Crazy hunting kills

[madmo44mag]

What made me think of this was the tread on Follow Up Shots.

99% of my deer hunting was with a 44mag at pretty close range.
Never had to make a follow up shot and if so it was just a trigger pull away.

I was camp cook on a lease and during bow season one of the guys hit a 10 point white tail that ran off.
It was early evening and he radioed camp he needed help tracking the deer.
(we all had 2 way radios linked to a base unit)
So 3 of us head out and start looking for a blood trail.
Finally Mark spotted some blood and we all got on the track.
The deer was just spotting blood; a drop here a drop or two there.
We were in the hill country of Texas so the terrain is hilly and rocky.
It was getting dark but we were determined to find this deer.
The sun had just barley set. It was that time of evening were there is light on the horizon but nothing on the ground.
Suddenly were heard a blood curdling scream from Mark and a string of profanity and then a pistol shot.
We ran towards to gun shot to find Mark standing next to his buck, pistol in hand trembling and bleeding.
He had come over a little bluff about 3 – 4 feet high and stepped down on what he thought was a big rock. In fact he had stepped right on top of his deer. The dear jumped up throwing him back onto the ground. The buck just didn’t have enough life left to run and stagger away about 5 – 6 yards and fall back down where Mark dispatched him.
From that day till today he takes crap about being the only hunter we ever knew that tried to ride his deer to death.

[Panfisher]

Just imagine the story if he had been able to stay on and ride the deer even a little closer to the road/truck. I can hear it now, "Why heck we don't need to drag deer, mark just climbs on their back and sinks the spurs, riding them out of the brush, dang handy feller to have along". Follow up, well where is Mark now, "Well ya see we took him on a hunt in alaska and one of the guys shot a grizzly that run off into the alders and well we don't rightly know what happened to him after that". Ya reckon the bear ate him? "Nah the bear went north and ol Mark was headed south."

[Barnacle Brad]

Nice...

That thread had me thinkin about some hard dyin critters I have run into.

One was a mule deer doe my son shot on the Snake River in eastern Wa. He double lunged her with the 300 savage and she ran off 20 or 30 yards before tipping over. I caught up with Wes and walked on over to her. She was still breathing some and Wes put a round in her dome at point blank. Still she labored at breathing. I felt sure it was going to end, but we were getting uncomfortable at this grisly scene! I reached down and cut her throat, something I never do, but anyway she managed to pull another breath or two down her severed wind pipe before expiring. Hard dyin satelite head!

[buck460XVR]

I was camp cook on a lease and during bow season one of the guys hit a 10 point white tail that ran off.

We ran towards to gun shot to find Mark standing next to his buck, pistol in hand trembling and bleeding.

The buck just didn’t have enough life left to run and stagger away about 5 – 6 yards and fall back down where Mark dispatched him.

Don't know how it is in Texas, but here in Wisconsin, shoot a deer with a firearm during bow season, even if it is just a coup do gras, and you are a poacher.

[Barnacle Brad]

Busted by the Morality Patrol!

[buck460XVR]

Originally posted by Barnacle Brad; Busted by the Morality Patrol!

Has nuttin to do with morality, but ethics, hunting and obeying the laws of your state. Since this is a hunting forum, it seems most responsible hunters would support those things while politely informing others to the possibility that some actions may or may not be illegal. Has always seemed better to inform folks than let them unintentionally break the law and get busted.

[Barnacle Brad]

Well it started out to be a fun thread...

Morality and ethics

Ethics (also known as moral philosophy) is the branch of philosophy which addresses questions of morality. The word 'ethics' is "commonly used interchangeably with 'morality' ... and sometimes it is used more narrowly to mean the moral principles of a particular tradition, group, or individual."

Is it more ethical to let a poor critter suffer for fear of being labeled "a poacher", or to put an end to the suffering?

Please forgive me as I wax philosophical...

[dogrunner]

Had the same discussion with the same fella a while back, Brad, you are right on!

[Art Eatman]

It's okay to wax Philosophical, unless ol' Phil thinks he's shiny enough, already.

I was ambling-hunting one morning, toting my little .243 carbine. Jumped a nice buck at about twenty yards. I went to kill him, but at 7X I saw an ear, some brown, tines and then a bunch of mesquite brush. "Hmm, sez I," I screwed up big time."

So, I figured he'd circle upwind and uphill toward a saddle in a ridgeline, so I walked up toward it, found a good place to wait--and waited. Sure enough, maybe fifteen or so minutes later, here he came, just walking along.

Lots of cactus and mesquite. I figured that if I went for a chest shot through a prickly pear pad that looked to be only a couple of feet away from him, I might do some good.

Bang. Whop. Flop.

