Originally Posted by Blackpowdersmoke

dbowling...

Congrats and glad that you were able to harvest a pair of nice does with your ML. I'm assuming you had tags for both and weren't concerned about shooting the second deer, even though you didn't realize you shot two deer until after you got to where the first deer laid. I'm not trying to bust your balls, but I know of several instances in which individuals faced with the same situation only had one tag or only had one for the management area they were hunting.
One individual was fortunate enough that his hunting buddy forfeited his tag to keep things legal, the other individual decided that it was not ethical to leave one of the two deer in the woods for the coyotes and attempted to bring them both out, one tagged and one not. Needless to say he got caught, paid fines, lost hunting privileges for awhile and was ran through the ringer just because he thought he was doing "the right thing to do". I know it's a tough decision to make once you fire a shot, but I always pause and listen for awhile and then go check before shooting again. I have knocked deer down and heard them flopping or moving about even when I couldn't see them after I shot. Unless I see the deer I shot at trying to get back up, or it's still standing in the same spot it was in and has no idea where the shot came from, I won't fire a second shot and I never assume that I just plain missed until I've done a thorough inspection of the area. What you do is your business. I do things my way to avoid hassle.

BPS