Longest it took you to find/track down your game after shooting it?

When muzzle loading first became legal here, I put together a CVA Kentucky rifle kit in .45. I shot a deer with it, a nice buck, at about 7:15 one morning. (I had hit it too far back and too high for it to succumb quickly and the little .45 did not penetrate.) I tracked it till 11:30, about 2 1/2 miles and found only a gut pile.

Never shot the .45 again. Sold it and bought a .54 caliber. Solved the penetration problem! Bigger bleed holes too! I also learned more about ML ballistics and have since placed the shots better. Live and learn.
 
never had one actually take an additional step after being shot, granted all my shots have been nervous system shots, head and neck shots. the one I shot this year at 400 yds, did the stop, drop and roll thing down the hill.
 
Now with bow I have shot one & had 1/2 mile thack job (1) lung hit. I have Shot one Through & throgh double lung jumpe up in air turned around started walking away like nothing happend I went to knock another arrow & she droped kicked alittel Expired :D
 
Was hunting on shotgun only land in West Texas, sitting in a mesquite tree with perfect view, out steps a doe not even 30 feet from me, raised the scattergun, and put all 9 pellets in her heart/lung area. She hopped, and took off at a dead run. I tracked her to a shallow, wide creek about 400 yards north of where I was sitting and found her nestled in a thicket still gasping for air, blood pouring out of her nose and mouth, but apparently she still had life in her and she popped back up and ran for another 50-60 yards before flopping over. After opening her up, one pellet went through the top of her heart and the rest through both lungs and lodged in the far side of her. This was the absolute last time I went deer hunting with a shotgun...:barf:
 
mine didn't go anywhere but head over heels.

shot was made maybe 25 yards away,from treestand with a 12 gauge slug. the slug entered mid ribcage from an angle (deer was facing slightly away from me). its right side towards me. it broke 3 ribs it and made an entrance wound about 2.5"x5". it passed through the deer exiting at the base of the neck.

either before i was born or while i was too young to hunt
dad shot 1 with his rifle (.35 rem) the deer dropped and spun around kicking like curley from the 3 stooges. not sure how far away it was,he hit it in the heart,upon field dressing the deer he found the heart was practically liquified.


back in the late 80's he went to maine to hunt with his father,( my grandad), i was to young to go. he shot a black bear maybe 120 pounds dressed,female.

in virginia when the 3 of us went hunting
he had another deer he shot many years later with the same rifle, it ran maybe 100 yards and fell,there was alot of blood where the deer was standing when he shot it. and alot to trail it with too. the following year,

grandad shot one with his .35 at first light of the morning, it jumped and ran down the hillside and dropped maybe 150 yards. a mess of blood there too.
 
Last year I heart/lung shot a 9 pointer at dusk at 197 yards. The deer only traveled about 30 yards from where it was standing but took 300 yards in a zig zag course to get there. I lost the blood trail and had to go get a flashlight to continue tracking, took me about 25 minutes walking back and forth before I found him. It was on top of a hill going down a steep embankment into a hollow. When I got close to the edge I thought for sure that he had gone all the way down in to the creek. When I got to the edge though I found him with his leg hung up on a tree root. If it hadn't been for that root I would have had quite a drag ahead of me.
 
Longest track has been about 100 yards (give or take a few) earlier this season. Double lung shot 8 point buck with my compound bow. Other than that all of my kills have been with the shotgun and that doesn't really allow for much tracking as long as you have some common sense with your shots.

Now, that 8 point buck took about 2 1/2 hours to track down. He bled heavily for the first 15 or so yards after the hit, but then the trail completely ended. Finally picked the trail back up almost 70 yards away, only reason I found it was from watching the deer after the shot, so I at least knew the general direction he ran. Once the trail picked back up it was very heavy and easy to follow, deer ended up being down in some thick reeds on the edge of the swamp I was in front of....fun part was dragging him back over the creek :)
 
Weird but the longest deer track I followed in the dark and rain was a long zigzag course which ended less than 60 yards straight line from its start but covered a lot more distance, maybe 120 yards total. A deer is hard to find in the brush and high grass; luckily it has a white belly.