I walked over to do the usual work after the fun is over. On the way, I came to realize that it was not just one pear pad, it was five. No three holes were in a straight line. I got to the buck. Where'd I hit him? I looked and looked. Magic? I finally saw a tiny drop of blood right below his ear.

The remains of that 85-grain Sierra HPBT had curved up and right, away from the chest and into the ear.

Like I say, I'll take luck over skill, any day.

[Mosin-Marauder]

Cousin of mine shot a deer out of season with a .17 HMR while coyote hunting. Didn't kill it and ended up next year, he killed a deer a mile from where he had shot this one (in season) that had a mysterious groove going along from its mid-nose past it's left eye, exactly where he had aimed. Coicidence? I think not.

[jimbob86]

Many years ago .... when I was about 6 ..... I begged to go hunting every chance I got , with anybody ...... and convinced my grandfather I would listen well and mind, whatever it took ...... Grampa and his friend Gerald Hedges were going out spot and stalk bowhunting (with 1970someting equipment- wood and fiberglass recurves with wooden, 4 blade arrows with actual feather fletching) ..... in south central Nebraska at that time, killing a deer, any deer, with a bow was a rare thing ..... grampa had an idea where a certain buck had been hanging out, and we saw him slip into a draw full of 6' tall dry sunflowers, with a county road cutting across it near the bottom ...... the draw was too wide for one of them to cover it alone ...... but someone had to block the end .... they came up with the idea of leaving the truck parked on the road and would walk around the section and come down the draw from the top end ...... and it being too far to walk for a 6 year old, they left me in the truck ( ), with instuctions to stay there....... they left and I waited ...... and waited ........ and waited. I had with me a black plastic lever action cap rifle (the kind where you flipped the sidplate up and put a roll of paper caps into it- working the lever advanced the tape containing the caps and cocked the hammer .....) .... and I got bored ...... and got out of the truck. I was playing in the dirt in front of the truck when I heard the sound of something coming through the sunflowers ..... a deer, and a big buck at that, came running out onto the road just feet from me and stopped ..... I commenced to blasting away at the deer with my cap gun ..... the deer spun and ran back the way it had come. A few seconds later, it came running back out again, bleeding profusely ....... and then staggered on across the road into more sunflowers ..... I gave chase. The deer piled up in short order, and when Gerald showed up, I was standing there with one foot on the trophy, stating "I got him." Gerald showed me the arrow wound and the bloody arrow ..... and assured me that he had "got him." I quickly shot back with "Well, you wouldn't have got him if I had'nt slowed him down!"

[Mosin-Marauder]

Many years ago .... when I was about 6 ..... I begged to go hunting every chance I got , with anybody ...... and convinced my grandfather I would listen well and mind, whatever it took ...... Grampa and his friend Gerald Hedges were going out spot and stalk bowhunting (with 1970someting equipment- wood and fiberglass recurves with wooden, 4 blade arrows with actual feather fletching) ..... in south central Nebraska at that time, killing a deer, any deer, with a bow was a rare thing ..... grampa had an idea where a certain buck had been hanging out, and we saw him slip into a draw full of 6' tall dry sunflowers, with a county road cutting across it near the bottom ...... the draw was too wide for one of them to cover it alone ...... but someone had to block the end .... they came up with the idea of leaving the truck parked on the road and would walk around the section and come down the draw from the top end ...... and it being too far to walk for a 6 year old, they left me in the truck ( ), with instuctions to stay there....... they left and I waited ...... and waited ........ and waited. I had with me a black plastic lever action cap rifle (the kind where you flipped the sidplate up and put a roll of paper caps into it- working the lever advanced the tape containing the caps and cocked the hammer .....) .... and I got bored ...... and got out of the truck. I was playing in the dirt in front of the truck when I heard the sound of something coming through the sunflowers ..... a deer, and a big buck at that, came running out onto the road just feet from me and stopped ..... I commenced to blasting away at the deer with my cap gun ..... the deer spun and ran back the way it had come. A few seconds later, it came running back out again, bleeding profusely ....... and then staggered on across the road into more sunflowers ..... I gave chase. The deer piled up in short order, and when Gerald showed up, I was standing there with one foot on the trophy, stating "I got him." Gerald showed me the arrow wound and the bloody arrow ..... and assured me that he had "got him." I quickly shot back with "Well, you wouldn't have got him if I had'nt slowed him down!"

That. Is. Amazing.

[bamaranger]

I was up in a favorite tree bowhunting one time and a small buck came through, very close, under 10 yds. I'd have to check what bow I was shooting, but the head was all I ever shoot, vintage Bear Razorheads.

I drew and released and danged if I didn-t hit a limb, and I clearly saw the arrow veer away and out in front of the deer. Little buck took off, running wide open. The cover and terrain was such that I could see him go, and at about 50 yds, he ran smack into a pine tree and collapsed.

