Lost the trail!


Turkeygirl

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Well guys, I got out of my stand last night, was walking down the edge of a cornfield and a deer comes out of the woods and starts heading right towards me. I put an arrow on my bow and get ready and it comes over this hill, stops, walks, stops, walks some more then turns broad side about 20-25 yards away. I release my arrow, I here a thwack and she hunches and takes off into the woods, making a bleating noise kind of. Andy comes over from his stand and we find the blood trail, no arrow yet, and track her. Well the trail started out ok then got really heavy and then it stopped, we only found a couple spots of blood before nothing! My mom is picking me up after my class ends at 10:50am and I'm going back over to see if I can find the deer or the trail and my arrow. So far it hasn't rained which is good. Andy thinks a leg shot or maybe gut, I'm not sure, what do you guys think? I felt so horrible and still do; it's part of hunting but still this had to happen in the same swampy woods that I shot the big buck in the leg my first year of hunting and didn't recover. I'll try to let you all know what happens later.

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Re: Lost the trail!

It sounds to me like you got a good hit on her TG.

You had a good blood trail and that is a good sign. You can tell if it's a gut shot, by smelling the blood drops that you've found and looking for gut matter in it. If it's good and red, with nothing else i it, then it's not a gut shot.

Something I have learned from mortally wounded animals over the years, is that they don't always fall on the trail during there regular direction of escape travel. By this I mean, that just before laying down or expiring, they will, 75% of the time, cut trail of their general direction of travel to the right or left, and sometimes even backtrack and then cut off. Sometimes they will make a fish-hook, from their general direction of travel, and then lay down or drop.

when you've reached the end of all blood sign, start doing a grid pattern to the right, straight ahead, left and behind in search of more blood or the deer itself.

If that fails to turn up anything, go back to the last sign of blood,...stand there and think to yourself ..."now where would I head for cover to lay down from here". . I have found a few deer this way, just by making an educated ,deer sense, guess at where they might have headed.

Good luck and let us know how it all turns out. wink.gif

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Re: Lost the trail!

Follow the blood trail and then search over everything where the blood ends. Look through the brush and even the palce you would not expect it to be. If you still do not find her then go back to where you started seeing blood and start walking in circles following the trail of blood. Good luck finding her.

Archerjg

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Re: Lost the trail!

Well thanks guys but I couldn't find her. I went out yesterday, at least was able to find the trail again, she went a little more right than we though, below the one stand, and the trail looked good but then just slowed down and all I was finding were drops. I followed the trail down to a creek and then I could not find anything, did a couple big loops and no more blood except for a drop before she must have crossed the creek. I didn't find my arrow either! I did see a nice buck with 2 does out in a field though. Well I'm bummed a little but I'm just going to climb back in the saddle and hopefully get me a deer this season.

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