JustMe2
Well-Known Member
What a day, whew!!! Shot the deer Thursday morning at 0800 hrs. Our Florida rut just kicked in this week, the last week of January. Three bucks were chasing 2 does; a 1 inch spike, 3 inch spike and finally this 8pt. They were grunting, etc. Pretty entertaining.
The bucks and does were rapidly crossing back and forth across a narrow food plot into the thick trees and underbrush on both sides so very little time to aim. Luckily, I had my rifle up against my shoulder and resting on the window opening of the shooting box and was just practicing aiming at the non-legal spikes and does. After they left, I was getting ready to lower the rifle when the 8pt stepped out. It appeared he was broadside to me so I aimed right behind the shoulder, shot, and he leaped into the woods. Waited 2 hrs, found lots of big puddles of blood, so buddy and I thought he was double lung and heart shot and he'd be close. NOPE. After 2 hrs of tracking through a miserable and very difficult swamp, the blood stopped, so we called a tracker. Two more hrs with the tracker and his dog and 7 miles of tracking according to his GPS through a tangled swamp still no deer. So we stopped for 2hrs for a break and lunch. Started again and the deer kept getting up and running from the dog and wouldn't stay down. Finally, at about 1500 hrs the tracker got close enough to the deer to shoot it with his 357 revolver because the deer was distracted fighting the dog and he said it threw his dog up in the air. We discovered I hit it where I thought right behind the shoulder but the deer was quartering toward me instead of broadside. Bullet went in just behind the shoulder and exited just in front of the hindquarters. Took out one lung and some intestines missing the heart. Didn't even hit the liver. Then we had to drag it out over a mile through the sharp briars, mud, downfalls, and tangled vines to the truck. What a workout. This is a big buck for Florida, but small mass for the northern states.
The bucks and does were rapidly crossing back and forth across a narrow food plot into the thick trees and underbrush on both sides so very little time to aim. Luckily, I had my rifle up against my shoulder and resting on the window opening of the shooting box and was just practicing aiming at the non-legal spikes and does. After they left, I was getting ready to lower the rifle when the 8pt stepped out. It appeared he was broadside to me so I aimed right behind the shoulder, shot, and he leaped into the woods. Waited 2 hrs, found lots of big puddles of blood, so buddy and I thought he was double lung and heart shot and he'd be close. NOPE. After 2 hrs of tracking through a miserable and very difficult swamp, the blood stopped, so we called a tracker. Two more hrs with the tracker and his dog and 7 miles of tracking according to his GPS through a tangled swamp still no deer. So we stopped for 2hrs for a break and lunch. Started again and the deer kept getting up and running from the dog and wouldn't stay down. Finally, at about 1500 hrs the tracker got close enough to the deer to shoot it with his 357 revolver because the deer was distracted fighting the dog and he said it threw his dog up in the air. We discovered I hit it where I thought right behind the shoulder but the deer was quartering toward me instead of broadside. Bullet went in just behind the shoulder and exited just in front of the hindquarters. Took out one lung and some intestines missing the heart. Didn't even hit the liver. Then we had to drag it out over a mile through the sharp briars, mud, downfalls, and tangled vines to the truck. What a workout. This is a big buck for Florida, but small mass for the northern states.
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