I was taught in the Air Force that it takes 7 seconds to go unconscious if something cuts off the blood supply to your brain. So how far can a deer run in 7 seconds?
 
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The longest distance was approximately 260 yds for a big whitetail doe I had shot with my bow. There was a good blood trail for about 200 yds and it ran out. I got a line from the blood trail and walked that direction straight ahead and found her.

The longest time was also on a whitetail deer (buck this time) shot with my bow. I looked for 5 hours the night I hot him and then another 3 hours the next morning. He had gone only about 150 yds, but it was heavy brush and no blood trail (the arrow had gone through the deer and hit the opposite front leg and turned down and the broadhead was under the skin about halfway down the leg. The deer had been dead before I left the stand, but no blood trail.
 
my fist buck first tracking

My first year hunting was with a bow. I shot the deer and waited about an hour we tracked it through the woods for about a 1/2 mile, then throught the thickest buckthorn you have ever seen. (took about 2 hours to go 50 yards crashing on our hands and knees. There was very little blood but we could follow the trail as it was the freshest. My hunting mentor kept saying.. "I don't know, doesn't look good" and I kept saying I know I hit it good.... So as a good guy he kept with me.

Then it traveled across a stream about 4 times then it went down the stream and we finally saw where it got out of the stream, it crossed the road, along a small airport runway which was windblown so now no trail at all. We followed six or seven other trails and finally found one with a dot of blood. We followed it and it and crossed another highway. (I shot it about 4:30 pm and at midnight we stopped at that highway.)

It snowed all the next day and at work it made me sick to think the trail was going to be lost. The next day we picked up with about 12 inches of snow. We crossed the road and could see a faint trail where a deer was running underneath about 12 inches of fluffy snow. The trail was there and even after all the snow you could see where a deer was running. We thought this must have been our deer. There was already about 12-18 inches on the ground before that day. We bushwacked down along a hedgerow and lost the trail. We surmised the deer went into a thicket along the lake and we started just poking around under overhanging scrubby pine trees.

We found it. small 8 pt buck. It was gut shot with a piece of intestine hanging out about 6 inches from the exit wound thus stopping the blood flow. I shot my first buck with a shotgun a week later and they are mounted together. They are the only mounts I have and they were both a story that 19 years later we still refer to as "that epic tracking". I have tracked alot of deer and found almost all. (tracked deer others have shot.) There is an art to it. You have to see the blood, the hoof prints, the logical routes and be patient. If the deer went a certain way there will be signs you just need to know how to see them. I always suggest if you loose the trail to try to think where the deer might have "holed up" if injured. You will be amazed howmany times you can find it if you try. Don't give up.
 
My longest tracking job was one I didn't find. I tracked that sucker for over a mile. I 100% positive it survived. It made 2 scrapes along the "over a mile". The hit went down in between the shoulder and the ribs out the arm pit, never entering the chest cavity. I've only not found 3 deer.

Longest tracking job when I found the animal...Less than 100yds, including rifles and bow.
 
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shot a black bear in minesota, at dusk, with a knight wolverine inline rifle, using 220gr sabboted .44 solids, at 40m.
the bear blasted off gone before the smoke cleared.
there was sooooo much blood that we had no problems following it into an open feild. then it started raining buckets. we looked for that bear for 2 days before we gave up. i think it came out on a fire road and somebody snagged it.

i also shot a deer that ran around a hill top(1/2mi) almost back to the place i shot it before it dropped.
 
shot one 2 years ago and tried tracking it for about 60 yrds but gave up and decided to get the family to help (they love it when u ask for help). on the way back to the cabin though i found the deer laying 5 yrds off the trail about 150 yrds from where i originally shot it :)
 
Perhaps you'd be a little more specific than just "through and through". Like, where'd you hit the dang thing?