"Geez , I scared that deer to death", thinks I.

Climbed down and went over to the arrow. There was white hair everywhere. There was the slightest hint of blood on the shaft and on one insert blade. Following up, I started finding blood, over waist high, on limbs, saplings and so on. At the deer, I learned that the arrow had creased the bucks throat just at and below the white patch, and cut the big veins/arteries there, neat as you please.

If I remember right, that was the only deer I killed that year, and the last from that tree. I oughta go back there.

[globemaster3]

My most incredible ones are duck stories.

In high school, 3 of us in a boat blind hanging out, just after shooting light, 2 of us heads down in the blind rummaging for breakfast when the only guy looking out calls "duck coming in". The other 2 of us pop up. Inbound was this ringbill, descending into the dekes, passing right to left across the front of the blind. A mad scramble ensued for everyone to come up with their shotgun amongst breakfast and such. Duck sees the commotion and starts to climb right in front of the blind. All 3 of us cut loose in sequence. Duck continues to fly off. All 3 of us are laughing so hard about the spectacle, that it hard to believe that same, said duck turns back inbound and tries to make the dekes again. Laughter turns into muttered words not suitable for print, as we are all thumbs jamming fresh shells into our shotguns. In comes the same ringbill. This time, he doesn't make it out of the fusillade reminiscent of WWII bombing missions over Germany. That duck was labelled "dumbest duck in the world" and now almost 30 years later, is still talked about amongst us who were there.

Second thought was as a young 2Lt at Fairchild AFB, hunting on West Medical Lake, I had a hen mallard light into the dekes. I called it to my other 2 compatriots and as that duck came in gear down and wiggling the last couple yards, I jumped up and delivered what I was sure was going to be a one shot kill. At the report, feathers flew. But the duck continued to climb! Ok, I'll get you with this one! Bang! Feathers! What? That duck is still flying! Third round... More feathers! Duck is now flying directly away. My other 2 compatriots are now doubled over in laughter at the sight of this. I, standing there dumbfounded, hollered out some indecipherable rebuke at said duck. At this, the duck suddenly pitches up, flying pure vertical, where it suddenly stops it's climb, still flapping, and starts descending backwards, while still flapping and pointing straight up, when it suddenly folds and falls to the water.

My friends suggest I just yell at them in the future instead of shooting at them.

[madmo44mag]

One of the other guys on the same lease had bought a 300 H&H because he had secured a lease in Mexico and was going Mule deer hunting next season and knew he would have some long shoots.
The 2nd morning out I hear a BOOOOOM .
About a hour later Paul comes dragging in a nice 6 point with both front shoulders obliterated.
I was leaving early that day and would not have time to process his kill so he took it to a processor in town.
When he went to pick up his meat there was a bright yellow tag taped to the box that’s said “Texas White Tail Deer – To Much Gun”

[jimbob86]

On another occasion, not more than a couple of years after that, my brother and sister and I piled into the back seat of Grandpa and Gramma's big ol' Ford LTD for opening day of firearm season ....... Granpa worked for the county roads department, so most every day he drove a road grader (it had a gunrack in it ) over the same area of Furnas County ...... he scouted deer every day, all day, at work ..... and on weekends, we would go out in the evenings and "look at deer" ...... he KNEW the land ...... knew where the deer would probably be, and if they were moving, where thay were headed...... and would often get there ahead of them .......

The terrain was mixed dryland wheat, corn, milo and shortgrass pasture on eroded Loess uplands ...... the pastures could be really rough ...... let's just say that I've been places in a couple of diferent LTDs that they were just not meant to go .....but did.

On this particular morning we saw a herd of mulies with a large buck with them going over the horizon. G'pa said, "They're headed over onto Liebrandt's...." and away we went, in the opposite direction, which puzzled us kids in the back ...Gramma explained that "there was no road - ya' can't get there from here" ...... after a long end around route, we turned into a stubble field, went up over a rise .... and there were the deer,just where G'pa said they'd be, down in the bottom of a large draw ..... they started moving back up the hill in the other side, and G'pa got out, jacked a shell into his open sighted .270 and dropped the buck like a sack of potatoes from well over 300 yards ..... we spent the next 1/2 hour getting the car around to the other side of the draw. When we did, G'pa got out with just his knife .... when he latched onto that mule deer's antler to cut it's throat.... he thought it dead, but the deer did not agree with him on the fact: the deer had a broken back, but with just the strength of just the front third of it's body, it flipped a 130ish pound man completely over him ....G'pa went from standin' on one side of this deer to landing on his head and shoulders 4' on the other side of it, and rolled on down the hill into the bottom of the draw like a lost hubcap ..... and came back up cussin' up a storm ....I learned a few new words and phrases that morning, though none usefull, as they would have earned me a mouthfull of Lava soap if I had repeated them...... G'pa stomped over to the car, got out his rifle and the deer commenced to bellowing and dragged itself around to face him on it's forelegs. Boom! $#!+!!!! Now hold still you sunnava@!+&*!!! .....

