Can they survive?

[growalot]

I shot a 7 pt. Just to put it down for I thought he had an arrow sticking straight up between his shoulder blades. Turns out he had been hit by a car and it was one of his ribs..I took him to the region 8 office and got a new tag....infections aren't just at the sight always..they can run through the blood stream around d the body....his was nasty.

A point on blood trails...I never "tracked" my bow deer from yesterday. I watched him carefully then went to where I'd last seen him. That said,I did back track his trail. This taught me a few things on what I thought I saw. Also the fact it was a dang good thing I watched him carefully.double lung and he didn't leave but a couple of specks for the first 100 . Ft...then the fawns messed up another 100ft...tracking him could have been a tad difficult. Then even when I knew where he was...trying to circle to the front of him to make sure he was dead,from a distance..I lost visual 3 times. Even after gutting him then returning with the Gator...he was hard to spot...it really is amazing how a wood lot can " gobble " up a downed deer.

[ncountry]

Deer are amazing animals, Barring infection . I think often they can recover from hits to the legs,shoulder, above the backbone,etc. I have seen 3 separate deer with boadheads in hip,shoulder,and middle back with (cartilage?) grown around it.none of these deer had any visible wounds or handicaps before being killed.Not sure what the actual survival rate is, but I would like to think it is fair to good.

..

Imo.. Any shot that penetrates the body cavity is lethal 99%+ of the time.. Sometimes we like to think that they will survive ,  but this just is to make us feel better about a poor shot.

[phade]

People tell themselves a lot of stories. I see no exception in this thread to that generality.

You hunt long enough, a bad hit will happen. Inferring intent based on a post on an online forum and judging as to the moral/ethical character of that hunter without clearcut words from the poster to go by is telling yourself a story, period. Sometimes people want to share experiences, both successes and learning opportunities, with people who share the same passion and who can at the very least, understand what that hunter is going through. I'm not saying there aren't some moronic threads on this topic, but the law of averages dictate there will be some bad eggs mixed in the bunch, but the majority mean well.

Let's not rush to judgment. You can own a mistake - but it doesn't mean you need to flog yourself and cannot share the experience with others. When I make a bad shot (I have), I tell my hunting partners and we do what we need to do to exhaust the search. When it doesn't work in my favor, I'm not happy, but I certainly prefer to talk about it to my hunting partners. They offer insight, things to consider that I may not have, and I have takeaways from that interaction. There is a reason why there is truth in the "you learn more from your losses than you do your victories" in sports. This applies to hunting, too.

People who may post online might not have a hunting partner and may be looking for factors they should have considered that they might not have. Who knows.

Edited November 17, 2016 by phade

[brownclown]

A friend sent me a link to this recently and i found it amazing

https://www.bowhunting.com/blog/2016/11/12/happened-bucks-legs/

 

[grampy]

33 minutes ago, phade said:

People tell themselves a lot of stories. I see no exception in this thread to that generality.

You hunt long enough, a bad hit will happen. Inferring intent based on a post on an online forum as to the moral/ethical character of that hunter without clearcut words from the poster to go by is telling yourself a story, period. Sometimes people want to share experiences, both successes and learning opportunities, with people who share the same passion and who can at the very least, understand what that hunter is going through. I'm not saying there aren't some moronic threads on this topic, but the law of averages dictate there will be some bad eggs mixed in the bunch, but the majority mean well.

Let's not rush to judgment. You can own a mistake - but it doesn't mean you need to flog yourself and cannot share the experience with others. When I make a bad shot (I have), I tell my hunting partners and we do what we need to do to exhaust the search. When it doesn't work in my favor, I'm not happy, but I certainly prefer to talk about it to my hunting partners. They offer insight, things to consider that I may not have, and I have takeaways from that interaction. There is a reason why there is truth in the "you learn more from your losses than you do your victories" in sports. This applies to hunting, too.

People who may post online might not have a hunting partner and may be looking for factors they should have considered that they might not have. Who knows.

Very well said phade. 

[Buckmaster7600]

I don't like this topic, posting pics of wounded deer doesn't seem conducive to our goals. It's a reality that we all know too well.


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[dbHunterNY]

the last picture is something that happens from deer getting hung up on a fence.  I've never seen it but I guess it's not as rare as someone might think.  it wasn't that some hunter(s) happened to shoot off both feet by accident.

[LET EM GROW]

They are tougher than we give them credit for. But any wound that can create an infection, or inhibits their ability to move can lead to death as we all know. The only difference is the length of illness.

Any deer that seems real weak on the hoof, or not functioning properly, as long as i have a tag for i will harvest. No matter if its in or outside my "management standards" .. Have done this twice now. Both deer would have been taken that winter, either by predators or weather.   

[LET EM GROW]

54 minutes ago, dbHunterNY said:

the last picture is something that happens from deer getting hung up on a fence.  I've never seen it but I guess it's not as rare as someone might think.  it wasn't that some hunter(s) happened to shoot off both feet by accident.

One of the bucks i just mentioned probably would have ended up like that buck, had i not taken him, a tresspasser unloaded his gun and sent slugs through (3) of the deer's legs right above the hooves, the deer ran through the woods stopped at 30 yards and i took him for his inability to walk. 

 

Lucky for me, he went on my wall, meat was good. and i rid the trespasser AND his buddies that all were illegally on my property and thought they had permission... 

[philoshop]

I've always assumed from the start that every deer I've shot at has been mortally hit. From that point on I follow it or look for it until the animal is either recovered or I just flat run out of places to look. I simply have too much confidence in my shooting abilities, otherwise I probably wouldn't be out there to begin with. It sucks to lose one, but I've never tried to assuage my guilt by thinking that I might have 'just wounded' the animal.

[growalot]

Quote

i rid the trespasser AND his buddies that all were illegally on my property and thought they had permission... 

 Well right there is the biggest problem with trespassers...They always seem to have an " I thought" going around in their little brains.... LOL

[Taylormike]

Buckmaster, whether you like this topic or not doesn't change the fact and the very real outcome of many of these wounded animals.  The only reason I began the topic was because I was reading many hunters say "Well, I didn't recover him but I think he'll survive."  The likelihood of survival is very low, especially after the infection takes hold. 

11 hours ago, Buckmaster7600 said:

I don't like this topic, posting pics of wounded deer doesn't seem conducive to our goals. It's a reality that we all know too well.


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[dbHunterNY]

21 hours ago, LET EM GROW said:

One of the bucks i just mentioned probably would have ended up like that buck, had i not taken him, a tresspasser unloaded his gun and sent slugs through (3) of the deer's legs right above the hooves, the deer ran through the woods stopped at 30 yards and i took him for his inability to walk. 

 

Lucky for me, he went on my wall, meat was good. and i rid the trespasser AND his buddies that all were illegally on my property and thought they had permission... 

good job.

[BigMedicine]

My buddie Bill when and picked up his buck last night from the processor and they told him that there was not a neck roast in with the rest of the meat as he had requested. They went on to tell him that someone had shot it in the neck, and the tissue had healed around the broadhead of the arrow which left a hard mass of tissue in the neck. So, yes they can take a hell of a beating, they are extremely tough animals, sucks that they have to go through this sort of thing, but when it comes to hunting Newton's Law is always at the ready.