Here's what happened to me a couple of seasons ago. A spike buck was running does around my stand one morning. He crossed bak and forth a few times right in front of me. I had finally had enough. At about 60 yrs I decided I was going to take him. The shot from the .50 cal knocked him down in his tracks. I reloaded. He lay there for a few minutes. He got up. I debated and decided to shoot him again before he could run off into the swamp and disappear forever. Second shot knocked him down again. I thought this time was for keeps. I waited a bit and started down the tree. At the base of the tree I reloaded. As I picked my way over to the deer at about 30yrds out he jumped up and I unloaded the third time. This time he was dead before he hit the ground. As I made it over to the deer I heard thrashing in the water over in the swamp and I figured it to be the does this spike had been running. Just to see how they would react to the grunt call I hit it a few times and went on about the business of retreiving the deer. Would you believe it, a huge buck ran up to within steps of me and I had nothing but the gun/club to defend myself. I had to scare him off by yelling at him. I was out of reloads.

Nahum 1:7