davidmil

SALT...it's a crap shoot. One of those damned if you do damned if you don't deals. If you go too soon in an attempt to ensure the meat won't spoil, you stand a better chance of chasing a poorly hit animal into never never land where you can't find him. When in doubt the only real choice is wait. You can follow quietly for a VERY short distance, say 100 yards. If the deer isn't down in that distance he stands a good chance of going for "A WHILE". What's A WHILE?? Well, it all depends on the hit. A properly hit deer will die soon enough. A poorly hit one may take hours. If you push it, you'll more than likely loose it. Oh it can still die but you'll loose the meat anyway. The figures people use, like 4 hours / 8 hours are based on science. How long for a deer to die with a marginal lung hit. How long for a deer to die with a total gut hit etc. You just have to read the sign on the ground and more importantly on the arrow and decide a course. Pending weather etc can throw it all out the window because without a blood trail, life is tough. If you want to error on the side of caution(always a good thing) just remember a gut shot deer gets sick quiet fast. They'll want to bed down as soon as they can. They may get up a time or two but if not pushed, they won't go far. IF you know a deer ran down a particular ridge and he's not pushed, he'll probably not be a LONG LONG Ways from where you last saw him.