fence. At that point the deer entered a small tilled field. We were probably a little more than 100 yards from the start. As the deer entered the field the blood trail got pretty sparse. We followed tacks and blood drops 70 yards across the field and marked where he entered the next patch of brush before I told them we should stop. We found the deer this morning about 40 yards from where we stopped. Here is the pic of what we found. What do you all think, did I go in too fast and too far, or mess up by stopping last night? ![[Linked Image]](https://www.24hourcampfire.com/ubbthreads/ubbthreads.php/ubb/download/Number/137762/filename/9BE26094-7B7D-44D8-97E6-5CE829482D88.jpeg) Well, it's my experience that "back-out 'til morning" bullshit is made for TV versus reality. Especially Kansas in the early season. Don't know where you hunt, but where I hunt the coyotes always, always, find that deer before morning. I immediately go after a shot deer, and stay on it until we find it or it's determined that the shot wasn't fatal. On the bright side - nice buck and congrats to your nephew!
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Hindsight is always 20/20. You found the buck. Congratulations! That is a super nice deer. You would be even more upset if you had pressed on and jumped a gut shot deer and never found him. You never know, the situation is different every time. The way I would look at it is you found a super nice buck for a young man that is going to hopefully be proud of it. He learned allot and hopefully will continue to be an avid hunter. It is a shame the meat was lost but unfortunately that can happen.
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In my past experience in hunting SE Kansas - you're damned if you and damned if you don't. It takes a danged miracle for coyotes to not spoil the party overnight. Given similar circumstances, I likely would have given it another hour or two when you got to that next patch of brush, then went after him. But it sure is easy to play QB here after the fact. ![smile smile](/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/default/smile.gif) I'm guessing the deer was pretty sick when you got to within 40 yards - maybe even caught part of the liver. The lad gained a lot of experience last night though - heck of a buck.
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You didn't even track 200 yards before giving up? I understand hindsight and all that, and I don't hunt where there are lots of fencelines, but I wouldn't have given up after less than 200 yds. You knew the deer was shot, you knew that there was a blood trail. You just gave up for some unknown reason. Kind of sad, if you ask me. That 16 year old kid likely isn't too excited about it either.
I belong on eroding granite, among the pines.
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You'll never know for sure - shoulda, woulda, coulda. Personally I'd have held off an hour or so last night and then pushed on slow and listened to hear him bump before deciding to call it off. If you didn't lose it to the yotes you'd have lost a least a portion to spoilage IMO...quick google search shows lows in the upper 50's in SE KS last night. Wouldn't be too excited about opening up a gut shot buck that layed overnight in warmish weather.
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You didn't even track 200 yards before giving up? I understand hindsight and all that, and I don't hunt where there are lots of fencelines, but I wouldn't have given up after less than 200 yds. You knew the deer was shot, you knew that there was a blood trail. You just gave up for some unknown reason. Kind of sad, if you ask me. That 16 year old kid likely isn't too excited about it either. I didn’t give up, just waited till morning. Not for an unknown reason either. I assumed I was, and turned out to be correct in assuming, tracking a gut shot deer. I didn’t want to bump him and lose it for good. We were already on neighbors property (with permission) and blood trail was getting hard to follow. I was afraid there wasn’t enough blood to follow in the brush. Last night I was kicking myself for possibly already pushing the buck farther onto neighbor than I should have. Obviously I’m kicking myself for the opposite now. My nephew was more than excited to find his deer. The plan is for my brother or I to shoot a cape donor so he can get a shoulder mount.
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In my experience, if I am on a good blood trail and the deer quits bleeding, it is probably down within about 50 yards or so. They only have so much blood and if there isn’t enough to hit the ground when there was, there probably isn’t enough to run the deer very much longer either.
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In my experience, if I am on a good blood trail and the deer quits bleeding, it is probably down within about 50 yards or so. They only have so much blood and if there isn’t enough to hit the ground when there was, there probably isn’t enough to run the deer very much longer either. I've found exactly the same. You didn't even track 200 yards before giving up? I understand hindsight and all that, and I don't hunt where there are lots of fencelines, but I wouldn't have given up after less than 200 yds. You knew the deer was shot, you knew that there was a blood trail. You just gave up for some unknown reason. Kind of sad, if you ask me. That 16 year old kid likely isn't too excited about it either. I didn’t give up, just waited till morning. Not for an unknown reason either. I assumed I was, and turned out to be correct in assuming, tracking a gut shot deer. I didn’t want to bump him and lose it for good. We were already on neighbors property (with permission) and blood trail was getting hard to follow. I was afraid there wasn’t enough blood to follow in the brush. Last night I was kicking myself for possibly already pushing the buck farther onto neighbor than I should have. Obviously I’m kicking myself for the opposite now. My nephew was more than excited to find his deer. The plan is for my brother or I to shoot a cape donor so he can get a shoulder mount. Just because a deer is "gut shot" doesn't mean anything specific. Either does a dwindling blood trail. Heart-shot deer "hunch up" for me as well. As someone else said, the idea of backing out overnight only works on hunting shows. I wasn't there, so I'm not trying to criticize what you did, but rather to offer my opinion based on my own experience. I'd track for at least a quarter-mile if I could. If I thought I was pushing a wounded animal, I'd wait until 2 hours after the shot, then chase blood. I'd then mark the last spot of blood and come back in the morning. I've seen heart-shot antelope run a quarter-mile. It's a tough call to make. If you think this is a successful outcome, don't learn anything from it. If you don't like the outcome, learn something from it and do things differently if it happens again. Either way, I wish you, your brother, and your nephew well.
