Have you ever reported a deer you lost?

[ATbuckhunter]

Like the tittle says, Have you ever tagged a deer you shot and knew you killed it, but you just couldn't find it? I know I did this year when a deer that had a good blood trail abruptly ended and I couldn't find the trail after searching for 100 yards in each direction and a couple of days worth of looking. I ended up filling my tag and reporting the deer because there's no way he could have made it. I have a feeling someone took the deer though because it was a good double lung shot and the blood trail proved it. 

[Pygmy]

Nope..never did that..

 

I also never knew for sure where the bullet/arrow went until I recovered the deer.

 

Muscle tissue hits bleed pretty good sometimes and can fool you.

 

You may have reported a dead deer that is still walking around.

[turkeyfeathers]

Huh? I fill out my tag when I'm standing over the dead deer. I can't tally up sleeping with a girlfriend in High School as I thought about it but yet she was never on her back. I've lost 2 in my life with gun. Both shots were cake, thought I had good hits. Tracked for a long time. I was tracking live deer. Bet the house they made it. Felt like crap about it too.

Edited December 20, 2015 by turkeyfeathers

[Doc]

The problem is that the deer might be found by another hunter and he may tag it resulting in a harvested deer gets counted twice.

[Lawdwaz]

Nope..never did that..

 

I also never knew for sure where the bullet/arrow went until I recovered the deer.

 

Muscle tissue hits bleed pretty good sometimes and can fool you.

 

You may have reported a dead deer that is still walking around.

 

100% spot on.

 

The words "a good double lung shot" tell much.

[Lawdwaz]

 I can't tally up sleeping with a girlfriend in High School as I thought about it but yet she was never on her back.

 

LMAO.........................

 

 

My handle here would be  "JohnHolmes"  NOT Lawdwaz if I counted all my fantasy women.

 

 

 

Edited December 20, 2015 by Lawdwaz

[ants]

Never…..IMHO it doesn't count as your kill until you are standing over it. 

[The_Real_TCIII]

Did you send the taxidermist $500 too?

[Lawdwaz]

Did you send the taxidermist $500 too?

 

Not to pile on here but if the OP wants to send me $100 I'll butcher it for him.

 

 

 

 

 

[growalot]

just mercy kills

[turkeyfeathers]

just mercy kills

so you saw deer go down and know you killed it ?

[The_Real_TCIII]

I think she means wounded deer she had to put down

[growalot]

I'm not sure what you are asking...I save doe tags in order to have something to put on a mercy kill if I find one..in other words..the usual here being...... deer with their guts dragging on the ground...ones with gaping holes in them...hips shot out...coyote attacks ect....if it's a buck I will take them in and get new tags...I've done that on 2 bigger bucks...

No never deer that I have shot, to begin with,that is.

Edited December 20, 2015 by growalot

[Nomad]

Sometimes them dead deer can be tricky .....

My daughter shot this buck 7:30 opening morning 175 yards from where I sat. She took pics from the stand, texted her hunting friends and myself. I said let me sit another hour as is opening morning and I had two young bucks walk by already and Joe saw 3 , so its looking like a great morning.

5 minutes later she said she was watching a spike under her stand, looked back and this buck was in a field walking away with 2 doe !! Boy do,I wish I ran right over......

I could not believe it but was sure it wasn't going far. We found 2 small drops of blood in its bed right where it's head layed. After a long search that was all we found.

Edited December 21, 2015 by Larry302

[mlammerhirt]

Wow...that's a pisser.

Sent from my XT1254 using Tapatalk

[Zag]

Sometimes them dead deer can be tricky .....

My daughter shot this buck 7:30 opening morning 175 yards from where I sat. She took pics from the stand, texted her hunting friends and myself. I said let me sit another hour as is opening morning and I had two young bucks walk by already and Joe saw 3 , so its looking like a great morning.

5 minutes later she said she was watching a spike under her stand, looked back and this buck was in a field walking away with 2 doe !! Boy do,I wish I ran right over......

I could not believe it but was sure it wasn't going far. We found 2 small drops of blood in its bed right where it's head layed. After a long search that was all we found.

Wow crazy. My dad had something kinda simlar, shot a nice buck, drops it, unloads his gun loweres it down from th stand, have way down the tree the deer gets up and takes off running before he could get out of the tree. Never found it.

[The_Real_TCIII]

My cousin claims he shot a mulie in Montana that had a tag on it, true story!

