[219Zipper]

A close friend, Tom, related this story to me. He was on his first or second hunt and spotted a nice looking buck, took careful aim and fired. It dropped like a rock.
Tom hurried through the brush to where the deer had fallen, set his rifle down carefully and got out his tag. He had recently taken the state's hunting course and that was one of the things they had stressed: tag the deer immediately.
Tom filled the tag out, tied it on the antler and then started looking the deer over to see where he had hit it.
No bullet hole was apparent on this side, so he grabbed its antler and pulled to turn it over when it suddenly jumped to its feet and ran away!
Tom grabbed his rifle and took off after it.
He hadn't gotten far when he heard a shot, loud and close.
A little further down the trail, he came upon a hunter walking up to a fallen deer. Tom said, "I think that's my deer."
The hunter said, "Nonsense. I just shot it."
Tom replied, "Its got my tag on it." and he pointed at the tan slip of cardboard fastened to the antlers.
"Well," answered the hunter, shaking his head in disbelief "If you can tag it before I can shoot it, then I guess you can have it." He stepped back leaving the deer to Tom.
Upon examination, Tom discovered that his bullet had indeed hit the deer, there was a clipped mark at the base of the antler where the bullet had struck and knocked the animal unconscious.

 

[mattsbox99]

I know a person that that happened too. Except that his bullet hit low enough in the skull to knock it out long enough for him to gut it, it was doubly dead then. Kinda hard to run with your guts dragging on the ground.

 

[219Zipper]

Two of my cousins have also done antler shots. Mark dropped a bull elk and by the time he got over to where he had seen it drop, there was no sign of it, no blood, no nothing.
My father always taught me to shoot, then sit and wait, watching through the scope to see if anything else happened. If it is dead, it will still be there when you eventually get to it, if it is wounded and decides to get up again, you will be in a position to shoot a second time.
My other cousin, Steve, was on a guided moose hunt, he shot and put a bullet hole right through one of the antler webs. He felt he had ruined a good trophy, I always thoght it looked kind of cool. Steve defended himself saying, "It wasn't a fair shot, the moose hadn't seen me, so I wanted to get its attention first." He killed it with the second round.

 

[mattsbox99]

I only have gruesome shot stories so I won't share those. hehehe

 

[Gunnut45/454]

219Zipper
O.K Zipper I'll bite- I wouldn't normally put my two scents to these kinds of posted but my "Preachin hat" is on!!! What you have described in your two posts are shots that should not of happen if the shooter had known his rifle and abilities to put a fatal shot on the game in question. NEVER shoot into or through brush at game!!!!! You don't know if your going to hit the game animal or miss or hit something you don't want to-ANOTHER HUNTER!!! The one was dammed lucky he didn't get stomped or a horn in his belly for his troubles!! Dam lucky!! One of the answers was great -sit a look and wait!!! If you've killed your game it isn't going anywhere. If not your ready to do what should have happened at the first shot. Lucky in both instances you had another hunter that was understanding- heard of to many stories of it turning alot worse!! Bottom line don't shoot unless you can be dam sure your going to hit where and what your aiming at!!! It sounds also like in both cases they didn't know they had another hunter close by which is bad news and lucky someone didn't catch a stray bullet!!!! Preaching hat off.

 

[A.J.]

I'm not going to critique the hunter or his shooting ability, but it is a funny story. I read in a hunting magazine that you should never place your rifle on the antlers of a dead deer if you plan to take a picture. One hunter did such a thing and when he stood back to click the photograph, the deer stood up and ran off with his expensive hunting rifle. He never saw his gun again.

 

[Walter30-06]

I'm not going to critique the hunter or his shooting ability, but it is a funny story. I read in a hunting magazine that you should never place your rifle on the antlers of a dead deer if you plan to take a picture. One hunter did such a thing and when he stood back to click the photograph, the deer stood up and ran off with his expensive hunting rifle. He never saw his gun again.

I know a guy whose uncle had the same thing happen with an elk. He told me it was a REAL nice 7mm Mag.

Walter30-06

 

[Nimrod]

This actually happened to my cousin back in I think 73' in Vermont. He had a 3 point come by his stand and he shot it with his 30-30, dropping it where it stood. Excited to see his first deer on the ground, he ran back to camp to round up some help. Upon returning they discovered the deer was missing and a search of the area came up empty, no deer, no drag marks, no sign at all. Well you can imagine the discussions in camp for next 3 days or so about what happened to the deer. Until my uncle shot a 3point at his stand and when he grabbed one of its antlers to drag it, it snapped off in his hand. When he looked at it, he discoverd a perfect half moon about inch above the base of the antler. Apparently this deer got its bell rung by my cousins 30-30 a few days before.

 

[Talus]

Were all these people trying for head shots? If that is the case they should try for a heart/lung vitals shot next time to avoid these problems. Obviously a much larger target than the brain.

 

[LV2HUNT]

RIGHT ON!!!! gunnut45/454 with that reply.i was readin the replys and hopin someone gave a reply like that.i live in an area with some renegade dog hunters (not bashing people who hunt with dogs i sometimes do it myself but this particular club is a rennegade bunch) so its good to know some people still have ethics

 

[Lightning]

I was hunting with a friend several years ago. We were hunting over soybeans at his father-in-laws dairy farm. Anyway, "Genious" (the name has been changed to protect the foolish) was carrying a .243 with Ballistic tips (the old kind of BTs that came apart too easily). At about 5:00pm, he has a "big buck" come out on him at about 90yds. He lifts the rifle, puts the cross-hairs on the shoulder, and fires. He said he heard the whaaack!! of the bullet hitting and said the deer just rolled in a cloud of dust. "Genious" watched for a few minutes and when he saw no movement, decided it was time to go get his deer. He climbs out of his stand, leans the rifle against his stand (yes, he decided he didn't need it), and begins walking towards his deer. He said that when he got about 15yds away, the deer sat-up and looked right at him (it was at that point he realized it was a 10 point). He said they stared at each other for a few moments. "Genious" was shocked that the deer was still alive. However, he figured he would just move in and dispatch it with his pistol. Two more steps and he was looking at a whitetail running off in the distance. He never got a shot off with his pistol - probably would have been difficult since it was still in his holster.

Anyway, I showed up after dark and he related what happened to me. I asked him to repeat the "leaving the rifle" part because I could not believe that anyone would do that. We began looking for the deer for about 4 hours (until our lights died). We found a ton of blood but no deer. We decided to come back the next morning with a dog. We followed the dog and blood to a creek but could not find any sign afterwards. We looked for buzzards over the next couple of days and never saw any so we do not know what happened to the deer.

Its a shame that the deer was hurt and subsequently lost. Truly a dumb thing to do. Take care.

Jack