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A good shot placement

"J"

Git Off My Lawn
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North Carolina
Okay, was conversing with a couple of my Son's buddies last night via texting... One of the guy's hit a good buck and they were searching for it and asking questions since they were at their witts end not finding any blood once it got out into a been/alfalpha field.... I told them too grid search the field and walk the edges of it after that and if no blood back off until the morning and hit it again.... Well the grid search did it and they retrieved it but it had gone over 200 yards after getting a good hit????

Got me too thinking whenever I've gotten a good hit on a deer it's gone usually about 50 yards or so and then piled up... The longest I had one go is about 100 yards with a double long shot and I was amazed at that (try holding your breath and do a full out sprint....) So with that said what do you guy's typically and ai guess non-typically see for a so called good shot the distance for them too drop????

The doe I got this year went 30 yards from the shot and piled up and it was a right lung and heart shot.....

So opinions/experiance Please.....
 

Jackalope

Dignitary Member
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Good Thread!

All of this however is dependent on the size and sex of the deer. Bucks run further than does IMO. and yearlings or young deer less than that..

Of all the deer that I have ever shot or helped track here are my observations.

Double Lung hit 30-75 yards before crashing.

Single Lung. 100 yards with maybe a 10% chance of survival if it's a big deer and a lung was all that was hit.

Liver hit... Balls to the wall sprint for 200-300 yards usually die running, between and hour or 3 if they bed.

Gut shot. 100 - 200 yards before bedding. Might take 4-6 hours to die. If bumped they'll run flat out like a liver hit.

If a deer starts to go uphill and it has been less than 2 hours since the shot.. Go back to the truck.. Hard hit deer rarely if ever go up hill. If they do it's gonna take more than 2 hours for them to die. back out.. Come back in 4 more hours or in the morning.

If a deer is running and you're blood trailing and there is a fence, ditch or other obstacle or even a logging road in the direction they are headed.. Mark blood then take a minute to go walk that object. . If you can find where that deer crossed you just saved yourself a bunch of time.. For instance.. If a deer enters a field and you and your buddy are blood trailing it.. No sense in both of you following blood.. Leave one guy on the blood and have your buddy go walk the opposite fence... Have him look at every break in the vegetation, the field edge, trails etc.. If he can cut blood he just save you a crap ton of time and strain tracking in a field.

And this is going to sound stupid... But don't run a trail backwards... lmao.... I did that last night.. Alex shot his doe and backed out after tracking it about 100 yards... He stuck his arrow in the ground to mark last blood.. One problem. This deer was in 50 acres of thick honeysuckle trees.... I got there and we went to pick up blood. He couldn't find his arrow. I just started looking for blood.. Found some and picked up the trail. After about an hour of me bitching about how there were so may deer in there i couldn't see prints.. Alex said. You sure you aren't running this track backwards. Sure as hell we we're almost at his arrow. I had cut blood that far ahead. Now we need to back track a blood trail that we had already walked over... We tried to find the spot i first cut blood but could only get the general area. I cut blood again and found her not 15 minutes later.

When in doubt back out..
 
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"J"

Git Off My Lawn
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North Carolina
Good point on the big deer vs the smaller ones Joe (not much experiance on the bigguns) lol..... One nice thing about a liver hit is from my experiance on the ones I did it was a easy track job (lots of blood) after letting them go and not pushing them for an hour or so.... I usually replay it over in my mind and when in doubt I back the eff out...... No sense in pushing them off of the property and really make it a hard track job.....
 

Carpn

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You gotta take into account whether it a small doe or a mature buck. Big bucks can travel a lot farther than a doe on a comparable hit. Another big factor is how the deer reacts after the shot. I have had deer jump and stop after10 yds then stand there till they drop. However if I don't find em within a hundred yds I start getting worried. Most of my deer travel 30-80 yds depending on their reaction after the shot.
 

Carpn

*Supporting Member*
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My experience with liver hits is they don't go far and bed up and die. Give em time to die and it will be a easy recovery, go to soon and jump em and you won't have shit for a bloodtrail after u jump em out of their bed.
 

"J"

Git Off My Lawn
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North Carolina
Exactly I try too keep it in sight the whole time too see its reactions as well sometimes its easy and sometimes not so much... hunting elevated vs on the ground, a lot of my hunting used to be off of the ground and it was easy too lose sight of them within 50 yards or so depending on the terrain....
 

"J"

Git Off My Lawn
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North Carolina
Thats why I always try listen for the crash.... if I don't hear it or see them go down I wait it out some....
 

Schu72

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Streetsboro
The deer I shot saturday probably ran over 250 yards, although I recovered him under 130, due to him doubling back. I thought I had made a great shot and was somewhat concerned that he ran like he did. After gutting him, I could see my broadhead had passed through the center of one lung, but the other lung was tore up bad from gutting him. So I'm not sure on single vs. double lung, but it was a comlete passthough and there was spray everywhere. There was foamy blood and chunks of stuff all over yet he made it almost 200 yards before crashing and still had enough strength to get up and run another 50ish before finally expiring.
 

hickslawns

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Neighbor kid hit one in the shoulder last year we tracked with Hank. Not recovered.

Heading out with Hank in an hour to look for another one he hit. Claims it was a good shot. Says right behind shoulder slight quartering away. Told him to hold off until we took Hank in there. He went back in this morning anyway. Dang impatient kids. Had he called I would have been there first thing instead of waiting until 11. 11 was his call last night. Will be interesting to see if we find him now that jake has been in/out of there. Says there was good blood but did not find deer? hmmm. . . my point is this: What many feel was a "good shot" is not always the case.
 

"J"

Git Off My Lawn
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North Carolina
The deer I shot saturday probably ran over 250 yards, although I recovered him under 130, due to him doubling back. I thought I had made a great shot and was somewhat concerned that he ran like he did. After gutting him, I could see my broadhead had passed through the center of one lung, but the other lung was tore up bad from gutting him. So I'm not sure on single vs. double lung, but it was a comlete passthough and there was spray everywhere. There was foamy blood and chunks of stuff all over yet he made it almost 200 yards before crashing and still had enough strength to get up and run another 50ish before finally expiring.

Shu, what was the angle of the shot?

Phil good luck with the tracking job.... Hope gets another under his belt....
 

Schu72

Well-Known Member
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Streetsboro
Slight quartering away, almost broadside. The buck was at 22 yards, but on the downhill side of my stand, so the angle was a little steep.
 

jagermeister

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I think Joe nailed it with those distances. Every deer that I've shot with a bow and made a perfect double lung shot have all expired less than 100 yds from me. I shot a doe through the liver a few years ago in SO and she ran balls to the wall for at least 400 yds, before piling up near a creek bank. At the time, she had a couple bucks on her ass though so that may have pushed her a little farther than normal.
 

bowhunter1023

Owner/Operator
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Appalachia
Joe covered it well IMO...

There is nothing deadlier than the old liver/lung combo with the exception being a straight heart shot. I've seen liver/lung deer go less than 40 yards and pile up. The buck I shot in 2008 was 6.5 and dressed at 200. He made it less than 40 yards after the Rage cut his liver in two pieces and chopped the top parts of his lungs off. I'd take that shot every time!
 

Darron

Junior Member
273
0
Dayton, Ohio
The deer in the first pic went 40 yards.

The second deer went about 125 yards
 

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loose_is_fast

Junior Member
618
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McClure
i always try to grunt as soon as i shoot a buck sometimes they will stop and look back and those are precious seconds if he does.I also try to be as quiet as possible after the shot for at least till they crash or ten min.