How many deer do you injure and not recover every year?

well 30+ years and I can remember 2 that I lost only to find them later after the coyotes found them.

there was one I got in the early years that I remember tracking for 4 hours over at least a mile, good lesson on not taking marginal shots.

so to answer the question... approximately 1/15 deer per year.

the OP story of the guy talking about losing 3 this early in the year is disturbing.
 
in 40+ years of hunting I have wounded only one deer myself. I felt terrible about it, I trailed it for two days. Found his bed in the snow with a small blood spot, and there was no more blood after that. The shot went way low, and I never did figure out why. Deflected maybe? There never was a lot of blood, so I think he survived just fine.
Some folks do not care about the game they hunt, and those folks give us all a bad name.
 
Never lost a deer. I don't shoot unless I can get a round in to the boiler room. I lost a goose last year. I hit it and it wobbled and dropped altitude, it glided behind a treeline and managed to fly away. It was not a good feeling.
 
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I lost the second deer I ever shot. I was sitting against a great big upturned tree root looking over a open side hill and not 50 yards away out walks a nice mule buck. Lined up my 30-30 and squeezed one off, watched him buck and take off into the timber. I flagged the spot he went in and went to go meet my dad somewhere halfway as I knew id need help and he be coming to the shot. By the time I got to him and back to the spot it had started snowing and had dumped just enough of a skiff to cover the trail. We searched and searched but he either bedded up real tight somewhere or got far enough away before the snow started to fall that we never could find the trail. I felt really bad and mad at myself for not going in after it but I figured I'd give him time while I met up with dad, I was pretty excited and not thinking clearly as I was already picturing hoisting up a nice 4 pointer in front of dad. The weather was the last thing on my mind, but the worst was it was on a Sunday 5 hours from home :(
 
I've never lost a deer and I've hunted... 24 of my 25 years since I took the test, getting 1 or 2 deer most years. I've not hunted enough a couple years. I've looked hard for wounded deer a couple times though, and almost gave up on one that stopped bleeding but I kept finding fresh pee spots and a magpie helped me find it about 3 hours after the shot.

I lost a hare the other night and it bugged me for a little while. I used a Remington Thunderbolt .22 shell I think, kind of a good hot one for small game and I hit it hard, it flipped over upside down and kicked. I got closer and the little bastard turned over and hopped quickly but a little limply into the thickest #### ever. I looked for a while but couldn't see it or any sign at all. Damnit, I know the coyotes and stuff have to eat too, but I wanted it.
 
I've never lost a deer and I've hunted... 24 of my 25 years since I took the test, getting 1 or 2 deer most years. I've not hunted enough a couple years. I've looked hard for wounded deer a couple times though, and almost gave up on one that stopped bleeding but I kept finding fresh pee spots and a magpie helped me find it about 3 hours after the shot.

I lost a hare the other night and it bugged me for a little while. I used a Remington Thunderbolt .22 shell I think, kind of a good hot one for small game and I hit it hard, it flipped over upside down and kicked. I got closer and the little bastard turned over and hopped quickly but a little limply into the thickest #### ever. I looked for a while but couldn't see it or any sign at all. Damnit, I know the coyotes and stuff have to eat too, but I wanted it.
 
Wholesale Sports has a small handheld thermo made by seek under $600
I have a FLIR ps 32 and love the thing I can easily follow blood trail you can't miss it
Most times I can see wear the deer moose drops exactly and eliminate the need to follow a blood trail as a result better meat as I can have it gutted faster

If you can afford $600 I would recommend you think about getting a Seek handheld
 
carverk said:
Wholesale Sports has a small handheld thermo made by seek under $600
I have a FLIR ps 32 and love the thing I can easily follow blood trail you can't miss it
Most times I can see wear the deer moose drops exactly and eliminate the need to follow a blood trail as a result better meat as I can have it gutted faster

If you can afford $600 I would recommend you think about getting a Seek handheld
Click to expand...

That's pretty cool. I just looked over at wss and they have one that plugs into your smart phone for $299+ dollars. Great idea.
 
doc25 said:
That's pretty cool. I just looked over at wss and they have one that plugs into your smart phone for $299+ dollars. Great idea.
Click to expand...

I think it is a great preventive measure
Anything a person can do to recover game quicker Is important The biggest asset with thermo is finding a down animal especially late evening when you're pushing Daylight so you can at the very least get it gutted quickly and pack out in the morning
 
the spank said:
I used to know a fellow each year like clockwork would lose at least 1 deer arrowing it in the last minutes or seconds of available daylight and then was unable to find it. He would always search the next morning to no avail. Used to make me sick to my stomach and I always called him on it and it was always the same excuses. I put the wrong pin on it or the arrow hit a branch or the deer flinched at the sound of the release. He never seemed nearly as bothered by it as I was and I didn't even hunt the darned things.
Click to expand...

Some deer are tough....what was the hunter thinking?
 
shot one sometime in the last few years through both shoulder areas while it was running with a rifle. it went in a treeline that was 40 yards wide, big old trees and some spots pretty thick but mostly quite open with good visibility. I was confident I hit it good in the chest. I looked for an hour. there was very little snow, just enough to track it onto the main trail. sometimes I swore I could smell it. I got help. we looked some more. finally I went back to where I swore I smelled it earlier and walked into the wind. 15 yards later there it was. in-between 2 long fallen over tree trunks 2 feet in diameter laying parallel to each other. he went 40 yards from where he was shot. good thing I tried to trail him by smell cause I was about to give up. after gutting it was determined that the bullet hit and exited the shoulders when his front legs were at there most forwards points of the stride. after the shot he slowed to a walk. the holes in the shoulders didn't line up anymore with the hole through the chest. no blood trail.

only deer I ever did loose is when I started bowhunting. short draw and big cut mechanicals don't go together I learnt, 22 yards shot got poor penetration. just pushing too much broadhead. I looked for about 200 yards along the river. I should have looked for 210. she was another 10 yards from where I stopped looking along the trail. the coyotes COMPLETLY finished her overnight. head neck and bones was all that's left.
 
I lost one one deer in the last 48 years. It was the first deer I ever shot in 1968 . Aimed behind the right shoulder at about 60 yards with my Ross 303 and it went down like a dropped sack of potatoes. But a second later it got up and ran and we never saw it again. We looked and looked and went to town and borrowed a dog but never found it.
 
In southern ontario we have shotgun only season lots of guys in my group use buckshot. They should ban that stuff it leaves tons of wounded deer. Not bad in really thick bush but I only use challenger slugs if you hit him he's not going to far.
 
I lost a couple when I was young and stupid. Mostly bad shots due to buck fever. Age and experience taught me a lot, but I can't say I ever took a shot where I didn't do everything possible to retrieve the animal. Now I never pull the trigger unless I'm absolutely certain of my shot.
 
Shot a doe last fall, hit her slightly low. She went about 2km before I found her. Took almost 3hrs from the shot to when I found her. Definatly felt like giving up a few times as the blood train and tracks were very sparse through the dense brush,but shows that you should be able to find most animals unless a very maginal wound was inflicted!!
 
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