Straight down treestand shot: Would you take it?

[bear bowman]

I had this exact shot opportunity on two good bucks this year. I chose to let them both walk and wait for a better shot. Neither deer gave me a shot. I have an empty freezer based on that choice but I also have a clear conscience.

[Pine]

This is one of the many reasons I'm a ground hunter .
Fred Bear was strongly against elivated hunting because of the smaller kill zone and the animal is thicker from top to bottom .
If I can't double lung 'em , I'll pass .

[highlow]

Definitely D. I've had a doe actually walk between the ladder of my stand and the tree. Did not take the shot. Waited til it got farther away and presented a good shot, and a kill.

When I wheel hunted, years ago, had a doe walk past my tree, actually brushing the tree where I was ensconced in my portable. Again, waited til it got past and presented a better shot. Took that one as well.

And in closing, due to my advanced age, doubt if I'd even be able to bend far enough for a straight down shot. Don't practice that one very often. In fact, never.

[katman]

Originally posted by creekwood:
Anything but D is probably the last time you will ever see that "giant" buck.

Pass for me, better to let him walk than to take the chance on what I consider an iffy shot. If I never see him again that is fine and would sleep better than  wounding and loosing him.

Straight down best case is a spine shot, next worse a miss, worst is one lung hit, not usually to good unless a major artery is severed.

[Doc Pain]

I've killed at least a half dozen bucks like this. More importantly I have never lost a deer taking this shot. As long as I can bend at the waist and have good bow clearance I would take the shot. Even what we call straight down still has a little angle on it so there's a good opportunity for a piece of heart and that's what I'm always trying to hit.

[jonsimoneau]

I've had this happen lots of times. I've never taken that shot and never will.

[Bamboozle]

My first whitetail with a bow was taken with just such a shot. Straight down from 9 feet up in an apple tree with my good old Damon Howat hunter, 2117 XX75s and green razorheads. I did get two holes. I was 17. Long tracking job and bumped the deer a couple times along the way. Finally got him though. Wouldn't / haven't taken the shot again and the size of the horns isn't a factor to me in shot selection. Good topic!

[Zwickey-Fever]

This topic reminds me of a hunting experience several years ago when I lived back east. I was hunting with my father in a small section of woods. We went in early in the morning. At first light, I heard a commotion coming from my dads deer stand. I seen the flashes of white and brown moving fast through the woods so I picked up my bino's for a closer look. And there standing about 75 yards away was a buck with my dads arrow buried all the way up to the feathers. Knowing my dads shooting ability, I thought it was a done deal so I just watched the buck walk out of sight and marked the last spot. Later that morning I made my way to my dads deer stand to only have him shaking his head. He took this straight down shot. We tracked the deer 150 yards or better to only find his Zwickey covered in blood. We checked all the creek beds and every where we could think, nothing. Two weeks later, my brother shot the very same deer with more lethal results. On examination of skinning the buck we found out that my dads arrow never penetrated the rib cavity, but it his arrow rode a rib around the bucks chest cavity. Would have never believed it if I did not see it. Strange but it happened.

[Pat B]

My first trad kill, right after I bought my Treadway bow in '99, was straight down on a doe. She was 8' from the base of the tree, facing the tree. When I shot she ducked and the arrow went a little back. She ran up a hill and stopped about 50 yards away, hunched up her back and slowly went and laid in the cane patch she stood up from. We search for hours for her that night, crawling on hands and knees through the cane and couldn't find her. The next morning I went back and there she laying in the cane where I saw her lay down. She had bowed up so no white was showing. It was a liver shot.
 I doubt I'd take that shot again. I like them close, 10 to 12 yards but not straight down.

I have never shot a deer from a metal tree stand, I have spent many hours in them.  We only get one deer here. I always seemed to have gotten my deer going to or from the tree stand, that's what can happen when you walk softly a carry a big stick.  I did touch a deer from a wedge stand once.  6 pointer straight below me and content to just stand there. I had a 90 pound 70" Hill longbow that day.  Yes I had practiced the straight down shot, I rotate the bow to an invert position.  It is easy with practice.  That day, I bellied the wedge stand, pre-safety harness days, reached down and touched the little buck on the butt with my bow.  He jumped so violently that my bow went flying and hung up in branches out of my reach. I have been witness to only one straight down shot, the deer dropped on the spot with a spine hit.  In that case it was a longbow shooter and he hung on a branch to make the shot, he did not have a tree stand.  Those particular woods had climbable trees that we shot deer from, a dangerous technique by today's standards, but I was a monkey back then.

[Warden609]

Pavan, what a story!! What an education you gave that buck. Haha

[Michael Arnette]

Dang Pavan we are pretty spoiled these days!!

[wingnut]

D is the only good answer.  I shot a doe straight down at 6 ft once and recovered her with almost no blood trail.  Never again.

Mike

[md126]

An exit wound is critical with that type of shot. Absolutely critical.

If you're equipment set up can't penetrate enough to give yourself an exit wound than I'd pass. Simple as that.

[perry f.]

Done it once and will never do it again. No blood trail. Got lucky I was hunting a field edge and the deer ran across field and I watched him go down. I hit right between the shoulder blades off to one side of the spine.

[indianalongbowshooter]

D D D -- shot a doe once that was almost straight under me but not quiet, she ducked and spun at the shot and arrow went straight down through her back and was poking out straight under her lungs, she ran about 50 yds and drug the arrow out, bled like a stuck hog for another 75 yds then quit, never did find her looked for 2 days..arrow had bright red blood and no stomach contents but no deer.

[BAK]

Taken a few with that shot and never lost one with it.  Don't see it as an issue.

[mnbwhtr]

No to shooting straight down, tracked to many deer only to lose them. One lung deer can live a long time. If you don't get the spine you'll only get one lung.

[Littlejake]

I'm a big D! And I don't mean Dallas.