I harvested this guy this morning. He's a button buck. I got in my tree stand this morning and was all settled in at about 6:15 am. I was doing my usual as far as grunting every 15 minutes or so when at about 7:20 am this guy comes running down the trail to my right. The trail runs perpendicular to where I was and about 5 yards from my tree takes a sharp right turn and heads up the hill away from the creek. He follows the turn in the trail and still in a good gallop starts heading away from me so I raised my rifle, found him quickly in the scope and squeezed off a shot that at that time looked to be a sharp quartering away shot. It's been more than a dozen years since I have taken a running shot at a deer but this one was only about a 20 yard shot and I didn't think I could miss. After the shot the deer hopped off the trail into the woods and slowed to a walk. I watched him continue up the hill about 50 yards and disappear. I wasn't totally confidant I hit him but I did feel good about the shot so I stayed in the tree just in case another doe came by. We can harvest 10 does here during the firearms season. I sat in the tree stand for 2 hours and at 9:20 am I climbed down to see if I could find any blood. It had snowed here Tuesday so I thought if I had hit him It would be an easy tracking job. As I walked up the trail to the area I believed I had taken the shot I saw no blood. I was very surprised. I walked back and forth and still I saw no blood trail. So I decided to head up the trail and go into the woods to check the area where I last saw the deer. Yep, there he was. And there was a very good blood trail. I couldn't understand why I didn't see any blood from the trail so I followed the blood trail back to where it started and found that the blood didn't start to hit the ground until abut 5 yards into the woods.
Firearm: .54 caliber Traditions Deerhunter (caplock)
Powder: 80 grains 3f Goex
Bullet: 240 grain .45 caliber Hornady XTp
Sabot: Red .54/.45 MMP

Congrats on the deer. Good job recovering the deer.

pluckit

congrats!!! way to get the job done...

Congratulations on the deer!

Congratulations!!!

Good work Pluckit!

Congrats!!!!


He will eat good!!

congratulations he will eat good.

That kind of deer you took there is one of my favorite table type deer. Congratulations on a great harvest there.

Congratulations!
Some good eating there!