About to head out now to help a buddy of mine here close to home with a bow shot from this morning. It sounds like he just barely clipped the buck in the armpit. He said he thought he had missed at first but he said as the buck walked off he was favoring a leg and had blood dripping down it. He also had some blood on his arrow fletchings but he doesn’t feel good at all about the way the deer was acting after the shot….. That was early this morning so we’re about to go see what we can do with him………

To be continued……….

Standing by...........

I gave a fella your number earlier

The deer was just grazed on the back of leg or under the armpit….he wasn’t fatally wounded. We tracked him for over 1000 yards before we called it off. He had crossed two tall creek banks and just didn’t seemed like he was hurt that bad. There was decent blood at first but it just got lighter and lighter until he completely quit bleeding……..I feel pretty sure it was just a flesh wound..

I appreciate it..... .....That must have been the guy from Montgomery that called. The deer was shot yesterday evening and there was just no way I could get to it today. I referred him to another tracker to see if they could track it for him this evening.

Looks like it may be an off day today………I haven’t heard any complaints out of the crew yet.

Bahahahaha. Otis and Shelby Lou are enjoying the day off!

Lol!!! Awesome stuff!

Just received on update on a track from 12 days ago. The buck we were tracking showed up on camera later that night with its jaw blown off and he was found dead today in the same area. They said it looked like he had been dead for a couple days maybe. That sure helps explain why we were finding such good blood on that one but he wouldn’t bay up. Rough way to go....

What part of body was deer supposed to have been hit at?

It was a really novice hunter on that one. I don’t recall for sure but I think he said the deer just ran off after the shot. We didn’t really know what kind of hit we were tracking on that one. All we had to go on was some blood. Here’s the call and the follow-up story…

First call reported tracking drips of blood for 150 yards before finding a decent spot where the deer had stopped. They tracked drips for another 50 yards and found another place where the deer stopped again. The blood started getting sparse after that and they decided to back out. I didn't think to ask on this one how the deer reacted to the shot or if he was broadside, etc?

The first buck was bleeding pretty good but just not fatally wounded. We consistently found blood for 700-800 yards before Otis got the buck up and took off on the chase. He just never attempted to bay up. We let Otis push him for another 800 yards or so before calling it off. We had looped out around Otis and gotten on a little straight away in hopes of seeing the deer cross ahead of the dog but no luck. You could actually smell that rutty buck smell in the road where he had already crossed.

Things have really slowed down over the last few days. I think the main peak of the rutting activity may have come and gone. I've gotten a couple of calls but they were both back slaps that the hunter decided not track after we talked about it. It's amazing how many of those shots occur.

Got another update from a track earlier in the week. This is the one that the older hunter was adamant he had hit but we didn’t find any sign and the dogs didn’t indicate on anything. The buck was killed this morning 300 yards from where he shot at it. It turns out he had just barely grazed it across the front of the legs…..doesn’t look to have been hit enough to even bleed. The deer probably reacted to it though and that was what led the hunter to believe it was a good hit.

Call just came in for tomorrow morning………

They only found a little white hair at the hit site. Went looking for it and jumped him at about 125 yards. Found some blood in the bed and tracked the deer another 75 yards past it before running out. This one sounds like it may be a low gut hit. We’re gonna give him overnight and see what we can do in the morning. It's supposed to rain but I’m hoping it stays light. The hunter said this was a swampy area already. That sucks but what can you do in this type situation. Hopefully the buck won’t run far before bedding back down again…..

To be continued…….

Good luck.

Better wear your PFD if its raining like it was the other day.

Looks like I may need it. Its gonna be a really similar track to the other day. I talked to the hunter this morning about daylight and we're just waiting on the rain to move out. There's a pretty good line of showers moving through the area right now.

Got him!....He's a pretty damn good one too.

Harold send me your number.

The rain wasn’t able to keep us down this time. It was a tough track but they were able to slowly progress the line through this swamp bottom and to the deer. We found the buck about 350 yards past where he had been jumped the night before. The hunter shot the deer from around 300 yards away and hit him way back in the guts…..just in front of the hind quarter. He was a typical 12 point they had been getting pics of since back in the summer but this was the first time he been seen in the daylight. The hunter said that he had apparently just broken off some tines within the last week.