Edited December 21, 2015 by The_Real_TCIII

[turkeyfeathers]

My cousin claims he shot a mule in Montana that had a tag on it, true story!

hope you're talking mule deer and not mule Either way , sorta funny Although I did hear of a guy who took his deer into a check in station a few years back. Thought he shot a spike buck. Turns out he shot a farmers goat DEC made him go apologize to farmer and no charges were filed.

[The_Real_TCIII]

hope you're talking mule deer and not mule Either way , sorta funny Although I did hear of a guy who took his deer into a check in station a few years back. Thought he shot a spike buck. Turns out he shot a farmers goat DEC made him go apologize to farmer and no charges were filed.

fixed that, thanking you

[grampy]

As long as no laws are broken. However a hunter decides to use their tags, who am I to judge.

[Pygmy]

I  have seen that happen more than once...A high shot, CLOSE to the spine but not  quite low enough to sever the spine, will drop a deer in his tracks, but  sometimes within a minute or two they recover from the shock and get up and take off with nothing worse than a flesh wound on their back.  There are no major blood vessels above the spine.

[turkeyfeathers]

Monty Python

[The_Real_TCIII]

I have seen that happen more than once...A high shot, CLOSE to the spine but not quite low enough to sever the spine, will drop a deer in his tracks, but sometimes within a minute or two they recover from the shock and get up and take off with nothing worse than a flesh wound on their back. There are no major blood vessels above the spine.

i had it happen to me the first hunt I got out after the October storm. Hit a doe high and knocked her down, a couple minutes later she "regenerated" like a Terminator and walked away. That's the only way I can describe it, she started crawling with her front legs and then got her back legs under her and off she went

[the blur]

My theory is use an insurance shot.

The 1st deer I ever shot, the deer went down with the 1 shot, I continued shooting until the mag was empty. My partner comes over and was like, WTF, I thought you were shooting a bear.

When we gutted the deer, I only hit with the 1st round. Every follow up shot missed !!!

[wolc123]

You wont have to worry about deer getting up and running off after they are down if you just check one thing.   Are the eyes open or closed?   If they are closed, then you had better place a second shot in a good spot quick because the deer is still alive.   That big prostrate buck in the earlier post clearly had his eyes shut. 

 

Personally, I don't take any chances here.  Fortunately, I learned that lesson from someone else (my own godfather) who learned it the hard way.  Now I always walk up to the kill ASAP and stick the muzzle of my loaded gun into the open eye.   If it closes, I am position to easily deliver a killing shot.   Many years ago, my uncle knocked down the largest buck he ever saw, with a shotgun slug from close range.   He leaned his gun against a tree and walked up to the "dead" monster buck with his knife.   As he reached it, it sprang to its feet and disappeared into the heavy cover, never to be seen again.   I felt especially bad for him, as he taught me much of what I know about hunting (besides this critical lesson) and was even with me when I took my first deer.  

 

In a separate issue, somewhat related to the OP: Last winter, I did use my own ML antlerless carcass tag on a road-kill button buck that I dispatched with my knife at the end of our driveway.   This was a rather unique situation, and I did not want to bother law-enforcement getting a "proper" tag.   I would think they have more important issues to deal with like keeping drunks and texters off of the road.  I may have committed a violation, but I would do it again, if it could put some of those brave, hard-working folks time to better use.   It was the last Sunday of late ML season and I had no more hunts planned anyhow.  I reported the kill with the DEC phone-in system.  I may have said "ML" rather than car/knife (there was no selection for that), but at least the date, location, and sex were correct. 

 

A neighbor across the street called on the phone, just as I returned to the house in my truck from my last hunt.  She had heard a crash a few moments earlier.  She saw a car stop, then take off, and saw a deer kicking around in front of our house.   I grabbed my knife and my daughter grabbed a flashlight.  She found the deer laying "eyes-shut" right next to our mailbox.   Unfortunately, my knife was very dull having several good "workouts" during deer season, so it was a sloppy, somewhat dangerous deal trying to finish off that little buck.   My daughter was fearful for my safety with the flying hoofs, but eventually I ended his suffering, without suffering any blows myself.  When I butchered the deer a few days later, there was a little bruising on one side but 90% of the meat was in excellent condition.   It was the "tastiest" of the (4) deer we had that year, especially the liver.  It is hard to beat them young ones, way better than "tag-soup", that's for sure.