Hit a doe at 30 yards during an evening hunt with my father in law. It was getting late fast, and I only waited about 10 minutes to get down from the stand (mistake # 1) because I thought I saw her go down about another 20 yards near the stream. I looked briefly (10 minutes maybe), but then decided that it would be better to come back in the morning. Came back with my father in law the next morning and found the entry and exit blood spots.....tracked it to the water, about 20 yards away like I thought. Noticed she actually doubled back on me and caught that trail across the water. After crossing the water we still had good blood and noticed she possibly laid down again. Up over the hill, in no particular pattern or even on a well laid path she continued up to an area that had a few different choices for her, bout 1/2 of a mile all in all. That was the last of the blood and the last spot was a decent size area of blood. To the left was a lay down area....straight ahead was a hill to higher ground and to the right were pines. I looked in each spot with no sign of her. What am I missing? Is there more places I should have looked or maybe further past these places? With no blood trail to go on and 5 1/2 hours of searching I was at my end. I consider myself a good tracker but am always willing to learn more.
Where did you hit her? you might have got a muscle hit or a fatty paunch hit. Did you get a pass through? What does you arrow look like? sticky and white? bright red blood? Dark Red Blood? What does the arrow smell like? At the POI were there any hairs on the ground? What color were they?
Deep dark blood, no bubbles, no hair and no retrieval of the arrow. Mossy underground layered in leaves. Going back in the evening with a metal detector to see if I had a pass through. Looked like a clean shot just under the shoulder. I thought even if I hit her in a muscle maybe that the blood would at least tapper off but she was bleeding good up to the last spot. Nice round 2 1/2' area of blood where she laid down each time....
Under the shoulder or behind the shoulder? Low, forward hit....Dark blood...hmmm no arrow right now, no hair. 2.5'? as in feet? you definitely bumped her up from her first bed. After that, she knows you are following her and all bets are off as to where she will go. I don't have enough info to determine if it a mortal wound. Muscle hits can bleed a lot...See if you can find the arrow. What about tracking with dogs?
Dogs are an option. Just weird how the blood just stopped without any signs of slowing down. Yes 2 1/2 foot blood spot ,matted down like she was laying for a bit.
Sometimes they back track on their original trail you may want to start from the begining again and see if there is another blood trail leading off the main one.
We recovered one this year that did the same thing...we found her dead 75 yards from last blood. It's possible that the blood stopped because the deer was out of blood.
Blarney....Yeah ...she did back track once already. That's completely possible. Of course we had rain for 2 days here in CT so its gonna be a loss. Heartbreaking....
Bootlegger.....I think we were out too far in the woods (as far as I know we are the only ones with permission to hunt it ) for someone else to have scooped her but anythings possible.
