Need advice lost deer.
 

Alright where to start? First let me state I know this is a xbow bolt. I used to have a compound bow. Unfortunately due to my impending divorce the compound has disappeared. Not really sure where it went. Luckily a friend gave me a great deal on his Horton xbow. I posted here before and everybody has been very helpful so I figured i'd start here first. I had about a month to get this croosbow ready and killed a doe on opening day. I didnt hunt much last week because of the heat. I shot the bow on Monday and it was driving tacks at 25 yds. My friend and i take today off to go hunting. Its the first cool day in while and we are pumped. I went to the ground blind and wait for shooting light. This is where the story begins. At 7:45 a nice mature 9 point comes in broadside at about 18 yds. He stops to work a scrape and I let the arrow fly. He runs in the direction he was heading, I hear branches breaking and then silence. I'm so worked up I feel like i'm about to pass out. This was a nice deer. All the crap I went through this year with my wife wanting a divorce and trying to sell the house has now gone away for a moment. I had killed my first trophy deer. Or so I thought. I wait about an hour and look for the arrow. No luck. So I go get my buddy and ask him to help. After a couple minutes of looking I find blood about 10 yds from where I took the shot. Its not a ton of blood but its a fairly easy to follow trail. Still no bolt. After about 80 yds of tracking up the hill the blood is getting heavier. Then WE FIND THE BOLT and a ton of blood! Now we decide to leave and go get breakfast. We firgure the bolt should have passed through and it didn't so lets give it some time. But we firgure with the amount of blood its probably passed on. So we come back at noon and pick up our search. We are seeing lots of blood ,bright red blood. Altough I am starting to get nervous becase I don't see any bubbles in the blood. We follow the trail for another 70 yds and it heads into a thicket. The blood is starting to get less and less. But we are still seeing drops of blood every couple feet. Not the amount we had earlier but still trackable. Now I get on my hands and knees and follow it into the thicket. There were spots where this deer had to crawl through this thicket. It was on of the nastiest brair patches I have ever the displeasure of working through. We start notice that at no point has this deer bedded down yet. Then disaster strikes. I lose the trail. After about two hours my buddy finds the trail outside the thicket. But there is hardly any blood. Then as luck would have it, it starts to pour down rain. We look and look and look. We find a drop here and there then nothing. The rain has now washed away what little trail we had left. We kept searching until 6:30 and finally had to call it quits for the night. The last four hours were spent hoping to find blood or dumb across the deer. And we found neither.
I am not ashamed to say I wanted to cry. I couldn't believe I may have wasted a deer. The thing about the bolt is it had a bunch of blood on 75% of the arrow. It just didn't have any on the front. I am posting pictures of the bolt so you can see. I obviously screwed up the shot orthe arrow wouldn't look like this. I'm just not sure what went wrong. I'm guessing a shoulder shot. Anyways I feel terrible. I'm ashamed this happened and I am looking for advice. I have killed quite a few deer and this has me really messed up. I'm mad at myself because I feel like I may have rushed the shot. I didn't feel that way at the time. But now looking back at it I keep telling myself, " If you would have a couple more seconds this might not have happened". I don't know. Well thanks for taking the time to read this. If you have any questions for me i'll be on here most of the night. I don't think i'll be getting much sleep.

RE: Need advice lost deer.
 

good luck remeber if you leave a deer for a long period of time use flags or something to mark the trail or even sue a can of marker spray paint

RE: Need advice lost deer.
 

Were you shooting through mesh? Did you watch the "bolt" his the animal"? Was the broadhead damaged at all?

RE: Need advice lost deer.
 

i think you fired your arrow backwards:Dsorry just trying to lighten things up for ya. i would say if its shoulder then that deer is dead cause youd have made the vitals. i hit a deer in the lower leg this year and got the bright red (leg shot) blood but it never got heavy and then went to nothing after 600yrds. if anything other then a vitals shot id have to say maybe a groin or neck shot depending on what end of the deer you think you were closer too. either way the deer should be dead and i think your arrow actually went through and fell out later thats why there isnt really any blood on the front cause it was sticking out of the deer.

was there any hair or fat or blood on the front at all??

RE: Need advice lost deer.
 

Looking at the arrow it looks like a possible flesh wound? Do you know where you hit it? (high,low,back???)

RE: Need advice lost deer.
 

I am thinking shoulder shot since the arrow was a ways off and no bubbles in the blood. Since the blood trail is washed away i would grid search and make sure to check any nearby water. Theres a good chance he's still alive.

RE: Need advice lost deer.
 

I was shooting through mesh windows. The broadhead was not damaged. My first mistake was I didnt see the arrow hit. It has green vanes and they are kind of hard to see. i did note the sound and it sounded like a good hit. No bone crunching sound.

RE: Need advice lost deer.
 

x2 on the water. Start walking circles from where you lost the first blood, start small then bigger. Even if it's where you already looked. More help the better also. Try to get on google earth and look at the terrain.

RE: Need advice lost deer.
 

I aimed right behind the shoulder and I strongly believe thats the area where it hit. There was know fat. There were a couple brown hairs.