...... Now Granpa was not the gearhappy Cabela's poster that many of today's hunters are- getting ready to go hunting was the same as any other day- he put on his denim coveralls just the same, same boots .....the only difference was that he grabbed his "big rifle", put a handful of shells in his pocket and took his knife and hatchet off the shelf .... he usually loaded 3 rounds in the gun ...... it took him till his last round he had on him to put that deer down, for the thing would NOT hold still ..... he finally shot it through the chest.

[Barnacle Brad]

Great stories! One of them made me think of an old friend that I bear hunted with in the Cascade Mtn foothills.

We had settled on a bait site outside the Cedar River Watershed, but archery deer had opened before any bears were busted so Doug went out to our area to check for deer.

Sometime in the afternoon that day, Doug shows up at my house announcing he has a deer to hang in the shop. "Excellent" I said and headed out to help. He had brought in a nice doe. Naturally, I asked him where he hit her and he told me "in the head". Liar! I accused him of taking liberties with the truth, but he insisted it was true and told me how she was standing in the tall ferns and that was the only target he had. He said it was just a lost arrow if he missed, so he loosed one and stuck her in the left nostril! Down she went, but was back on her feet at once with that arrow sticking out of her face. Doug was horrified! She was dead but didn'know it!! He decided that it would be prudent to let her have another and worked to get a lung shot.

I was still not convinced that this story was not a fabrication he conjured up on the ride to my house, there was no visible wound nor blood on that nose! I told him I did't believe his story. Doug says "I can prove it. I could't get the arrow out of her head - I had to unscrew the broadhead. It's still in her head!!"

Out comes the saw and I remove that scull cap just as pretty as you please, and to my amazement, there is the broad head! I gave a tug on it - woudn't budge! Pliers did the trick though. I gave the broadhead to Doug and dubbed it "The Immaculate Reception"!

[Unlicensed Dremel]

Fiction purveyed as fact: Met a guy (who was clearly a tall tale teller) who claimed to know a guy who had a big buck walk directly under his treestand one morning, so he couldn't get a shot. So the next morning he hauled a 35 lb rock up into the stand, and sure enough, same buck walks under again. So he drops the rock on his head and kills him dead. It was very hard not to laugh.

But OTOH, a true story. I didn't see it, but this is what my good friend actually did for his very FIRST deer kill. Shot it with a rifle from a close distance when he was in high school, stalking along. He doesn't know to just let it run off and die. He sees it struggling and doesn't want it to get away, so he literally jumped on the deer's back, pulled out his knife, and slit its throat over and over to finish it off. He calls it his "deer murder".

[kraigwy]

In the late 1800s my grand parents got married and lived on a homestead in Arkansas.

Deer season rolled around. The men folks would head off to deer camps for a few days for the hunt.

Having just go married my grandmother wanted to go with her new hubby, NOPE, in them days girls didn't belong in hunting camps.

So she was left home. So one morning she goes to the well for water and notices a nice buck had gotten hung up in the fence around her garden.

She took an ax, killed the deer and had it dress and hung when the men folk return. They all got skunked so she fixed them a breakfast of venison steaks from her deer.

[jimbob86]

She took an ax, killed the deer and had it dress and hung when the men folk return. They all got skunked so she fixed them a breakfast of venison steaks from her deer.

NICE!

[Backwoodsboy]

The craziest kill I have had was of a six point whitetail in western NY. While hunting with my father in law we were still hunting through a swamp. About fifty yards in and I noticed movement about 40 yards in front of me. All I could see at that point was the bucks head and he was looking in my father in laws direction. Worried that he would see me with movement I took careful aim and let one fly from my 12 ga. The buck dropped in its tracks with a head shot just below its right ear. My father in law came over and we bs'ed about how the kill had taken place. I reached down and grabbed an antler and began dragging the deer. About 15 yards later that deer ripped its antler out of my hand and began struggling to get up . After one quick coup De grace it stopped and we were able to finish the drag. From that point on they all get one last shot so there are no surprises.

[jeager106]

I shot a deer in a barber shop once.

[jimbob86]

I shot a deer in a barber shop once.

I've shot a little bull in a barber shop, on occasion .....

I'd guess your barbershop deer was not a hunting thing? LE/Animal Control?

[reynolds357]

I caught a deer inside a barber shop and removed it. Wonder what it is about deer and barber shops? It jumped through the plate glass window to get in.

[Art Eatman]

Hadn't heard about barber-shop deer, but I've read news articles about a bedroom-buck and a living-room-deer--both involving glass doors or large picture windows.

Not perzackly "hunting", though.