Longest track was 30yds. Unusual, since a 150 Sierra .30 cal. usually lets them go no where. If you like to use your tracking skills, then use a 180 gr. designed to zip thru deer sized critters without expanding, but perform well on elk--oh wait, you already did that.:p
 
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Bullet hits deer when heartis beating pressure is greater

I read this article about why some shots stop immediately and others don't, despite same placement. The theory was it was due to blood flow. If pressure is high during part of heart beat when bullet hits, a rush of pressure is sent to brain, and other parts of body etc. It was very interesting.
 
I shot one this past Tuesday (6 point), he was quatering toward me I put the round thru the neck,he spun side ways and I put another thru the boiler room just for good measure (I hate to track) not saying I can't track just I don't like to if I don't have to :D
I shot one with a bow a couple years back that went 250 yards as I was tracking it I heard a car stop on the road in the direction I was traveling and when I got to where the deer had dropped it was next to the road and you guessed it some one stole it from the side of the road :mad:
Now I normaly shoot a .270 w/90grn. hollow points my brother in law shoots the same caliber with 160 grn. corelock and he is amazed at how much bigger the hole is in my deer :eek: :D
 
My longest recovery was just last saturday. Saw a good sized 6 point coming out of a brush filled ravine on the other side of a creek maybe 75 yards out. Had been there all day without seeing anything and he was looking pretty good. Waited till he hit a clearing and took the shot. When the dust settled, he was gone and in what direction i didn't see.

I hit everyone on the radios that i needed to cross the creek to search for a trail or the deer before dark and got the ok to go over. I marked the spot i had shot at as best i could and began trying to find a spot to cross the "river". Seems every open spot had 3 feet of water at the bottom. Finally found a shallow area downstream and and made it over dry.

Found a briar hell that was literally impenatrable. Couldn't go around without a huge loss in time and it was getting dark... I crawled. Not sure how far but probably only 50 yards or so before things opened up enough to stand again. Finally found the tree i had marked from over the creek and started searching for signs of a hit.
Took a couple minutes but i found a tiny bit of belly hair...some gut material...a hit...omg don't let it be a gutshot...i knew my gun was on and i was so sure...forlorn i started tracking stomach material on my hands and knees in the darkening evening. My little AA flashlight was throwing a yellow cast that made it impossible to see well. No blood after 10 feet...Depression set in. I knew i needed help. I hung my orange hat on a tree to mark and crawled my way back out of hell.

Went to the barn where my cousins and their alcoholic buddies were coming in from an evening hunt. 2 does were being examined in a golf cart bed as beer tabs popped like fireworks. I explained my predicament as they congratulated me on what they felt sure was a good shot.
Said we'd go looking soon but needed to give him plenty of time to lay up and die. Being their farm, i chilled out and had a couple beers as they consumed an easy case. They had the does processed out by then and proclaimed it time to go get my deer. Another case of beer was loaded on one of the 4 wheelers and many bloodlight and spotlights were produced and put into bags on the machines. To my horror, cousin "scott" who had drank an easy 12 pack, pulled out a 12ga. pump and slid it into a scabbard. Cousins friend "terry", Must have seen my look because he laughed and said "doan worry man...thisis what we do!!" I worried.

Drove down to the pasture, everyone cut off their machine,its about 9pm, and i show scott the terrible hillside we would have to fight to get access to the hit site. He laughed and everyone popped another beer. We had a trail that he'd cut, he said...to go to the same spot. Indeed he drove to a crossing at the riverbank, rode across, took a right on the first trail and went 100 yards. He stopped his machine and said we'd all go by foot from this point. He started on a footpath that lead right to the terrible briar thicket i'd fought hours earlier and skirted through it. Another 40 yards and he laughed and said "this is too easy". My big buck had become a little 5 pointer but had only made it 50 yards from my orange hat i could see further down the trail. The deer had taken the .308 corelokt in the chest and the bullet skewered lenghwise before blowing out the stomach and going into the leg. He was probably dead before i got across the water the first time but it took 4 hours and tons of apprehension before i got this one. I'll always carry a better light from now on...J.R.
 
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