Man I visit several Bowhunting sights and seems there is always a blame it on the broadhead let me down thread. I was thinking about it and tried to come up with just one instance where it was actually the broadhead to blame for Deer I never recovered and couldnt come up with a single one. I have Bow hunted for over 30 years and used many brands including sevaral brands of mechanicals and the Deer I never recovered was always my fault. Was I just that lucky I never had a failure in all those years If you truely believe you had a failure feel free to talk about it. Lets try and keep brands out of it for sake of keeping the thread clean, just simply mechanical or fixed blade. I think shot angles ----1/4 to shots are not truely realized when the heart is pumping at full draw and looking through a 1/4 or smaller peep. I think things get over looked as to what really happened in the hunters eyes in all the fast pace excitement when the moment comes. Take those high percentage shots and sucess will go along with it if everything is executed right. Learn when not push deer when uncertain of the hit takes place. peace out,,,Crick
I'm with you Crick... This will be my 17th season bowhunting... I have used several different brands of mechanicals and fixed heads over the years and I can't think of one instance that I could blame a broadhead for anything that did not go the way I wanted.
I'm with you, crick. I've killed deer with both, will comtinue to kill deer with both.... and when I screwed up, I didn't blame the head. It's all about shot placement! If you put just about anything through a deer's lungs or heart, it's gonna die. Just my .02
Hey wait a minute? There are other bowhunting sites? If you really think about it it's all human error. Poorly tuned arrow, dull broadhead, poor placement. Hahaha broadheads fault? Really???? Sounds like Obama!
Well said Crick. It's easier to blame someone or something else for our failures rather than our own selves when something doesn't turn out the way we would like or feel that it should. We all need to do our best when put in those situations and focus on the task at hand by taking only ethical shots and eliminate those that are questionable. We do that not only for our own peace of mind when we squeeze the trigger and it's all said and done but also out of respect for the animal we are hunting. The goal is a quick, clean ethical kill. Sometimes "things happen" and we all get that. It's just the price we pay for playing the game we all love.... BOWHUNTING! Stay Focused and Have Fun!! Best of Luck to Everyone!! Traveler
Yeah- i just picked up a bow again (since 1970) my first kill was a seven pointer (i was twelve) using a ben pearson 40 lb recurve with a cedar arrow and those bear broadheads. At 35 yds, he did'nt make it 40. Hit him right!
I agree with the above! LOL, this is my 21st year of archery hunting and I have been very blessed to only have lost 2 deer. Both instances were a poor judgement on my part and poor shot placement. I also love it when you hear, "Missed the buck of a lifetime because my bow didn't shoot right!" Seriously? HEHEHE!
Well....I released at a tree rat one really slow day and I was very dissappointed to find my BH flattened at the tip from hitting a large rock. It was all the rock's fault. The shooter had nothing to do with the rock that jumped out in front of my arrow to save that squirrel. I concur. I have used numerous heads thru the years and NONE of them have failed me when I have provided that BH an ethical shot opportunity to work it's magic. From trial and error I have settled on cut-on-contact one-piece head even though I have not had serious issues with mechanicals....just like less moving parts. Example-NAP HellRazors and Montecs.
I agree, that shot angle and human error are the number reason for losing a deer. I have deer hunted for 40 years, and I still make questioable decisions. I lost a doe this week. 15 yard shot. No I couldn't wait for a perfect broadside shot. I would have happened. But, I took a gamble and took a shot when she was quartering away.(almost) My shot hit at the last ribs and my broadhead must of hit the far shoulder. Deer ran about 15 yards and stopped for maybe 10 to 15 secon ds and then IO heard her take off. The only blood I found was one big buddle where see stopped. Bright red blood. I went and got a friend to help me track. I even got my sons lab. We looked for 3 hours. I know that I killed this deer. The area where she ran off is so thick that I had to use hand to get through. I a nut shell, I made the mistake and took a questionable shot at 15 yards. I keep learning!
Would you consider this a broadhead failure. Lol. This was a good hit on a frontal shot on a jake turkey. I assume it caught the brisket. Bird flew up and arrow fell out and then the bird went down andran off. I marked that down in memory bank. Don't use excessively large cut heads turkey.Years earlier I had a thunderhead that had 3 blades look like that but I did catch the shoulder so that was a bad hit.
Yea,must have been a bad hit.lol. I agree with blood here for the most part. Put em in the boiler,even a field point will get the job done. I even agree that we need to educate ourselves about what our equipment can shoot effectively. But the plain and simple truth is that some heads perform better for most,even when the hits are less than desirable. I had a blade fall off a head once on a perfect hit. It did it's job and I recovered the animal but imo the head failed and the company sent me a new pack of a different model because of it.
I had a mechanical head not open for me one time. The arrow took out both lungs, but didn't pass all the way through the deer. I did find the deer, she didn't go far. But the blades on the head were still closed. Felt kind of bad for the deer. Now I use fixed blade, I just like them better.
Hey, its not the broadhead. Proper angles are everything! Period! Pleas think "double lung" or no shot.
What happened... I am an experienced archery/deer hunter - I have bagged many. This year I took a shot at a buck, at 50 yards, and I hit it perfect. I was confident I had the 8 point. It was not an angle shot, he was broadside, standing still, in a field. He was standing on a clump of grass that I had used my range finder on, so I knew he was right at 50 yards. I have never shot over 38 yards before, usually I am in the woods (Pennsylvania) and shots over 30 yards aren't very common. I do practice out to 50 yards, I have a 50 yard pin on my sight. Like I said, I hit him behind the shoulder, I heard a rib crack, I saw my arrow stuck in, about half of the shaft (the fletching side) was sticking out. My bow is a compound bow set at 62 pounds. I was using a carbon arrow with a three blade mechanical broadhead - the kind that the blades flip out and back when the arrow goes in. The deer did a 'fast walk' (he didn't fall down) into the woods where I lost site of him. I waited 1 hour exactly, it was getting dark, and I didn't find a blood trail right away. It took an hour, and I found a drop, then more. About 2 hours and 15 minutes after I shot, I found my arrow that the buck pulled out. The arrow had the broadhead blades folded back, the rubber band that held them in place was not on the arrow. I suspect when he pulled the arrow out, from the fletching side, the blades folded back. Then the blood trail was very good, lots of big splotches. (It was fully dark out at this point). I had made about 8 steps from where the arrow was laying, and I heard a deer jump off and run down the hill. I didn't see it. About 5 more steps and there was the spot it was laying - big pool of blood, pieces of lung. I couldn't find any more blood trail. I stopped searching that night, I didn't want to push it again. I thought I would have better luck the next day, but after 6 hours of searching the next day I couldn't find any sign of him. I circled the spot numerous times, and also searched the hill where I heard the deer run. The woods are thick in this spot, we have had some timber removed, there were tree tops etc., brush, laying about. I have made this same shot, hit the same spot, many times before. I always find my deer. (I did make a bad shot once, and no, I didn't find that deer.) What do you think happened? I have used mechanicals before, different styles, and I have used fixed blades as well. This mechanical was a 'Rage style', but a different brand. Have you shot whitetails at 50 yards with an arrow? Do you think the mechanical opened up okay? If I waited longer, it would have probably been dead, but it seems 2+ hours should be long enough? I'm not shooting 50 yards anymore, that field is too tempting for a long shot. When you read these threads, it seems like if you make a good shot, you will get your deer. I just don't know what I did wrong. My only theory is that the arrow must have lost a good bit of energy going the longer distance, plus mechanicals will suck up some more enery when they enter the body... I would like to know if you have shot whitetails this far with mechanicals and did you do okay? Any opinions or remarks are welcome.
