abitofinger

Hey all, my first post here.

I recently moved to North Carolina and am finishing up my hunters education training and will be getting my hunting license this fall for the season which starts on Nov. 19th in my county.

I bought a Mossberg 4X4 .30-06 bolt action rifle and am ready to hunt!

My question is this:

Say I make a sloppy shot and the deer isn't dead when I come up on it. How do I finish it off? I have no sidearm, only my great-grandfathers Bowie knife and the rifle. In the training course it said (along with what I've researched) to simply shoot it again in the vital area. I refuse to discharge a .30-06 rifle at point blank range into the dirt I'm terrified it will bounce back and kill me.

I understand that waiting it out seems to be the only option but I don't really want to wait if it could take hours for the animal to die.

Any suggestions? I'm new to this.


Thanks!

Mike