I once shot a buck at 60 yards with a .50 cal muzzleloader. He was quartering away. I was only seated 10 feet high in a scrub tree at the time. The shot felt great. The buck bolted so fast I thought I missed him. I waited 30 minutes and went to look for the buck. I could not find a single piece of evidence for the first 40 yards that I even hit the buck. At the 40 yard mark I found one tiny speck of blood. I looked for another 30-40 yards and found nothing. I could not even find a pin size drop of blood. I got very discouraged because he was what I thought at the time, my first mature buck.

I started searching in a progressively larger 45 degree outward pattern until I found the buck at about 100 yards. There was no exit hole and the entrance hole looked like it was not leaking at all. I opened him up and found his heart to be literally blown in half. The moral of the story...ever shot and bit of evidence in each hunt is different. Be stubborn and do not give up the search.

As for the original post, I would never give up searching for an animal, even if that meant I tromped all over a bedding area. I would proceed as GMMAT described above.