It had rained all day not a downpour but a steady drizzle the pile of apples I was watching had drawn several squirrels . They wasnt eating them just curious I guess. The pile was from a tree just up the hill from them and all had rolled down to the bottom My stand was 25yds away in a hugh Brushpile where I had made a ground blind which I dont care for hunting on the ground to start with but had no choice. The land owner there still has several crop damage permits to fill and has agreed to let me and my soninlaw take them with a bow if possible.James (soninlaw) had missed a doe a little earlier and was back at the house . About 4:30 a hugh doe came in to feed on the apples but didnt offer a good shot I looked around to see what was with her as I still have a buck tag I can use and there was a couple of small ones coming down the hill toward the tree. Now the house is within sight of where I was and I looked that way and saw James watching through Binocs. Finally the large doe turned broadside to me and I placed the pin just behind her shoulder and released the arrow. She took off like a rocket and James came out and shouted great shot she will not go far. I climbed out from the brush as he came to where my arrow was it was covered with bright red blood with bubbles on it. Now As I stated at the first of this book it was a pretty good drizzle of rain and I was worried about the blood trail, so we started looking for blood up the hill the way she ran. I looked on one side of the trail and James on the other. Nothing no blood at all but I knew that with the direction of the shot me being on the ground it may take a little for the blood to start coming out. I went all the way to the end of a field and made a circle around it with no sign of the deer or blood. By now it is starting to get dark so we go back to the house for lights and start back at the arrow again still couldnt find any blood. I started following one of several deer trails with no luck. James was doing the same on the other side of the trail with the same luck. We were both getting very cold as the temp was dropping and we were getting very wet from the rain. We agreed to make another circle and I would go into the woods just to see if I could see the deer lying there as it was pretty open. It has now been a couple of hours with no blood sign and raining pretty good now so I knew it was near impossible to find blood and my doe. We had to leave that night and couldnt stay to search today and its a couple of hours drive home.

Nearly all the paths that fed into the main one came from the left so we decided to make one last circle around the bottom of the woods just to mostly satisfy ourselfs we had tried. We went about 100 yards then I headed up the hill towards the small field and James went out about another 30yds and did the same. I had nearly reached the field when he shouted here she is. I went to him and we started to look for blood just to see if we could figure where she crossed into the woods and how we missed the sign. We never found but a couple of drops and they were right at her. She must have came down the path as she was on it when he found her but all the rain had washed it away. I guess the purpose to this whole novel is dont give up check the paths check everywhere. If you measured in a straight line she had only ran about 100yds but she had ran in a kinda circle so had gone quite a distance it was a double lung shot high in both lungs had I been in a tree it would have been no problem I dont think but being on the ground and a little high on the shot nearly all the bleeding was inside.

This is the first time I have found a deer that went that far without a blood trail so it can be done.

Roy