RE: Need advice lost deer.
 

I tracked 2 last year the sound about the same. Both deer were shot low though the front leg at the meaty part. Both blood trails we had great blood for about 100 to 150 yards then tapered off. Both bucks showed back up on film a couple days later. I would do a grid search where you left off and see if he is dead and if you can't find him after that I think he still might be alive.

RE: Need advice lost deer.
 

Sounds to me like a flesh wound. Go back tomorro and make some big circles with in 1/8 to 1/4 of a milefrom where you found last blood. If you caught the tip of a lung this deer could go a long ways. We've found deer dead1/4 of a mile away from where we've shot them when just catching the tip of one lung. If its a flesh wound the deer most likely will live, kinda sounds like one but the best thing to do is go and look again to be sure. You owe that much to the deer to give your best effort at it. Good luck my friend!

RE: Need advice lost deer.
 

Have you back tracked to the original trail? I have had deer circle back and found them dead behind me. So there was no blood on the front of the arrow at all? Where were you at in Ohio?

RE: Need advice lost deer.
 

I can't give you any "advice". I can only tell you that it's not uncommon for the "hit" to be different than we imagined it. I've seen it on TV too many times....and had it happen where I would have bet my home I smoked a deer.....only to find that NOT to be the case, in reality. I don't typically see the impact, myself. I don't think that's uncommon, either.

Only you and your "help" can assess what occurred with this deer. Believe me when I tell you that I feel your pain. It's crushing. I searched (I had announced, yesterday) 7 hours for a deer, this week with a trail that petered out at 300+yds. I have nothing "good" to tell you. I can only wish you luck in either your subsequent search.....or yourability to deal with what has occurred. It's extremely personal how each of us deals with these situations.

I wish you luck in both scenarios. I'm sorry this happened.

Good luck.

RE: Need advice lost deer.
 

There was a very small amount of blood on the broadhead. I hunt in knox and wayne county.

RE: Need advice lost deer.
 

i think you made a lethal hit. no bubbles in blood doesnt mean its not lungs from the sounds of it you were not ablt to search alot. do a search from the spot you shot it in a circle. walk straight from the spot for 500 yrds move over to were you could just see from that line and walk back to the spot all the way aroung and then do it from the last spot of blood if nothing turns up. usually someone who wasnt there when you shot is better at this since your mind keeps telling you the deer went were you last saw it or think you saw it.

RE: Need advice lost deer.
 

oh also the hair being brown is a good indicator that it wasnt low or in the lower legs usually because there would usually be some white hairs from these areas.usually

RE: Need advice lost deer.
 

Hang in there and keep your head up. As others have said go back and look for him. You will have another opportunity at another big boy.

RE: Need advice lost deer.
 

happened to me the same way before, lost em and found em. try to get the general direction and look ahead of you for cover of some sort. always circle back though because they do do that sometimes. if any creeks or hillsides nearby look inti them also

RE: Need advice lost deer.
 

I'll be back out in the morning. Hopefully the rain won't ruin my chances. I never heard anyhting jump when we were looking. The area we hunt is all woods with a creek valley and a pretty good size hill. Here is a pic of the area with some details of the track of the deer. Hopefully this is viewable. Thanks again everybody.

RE: Need advice lost deer.
 

Thats what I meant to do.

RE: Need advice lost deer.
 

Red line is the blood trail. Sorry.

RE: Need advice lost deer.
 

Maybe a liver hit...I'm not sure. Sounds like you may have got him. I know you said it rained but maybe he left some blood on the trees or ruffled up the leaves which may help you out.

Good luck and let us know one way or the other!

RE: Need advice lost deer.
 

good luck, I'm in the same situation, I shot one with the xbow today, watched him stumble up the hill with my arrow in him. it got dark and I couldn't find him so I'm going out first thing in the morning to look. I know the feeling you have, it really has made me have a sick feeling in my gut tonight.

RE: Need advice lost deer.
 

Well i'm going to the last point i had blood and going to try to find him. I just hope I find him.

RE: Need advice lost deer.
 

I had a similar issue a few years back some may remember. I shot a possible county possibly state record buck, complete pass through. started tracking and then it stated to pour. Went back out that nite in the rain with a game finder, didnt help much, went back the next morning and 2 days after that. we searched everywhere foot by foot. No sign of the deer. Rumor has it, hes still runnning around. I have yet to see him since the shot.I was sick to my stomach for acouple weeks, and still think he might show up again in the same spot and give me that second chance thatI so deserve for not giving up on him.

RE: Need advice lost deer.
 

If you contact the game commission you may be able to use dogs to recover your deer. Even if you do not have a hunting dog, if you can put the dog in the woods and on the trail of blood, that dog will find that deer. Ive done it before. Good luck do not give up. With all the blood you found it is likely that deer is dead, start griding, and get all your buddies to help.

RE: Need advice lost deer.
 

Using dogs for tracking is legal in Ohio. Good idea.

RE: Need advice lost deer.
 

Keep us updated Wonder Boy......best of luck.