I belong on eroding granite, among the pines.
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Looks like a nice buck, too bad...damn coyotes!.....Hb
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Too many things to reply to to quote them all. It appears damned if you do or don’t is about right. My only experience with a gut shot deer previous to this was one where the blood trail completely dried up in 100 yards. Turned out that intestine had plugged the hole until he filled with blood a few hundred yards later. That deer would have never been recovered had we not happened upon him floating in a pond 1/4 mile a way. Luckily that happened in the morning and not at night. I was afraid that guts may be plugging the hole last night as well when blood began tapering off. With no pool at either fence jump I was afraid he wasn’t hurt too badly. After dark and in the brush would not have offered a second shot. Was I successful, ultimately yes. We recovered the deer. Did it happen the way everyone would have liked, obviously not. I am trying to learn, that’s why I posted this here. I’ve killed around 20 deer in 25 years of hunting and am still learning. My experience is with a rifle and don’t have a lot of experience tracking over a couple hundred feet. Every article I read last night said don’t attempt a track on a gut shot deer for 12 hours. The consensus here seems to be to wait, but not that long.
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What cartridge was used and what ammo?
" Cheapest velocity in the world comes from a long barrel and I sure do like them. MB "
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This. There's no right answer. At least your nephew got the antlers from his first buck... and learned something about deer behavior in the process. Coulda been worse. If I know I hit a deer and it runs far enough that I don't hear it crash, I wait an hour and then search until I find it dead or bump it. Haven't run into one alive yet, but I'm sure I would if I didn't wait. Had one run like a lightning bolt straight into Texas mesquite and black brush. Waited an hour. The blood trail was very light but consistent, individual drops on leaves. A few small bone splinters at POI. Crawled through thorns for 25 minutes. Found it piled up after hemorraging on a cactus. Looked like Halloween II. The damn thing literally had no heart and not much lung left, the interbond had shattered the shoulder and spewed out bone chips. But still made it 60 yards leaving miniscule blood. Moral of the story: you never can tell based on the jump or the blood. Common logic would've said bone and little blood was a front leg hit and a long gone deer...
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me personally, I would have kept looking till I found him.
so basically, I am saying you didn't make the right call.
Last edited by blammer; 09/12/20.
Whatever you are willing to put up with, is exactly what you will have.
When your ship comes in. ... make sure you are willing to unload it.
PAYPAL, sucks and I will never use them again. I recommend you do the same.
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What cartridge was used and what ammo? 260 rem Federal Premium 120gr Nosler BT. This is what I gave them to use after my brother originally took him out with a suppressed subsonic 300 bo. I have no experience with this load. I had used 120 core-lokt before but couldn’t find any in my mess of ammo. I was told it was a quartering to shot from approximately 150 yards in the final minutes of shooting hours on a cloudy day. The buck hunched without kicking or jumping and walked away “looking hurt”. He only bled out of one side. I found no evidence of entry in the rib cage. Outside of that it’s all a guess
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Just curious that s all. MB
" Cheapest velocity in the world comes from a long barrel and I sure do like them. MB "
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If you truly felt it was a shot too far back, then I say you made the right call to back out until morning. It sucks that it ended this way, but you could have just as easily bumped him onto property you couldn't hunt.
If I ever think I have a liver or gut shot critter on my hands, I back out and come back that afternoon or next morning, taking my chances with the coyotes. If I know I had a solid shot then I go right in.
From what I can tell, you made the right choice for the info you had.
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I wouldn't sweat it, man, it happens. What county? Who are you using for a taxidermist?
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BTDT. This is the Neosho River - I'm sure you're familiar with it. ![smile smile](/ubbthreads/images/graemlins/default/smile.gif) Luckily he made it to the river so the coyotes didn't bother him overnight. ![[Linked Image from i.imgur.com]](https://i.imgur.com/FEvJR77.png)
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