gonna bea long sleepless night tonight

[HighTechRedneck]

Today was the muzzle loader season opener here in Indiana. I did not hunt this morning, but got out there this evening. About 10 min of legal shooting light left a 150-160 class 10 point buck came into the field I was hunting on. My SMI muzzle dropped him at a little over 200 yards but he got back up and ran off. I spent a little over an hour out there with flashlights trying to find him but I never even found a blood trail. Gonna head back out in the AM, and hunt the same stand for an hour or so then start looking for the big boy. If I am lucky he will be easy to find. I knew better than to take a chest shot in low light like that. Should have either shot him in te neck, or let him go without squezing the trigger. I'm soooooooooo pissed off at myself rite now.

 

[jlaughlin72]

I hate to hear that, when one jumps back up, alot of deer have been lost like that. I hope you find your deer in the morning, Keep us posted.

 

[HighTechRedneck]

Like I predicted it was a sleepless night. I laid in bed awake with images of the shot going thru my head time after time. With any luck at all I'll find a good blood trail that I kept missing last night with the flashlights. By bigest 2 fears at this point are that I pulled and just broke a front leg, or that the coyotes found this big boy last night. I can accept a clean miss. It will make me wonder why he hit the ground at the shot, but that will be better than losing a deer to yotes, or knowing that I crippled this big boy up.

Why did I have to do something as irresponcsble as taking a chest shot when I knew there was not going to be enough light to track??? :x :x :x :x :x

 

[MNSmoker]

I was over at a buddies house early the other afternoon after a morning hunt (Skunked again! The weather pattern here in western MN has not been very good for deer hunting.) We were watching one of the shows on the Outdoor channel, and a guy whacked a buck with his muzzleloader. The deer dropped like a brick, kicked around, then got back on his feet and took off at a full throttle. They analyzed the video frame-by-frame and it was unbelievable. You could actually watch the bullet going through the air, hit the deer right behind the shoulder, and see it bounce off without penetrating. It was unreal! A perfect shot, and all the guy did was give that buck a nasty bruise and maybe a cracked rib.

 

[Spitpatch]

Powerbelt???? :lol:

I have this brother who hunts every year for atoal of three days and never fires a practice shot all year. :evil: He then shoots a deer yesterday morning. It is a raking shot from BEHIND grazing the left hip high close to the spine. The deer dropped like a rock got up, dropped again then got up and ran off never to be seen again. This all at 100yards! :evil: Makes me mad!

 

[HighTechRedneck]

yeah it was a .45 cal powerbelt.

I found a lot of hair where I dropped the buck, but no blood anywhere. It was a quartering towards me chest shot, but evidentaly something went wrong.

 

[jlaughlin72]

So, I take it you didn't have any luck finding him. Sorry to hear that. If yall have buzzards over there, watch for them , you may be able to at least find the rack.

 

[choc-dog]

Frontal chest shot

I had a 8 point buck catch me in a tree 5 years ago and ther only shot I had was a frontal chest shot. I aimed at the right side of the brisket at 90 yards and put a 200 grain barnes .45 right there. The bullet exited just forward of the hip.

I only attempted and made that shot because I had confidence in the bullet doing what it was designed to do.

Choc-dog

 

[HighTechRedneck]

Well I had confidence in my ability to make the shot, and in the bullet doing it's job. Maybe I had a bit too much confidence.


jlaughlin72
Yeah we have buzzards, and I am going to watch them Thurs, Fri, and Sat while I am hunting the same area. There are several other dead deer in the area. At least 2 other big bucks dead with their heads cut off, and I think that there is a dead doe somewhere unless the idiots found it after I told them where I saw her headed on the posted ground. Also a few dead yotes, and 6 dead dogs in the woods. With all those dead animals around it won't be easy to pinpoint the deer that I shot from buzzard activity, but I am going to try.

 

[choc-dog]

question for you

Who is shooting the dogs and WHY???

 

[jlaughlin72]

whos shooting dogs

If I was to make an assumption, i would think that the dogs mentioned were strays that mixed in with the coyotes and are therefore usless to us other than to run our deer. The reason I am saying that is because at our hunting lease we have some, and we try to get rid of as many predetors to deer that we can.

 

[Tiderunner]

I read somewhere that Buzzards won't eat an animal that has eaten meat......

 

[HighTechRedneck]

I SHOT THE DOGS.
Everything meantioned except the 3 deer was shot by me from my stand while deer hunting. I guess that you can say my Contender, Savage, and SMI have been fired plenty this deer season.

I shoot every K9 in this area that gives me a 1/2 way good shot. in the last 10 years 1 neighbor has lost hundreds of chickens, we have lost between 25 and 30 tame ducks, and we have lost 6 new born calves to the dogs in the area. One of the idiots out there takes in every stray that they find, and at 1 time had 45 dogs that they were feeding.

I also shoot any/every dog that I see running deer reguardless of where I am hunting.

 

[clint]

they make good hotdogs clint

 

[flatland hunter]

I do the same... two strays were lucky this last Sunday. My daughter was with me... and they were standing next to my truck.

 

[choc-dog]

Thanks Hightec

I have a soft spot for dogs. I competed in American kennel club dog trials for 9 years with labrador retrievers..the chococlate colored dogs.

I understand your need to cull the unwanted or abandoned dogs.

Choc-dog

 

[HighTechRedneck]

Choc-dog
I understand what you are saying about a soft spot for dogs. Even though it doesn't seem like it I also kinda have a soft spot for them. I have a few house dogs and used to have beagles. I know that I seem kinda crule for shooting dogs, but after watching a few deer get run to death, and having calves killed I gotta do what I can to forget about my soft side and do what I feal is rite.
I honestly hope that nobody on here takes offence to that.

 

[clint]

that is a sbs job shoot bury shush!!!!! clint

 

[HighTechRedneck]

Clint
I agree, and I usualy keep it prety quiet. This thread just went in a direction where I thaught that I should say something about the extra dead animals

 

[clint]

sometimes you just have to do it my thing is cats!!! have trapped 14 in last 2 months close to 60 last 2 yrs clint