BTBowhunter

Sorry you had the bad experience but we've all been there. 8 inches of penetration is enough to kill but as BC said, 8 inches of blood doesnt necessarily mean 8 inches of penetration.
It sounds like you may have gotten substantial bone and one lung involved.

Thats a bad combination but the deer may revover. It will depend on how the one lung that was hit.

As for mechanicals, I also am not fond of them. They have come a long way from the original punchcutter but the problem lies more in their misusue that anything else. Far too may guys use them as a bandaid on a poorly tuned bow. The loss of kinetic energy due to poor arrow flight and the additional loss when the unstable arrow impacts the animal are ignored by too may hunters. Use the mechanicals if you want, but please make sure that they are not on your arrows simply because you cant make a fixed head group right!

Ben / PA

Fixed....expandable. My problem with this story started here.

If you can't give your quarry your best effort, able to let it go and come back in the morning, then I am not sure you should be in the woods on that night.

WV Hunter

CutEm...sorry to hear it. Most of us have been there, and done that. Analyze what you did, and what you think you could have done better, but don't let it eat you up.

It is possible the deer is dead....and "if" you actually got the 8" of penetration, a better chance. Not bashing your choice of broadhead...but that is exactly why I like a strong fixed head. Its not the good hits that matter...its on the not so good ones that we need all the uumph we can get. Would you have done better with a muzzy, ST or Magnus...we'll never know. I like to stack the odds in my favor though, which is why I choose to use those type of heads. I've seen some amazing penetration, especially with cut on contact heads.

Some VERY good points by GMMAT and BTB....way too many folks use mech heads as a band-aid. They buy into the marketing and away they go...totally untuned (cause they fly like field points). Well so do fixed heads out of a well tuned bow. One poster even said to contact the manufacturer to get your money back.

Keep your chin up...and I would continue to look for that deer the next chance you get. A one lung hit can certainly be fatal....sometimes it takes em a long time. Keep an eye out for the buzzards. Good luck.

AR Bowhunter

I know how it is to get excited with the circumstances that you had in front of you. The best that could have happened is a shot little further towards the rib cage an deep shot into the lungs. A deer can go on one lung for a while an could recover. Your best bet would have been to wait at least two hours an would have took up a good trail from start to finish if he was going to expire. The meat will not spoil if he is still alive unless infection started to get him in the days ahead.

The type of broadheads are not the main issue here.

CutEm

Thanks for all the support and advice guys. It's nice to get opinions on here. I don't have many friends that are as hardcore about hunting as I am so a lot of them can't relate to this stuff. Like you all have said..I need to learn from these mistakes..and I will. I will keep plugging away. I have a pretty good spot with a lot of deer. I am going to fill my doe tag as soon as the opportunity presents itself and there are still some other decent bucks out there for me to go after. At this stage of my bowhunting career I'm not a trophy hunter but I sure would be happy with a decent buck.

allmightyhunter13

LMFAO.... I Just switched to the rage 2 blades as well this year. the same thing happened to me last year i arrowed my first buck, and it to was a huge 8 and instead of waiting I trailed it, only not to find him! month later i shot my 7 point!! never know you might find him while shed hunting this spring!!

BTBowhunter

We've all made the same mistake, or most of us anyway.

Something else I just thought to mention. It's hard to visualize the actual hit from a story but another thought is that the shot was simply too high and not necessarily too far forward. The fact that your penetration was limited almost certainly tells us that a bone was hit. If the arrow is at the best height, you have to hit very well forward to get that legbone. I've helped many a bowhunter friend track shoulder hit deer and had a few experiences myself and many shots thought to be too far forward are actually too high instead.

Was the buck relaxed or on alert? An alert deer can drop considerably at the sound of a bowstring.

Look at some deer anatomy photos, watch some slo-mo video of deer reacting (dropping and springing) to a bowshot and replay the shot in your mind and you may deduce that the deer was hit a bit high.

Maybe you already know this stuff but I hope you find something helpful in my rambling......

boilermaker85

I CANT BELIEVE YOU SAID THAT! ARE YOU PISSY BECAUSE HE HUNTS ON SUNDAY? WTF IS THAT ABOUT! ITS HAPPENED TO ALL OF US!"IF U HUNT MUCH" CUT EM SOME SLACK AND LOSE THE HOLIER THAN THOU CRAP!

AK NIMROD

SORRY TO HEAR THIS HAPPENING.
I have heard of one lung hit deer and elk surviving....not common
my guess is it did not penatrate the chest cavity just a muscle hit, so many animals are thought to be hit good but on video shows differently. friend was guide in FL for hogs. he could not tell me how many time client stated hit certain spot and was way off from where hit was. that was 15 years ago and not as bows are faster it is harder to tell.

not sure Ben is displaying holier than thou attitude, sounds like making wise / ethical choices to me(all of us have made poor choices) I have not hunted when I would not be available next moring to hunt or search for poorly hit animal.....or passed on hunting when the rain is pouring down and blood trailing would be very difficult.

minnesotadeer

I don't even know why I'm responding but something keeps pulling me toward the post. Anyway, I don't think he's talking about hunting on Sunday but rather thinking things through in terms of, if I shoot the deer tonight, can I look for him tomorrow if need be. I've done this before, asked myself, will my boss be ok if I call in a half day tomorrow or do I have a ton of important meetings or customers to meet with? It's just a matter of planning for the end result, that not every shot or kill will go exactly as you had planned it. You want to get out there as much as possible, but you also need to have a plan. I don't think it makes you holier than thou to believe that.

Good luck the rest of the season CutEm! You learn something from every hunt no matter how much you've hunted.