I harvested this small 8 point Wednesday morning before work. Made a perfect heart shot, he only went about ten yards then started browsing for a second before flopping over.
Then Thursday evening I went out again and arrowed a doe for my second deer of the year. Made a less than perfect though, too far forward, arrow went in the back of the left should and came out dead center of her chest. It was warm out with impending thunderstorms so I only waited about 20 minutes before getting down and starting to track. I thought my shot was a little better than it was though and when I found my arrow covered head to fletching in bright red blood I got a little more confident. So I kept tracking blood for about 80 yards until I came up to a big puddle, it was just getting dark so I decided to keep going.
I tracked another 80 yards and came to another big puddle, then a couple spots of blood going off at 90 degrees from where she had been heading. I went about 15 more yards then saw a pair of eyes shining back at me from the middle of a pricker thicket. It was about an hour after I made the shot and I thought for she she expired but when I went in to retrieve her she jumped up and bolted away. I then realized that the big puddles I was finding were probably where she was bedding down and I kept pushing her. So decided to leave her for a couple hours and gathered my gear and went home.
I came back at around 1:00 AM and started tracking from where I jumped her. The blood was starting to get thin from this point but I managed to track her about another hundred yards before the trail ended and the rain started to come down heavy. So I did a couple circles around the last blood in a last ditch effort and found her piled up in a clearing about 30 yards from the last blood. she was full rigored up and looked to have died shortly after I jumped her last. I had her skinned out and in the freezer by 4:00 AM. But she must have been dead for about 4 hours with the guts inside in 50 degree weather before I got her cleaned up so I'm not sure how good the meat will be.
Sorry for the long post but I never almost lost a deer and this is actually only the third deer I've taken with traditional equipment (went completely traditional last season) and the first deer of my own that needed to be tracked, so I'm just looking to get some feed back from some of the more experienced guys on tradgang and to share my experience with others so they can learn vicariously. I'm also sorry I didn't post pics of the doe but I was soaked and exhausted and just wanted to get the ordeal over with as soon as possible although I was very relieved to have found her. Thanks for taking the time to read this novel of a post and your feedback. Matt
Topic: 2012 New York Deer hunting thread. (Read 9111 times)
