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Today is the first day of archery here in PA. At about 9:00 this morning my brother send me a text that he just shot a buck and he's tracking it ... Well its now almost 1:30 and he still hasn't found it. He said he had a nice blood trail, but its been raining like crazy today and that of course has by this time washed the blood trail away.

Now he's telling me that "maybe" he hit it in the shoulder. My gut tells me that the shot wasn't good. His chances at recovery at this point are just about nill as are that buck's ultimate survival.

This got me to thinking .... in waterfowl hunting if we knock a duck down and can't find it in the reeds or a goose sails to the next county ... It still counts towards our bag limit. Why is big game treated differently? Why should he get another crack at a buck during gun season or with a bow? In my mind anyway - he shouldn't ...

The buck will most likely succomb to the wound itself or infection and is one less buck for everyone else to harvest. In my mind - he should have to rip up his buck tag. He shouldn't get the chance at a second buck ...

Thanks for listening to me vent .... What's your take?

Sorry to hear this Cappy. Here's hoping he does find the deer with another look around. If he let the deer go for a while before starting after it it may be dead in the area, just under cover.

Been thinking about your comment on the tag, and I don't know if it would really help to solve anything. In saying that I'm supposing that folks all go into the field with the full intent to make a good shot on game. If there are some out there with a don't-give-a-crap-if-I-make-a-good-shot-or-not attitude then it still seems hard to figure out how to enforce such a regulation.

I know you hate the thought of the deer out there like that as do we all. But I'm not sure if adding to our already overly regulated lives is the answer.

Captn66 just my opinion but I don't think a regulation like that would be fair to most hunters because a lot of hunters wouldn't be honest about it and admit it. And it would be hard on the hunter that was out there trying to feed his family any way he could. Although if there was a regulation like that an honest person would probably learn to shoot better whatever weapon he is using and try harder to recover any game he wounds.

Thanks guys. I was mainly just venting. This just seems to be par for the course where my brother is concerned. He and a friend did look for it till dark yesterday without finding it.

I do have a lot of respect for this particular friend of his and if he was involved I know he wouldve put more than a fair effort into the endeavor.

But I think he didnt let it sit & bed up and pushed it through impatience or fear of the rain washing the blood trail away or whatever.

I'm definately not for more restrictions. My comments were mainly out of frustration with him, not being there to help look, and like I said .... Typical bad luck/snafu/lack of preperation/screw up/ whatever you want to call it ... related to my brother. And not understanding why theres a difference between migratory birds & big game. Like you said pat - i hate the idea of an unrecovered animal - makes no difference to me if its a teal, a squirrel, or a whitetail.

At least duck opens soon ... Much less complicated for me.

While hanging out in a ranger station here in Montana many years ago,waiting to have my deer checked out I had the chance of seeing a game bioligist cut a deer to check for something I guess but we all saw a wound that had healed pretty well.The deer had been shot with a high power rife and the bullet fragments were still there.1 lung was damaged but healed enough to not bleed and possibly a percentage of the lung could exchange air.The bullet fragments were still in one lung but the body had healed enough for this deer to go into rut.The game bioligist said he see's things like this all the time,nothing unusual for him.The hunters that saw it were amazed.
Since then I never figure the deer shot is a dead deer,they have amazing abilities to survive.Just my 2 cents worth.Mike