RE: Is a late recovery really a recovery?
Is it a recovery? Yes, provided you continued to look for the animal. It could be a week later, but if you still had the animal in mind and went looking for it, then you filled your obligation as a hunter too recover your game. Now, this year is the first time this exact thing happend to me. Long story short my cable slide on my arrow rest,it broke on the shot. It's my fualt for not checking my equipment better, even though I did take some practice shot prior to hunting that evening, I still did not "look over" the bow like I know I should. My shot still hit within the vitals, but I only got about half my arrow in. I saw him run off. I looked until 10 that night, and from daylight until noon the next day. I never found any tracks, blood, hair or anything! I looked everywhere I thought he might be. One week later( the next weekend off) I went back looking again, I basicly found him from the rancid smell<img src=icon_smile_dissapprove.gif border=0 align=middle>. I feel I recoverd the animal, but I am not proud of the situation, and I don't feel "complete" at all. I enjoy venison, and since all I got was a set of antlers, I am not really proud of the circumstances, but these things can happen. I hope it never does again, but it may.
Now on the other hand if you give up looking for the animal, and just by luck you or someone else finds the deer several days latter, I don't consider it a recovery at all. You quit looking, so you basicly just found a dead deer in my opinion. We all know in our hearts whether or not we really gave up, or honestly continued looking, you may be able to fool others, but you can't fool yourself.
TAKE YOUR KIDS HUNTING AND YOU WON'T BE HUNTING FOR YOUR KIDS