piney

Had one I bow shot at a downward angle right in the boiler room that groaned and died right there. Had one other that I shot quartering away that grunted like a pig. It ran about 40 yds and toppled over.

WNYhunter

The doe I shot the other day groaned a few times while she was expirering (5-10 seconds). But as I always do, I racked another shell and held on her till I knew she was done. Try to always expect the unexpected. Sorry you lost her.

jrfrmn

What gun is being used? Rifle or Shotgun? I do know the standard shotgun slug like the foster slug puts them down instantly if hit right. I am now using the Hornadysstsabot. I'm curious how they will do.
Thanks.

Jasonlester

Reminton 870 Fully rifled. Federal premium Hydroshock Sabots. I have shot several deer with these slugs. They are nice.

What I still cannot understand is how she flipped, started kicking, and then got up and walked off. I guess it is possible she only hit it high in the back. I didn't bleed like I had hoped, Obviously.

there are several things we should have done differently. Have her put another round in her is one. But I had never seen one do what this deer did and then just get up. She acted like she was just doing her final kicks. Or I would have had her reload. When I took the gun from her the deer had only moved 10 yards from the shot, this was after a minute of two, I pulled the slide on the 870 back slow as I knew she would spook if I did. The shell did not come completely out and I had to remove it to load the next one. By the time I got this done she had walked off.

We waited 20 minutes and got down. I checked and we had pretty good blood at the shot and up to where she stopped. Ifollowed a little farther and backed out. waited 2 hours and went back and the rest is in th posts above. My hands feel raw from all the thorns. I took one through my boot. I spent hours on my hads and knees at and around the last blood. I searched every possible trail from there for blood. I then walked through all the thick stuff I could find. We searched and searched.

I told the neighbor and he is going to look on his property today. They were out hunting so I didn't venture onto there place. I have no clue. I have lost deer myself in the past and it sucks. But it realy sucks with it being my daughter shooting it. I have a little hope my neighbor will find her.

My daughter is taking it pretty well. She is upset a little but not so much she wants to quit. I wanted to get across the point to her that if you shoot you owe it to the animal to do your best to recover it. I did that in this case I believe. Unfortunatly, the fact remains I don't realy know if the deer is dead. I guess it is possible she just hit realy high and through the deer for a loop. ?..?.?.


Anyway, if we don't find her today the coyotes will have thanksgiving early if she did kill her. My daughter wants to go out again soon whitch I am glad. We need to let the area rest a while as we walked all over it. It is raining pretty good today so I think all our scent will wash away.

Jason

gmil6184

having not been there my only guess is that she hit her high above the spine. If you look at the anatomy of a deer the spine is lower in the body then you might realize. If she hit her high it would seem that the shock the slug hitting her temporarily stunned her which would explain her flipping onto her back and appearing to be hit very hard. Once the initial shock wore off she would be able to recover and run away. Since the wound is really nothing more then a flesh wound it would make sense there would be some fairly good blood where she went down and thrashed about. it would also explain the lack of blood when you attempted to trail her. if you put a slug through anything vital she would be down in very short order, if you hit guts she probably wouldn't have flopped and you def would have found guts. My guess is that she is probably still out there walking around, likely pretty sore but other then that no worse for wear...they are remarkably tough animals. Chalk it up as a learning experience, you can teach your daughter that when in doubt shot again and to work that action immediately after the first shot so she is ready. Also teach her that when you work the action on an 870 to slam it back and slam it forward instead of short stroking it and hanging up the empty (although i understand your reasoning in trying to sneak the shell out quietly). tell her to keep her chin up, maybe you guys will get another shot at her later this season

Edcyclopedia

The 8 pointer I got last week did the same thing...

When he hit the ground he moaned for 10 seconds, but unknowingly, remained alive for 20 minutes until I got to him.
The reason it took me so long to get to the buck is that he had not moved since the 1st few minutes after shooting him, so I thought he was dead.
I ended up taking my time, packing up my climber, only to realize the buck was still alive when I walked up to him.
Of course when I was 20 feet from the buck he started kicking his front feet, which scared the Ba-Jesus out of me.
Well now I had to pull out my old Shrade knife (as I left my gun by my stand 75 yards away) and proceed to punch out his air bags, not very fun, but effective.
30 seconds later he died and I finished dressing him out @ 141lbs.

I hit high, in back of the shoulder between his spine and top of the lungs.
I like to call this area the "free space", as deer could live quite awhile without a lethal organ shot.
I believe the trauma from my 50 caliber muzzle loader must have paralyzed his hind end, as there was no hole in his spine, so in my case I was lucky he dropped in his tracks.

Jimmy S

Jason, I can emphasize...this is what happened just a few weeks ago:

Opening Day of rifle season in NH, I was hunting from my treestand. I was set and ready at 5:45 waiting for the day to begin. As the sun was beginning to rise, I heard the distinct sound of deer walking in front of me. In a few minutes, I saw two does slowly walking to my left. Both were big adult does with no fawns ( I would have let them both walk if there was a mother with her fawn)...anyway, I waited for a clean shot and took it with my .308.

She was only 30 yds away and I watched her go down immediately after the shot. She was on her back with her legs kicking. I have seen this a few times and the results have always been the same. Death occurs momentarily. Not this time. The deer got back up and ran under my tree as fast as a deer can run. When she went out of sight, I could hear her running and thought I heard her go down.

I check the entire area for 2 1/2 hrs and then had the help of 2 buddies for another 2 hours and there was not one single drop of blood. Just a few drops of blood where she was shot.

I have never seen a deer hit that hard, that knocks her down and gets back up without leaving and trail to follow. There was water behind me and I heard nothing to suggest she went through it. I know that area very well as do my buddies and we finally had to give up the search.

Years ago, I lost the only deer after the shot, before this season. I was a nice doe that went down hard at only 20 yds away. She was groaning loudly and managed to get up and run to the edge of a ridge where she tumbled down. I walked up to her and saw that she was really hurt. That's when I made a costly mistake. Rather than put her down, I fully expected her to take her last breath when she suddely got up right in front of me and walked away like a new born colt. She was out of sight in a flash but I was not concerned. I expected to see her laying within just a few yards. That was not the case. I never saw her again. Two buddies and I searched for the remainder of the day with absolutely no blood trail. It was the most disappointing day in my hunting life. Not because I failed to fill my tag but because I wounded a deer that I should have put down in an instant. I had poor judgement because I thought she would expire in front of me instead of going out of sight never to be seen again.

Jasonlester

Kinda what I'm thinking the more I think about it. I know all the deer I hit with my 870 haven't gone far at all. So I'm thinking it being so close she hit high above the shoulder looking through the scope. The slugs are devistating but if she hit it poorly I can understand. If I see the deer again I'll do everything I can to take it. I've warned the neighbor to check for it in the areas on his place where she was headed.

On a positive not I found a ton of buck sign in the thick stuff. Actually I knew it would be there but I've intentionaly stayed out because its pretty much unhuntable. Unless I had a tripod stand or something. Anyway I'll get her back out in guns season. This was our youth gun season. I'll probably bowhunt Thursday and gun hunt opening day and the next day.

My daughter I think is taking it better than me. LOL I hate lossing one. And I hate it for her. But she does know we did everything we could. And she knows it realy won't go to waste.

Buck Hunter 1

You guys never heard a deer cry or groan? Hell I got hit w/ aslug I'd groan. They yong ones will cry if you don't hit em' good, it is an eerie and gut wrenching sound.

Jasonlester

True enough. Just haven't heard it in all the deer I've shot.