re: IST 1/28

Thanks man!

This was my third encounter with him this year. The first time, I had him at 18 yards but he faced me the entire time. I had a very marginal quarter to shot when he came in, but didn't take it because it was going to rain and I figured he'd give me a better angle. He didn't. The second time, I just saw him cruising through the woods and he didn't come in range. He pretty much disappeared before Christmas and I'd all but given up on him this year. I was still getting occasional photos of him around the area I'd originally seen him, but nowhere near where I was hunting yesterday. I'd made my mind up that any decent buck was getting an arrow yesterday because I really needed another deer for the freezer. I saw a small 8pt yesterday morning but he didn't give me a shot.

Around 4:30 yesterday afternoon I caught some movement and saw a buck coming straight towards me through the woods around 100-120 yards away. It's pretty thick and light was fading a bit, so all I could tell was that he was a good deer. I got my release clipped and angled towards the trail he was on. Once he closed a bit, I realized what deer he was and immediately decided that if he gave me any angle inside 45 degrees quartering to, I was going to shoot. He eased towards me but kept looking over his shoulder and was obviously uncomfortable with something. My pin was set at 20 yards but the trail he was on was right at 30. He passed behind a big oak and I drew. Once he passed the tree, I released as soon as his nearside shoulder opened up, but he was still quartered to. I held a little low expecting him to duck because of how alert he was and the range.

I blacked out at the shot and didn't really hear the impact. The deer ran right back where he came from and just stood at about 100 yards for a few minutes. All I could see was the outline of his tail and it was tucked the entire time. I grunted at him a couple times and nothing happened. I thought I missed. Once I couldn't see him anymore, I got down and checked my arrow. Covered in blood and gut. I'm immediately thinking he's gutshot bad and that I underestimated the quarter angle. I called my buddy to get some dog help. We waited 3.5 hours to go back in. The blood really cleaned up about 10 yards from the shot site, so we started to track. Dog got on him and pushed him off of the spot he was laid up. 700 yards later we hit 2 acres of shin deep water and I thought we were toast. I started prepping myself to lose the biggest deer I'd ever released an arrow on and cursing myself for starting the track too early. We'd been kinda grid searching the water and the little islands for about 45 minutes with no sign of blood and the dogs lost the track. I wound up on the other side of the water maybe 150 yards from last blood, and I randomly come across a blood spatter on a tree.

From that point, we could've blood trailed him. He bled the entire time and eventually bled out. Turns out, the deer wasn't quartered that hard, but my shot was low. The height angle was steep thankfully, so the deer bled forever. He made a giant loop and we wound up finding him laid up right on the trail he used to run off initially, maybe 150 yards from my stand. If I would've let him lay overnight, he probably would've been dead at the first spot he laid down, ~100 yards from the stand.

Lessons learned: always let marginal shots sit overnight if the weather allows, never give up on a track if you don't, and don't hold low if your pin is already under-ranged . I've been trying to kill a mature deer with my bow in Washington/St. Tammany my entire life and I finally did it. Tough to describe the feeling. I've been fortunate enough to have a lot of different outdoor experiences in my life and this one is up there at the top.