This evening saw a stud of a 3 year old big 8 point come into an open field behind my blind. I put some corn out there today for the first time to see what can in. About 515 I look back there and all I see is horns moving through the brush headed to my corn. Get the binos up and looking and liking and he steps into a clearing instantly I see he is young and determine no shoot. But I notice something is off about him. So he hits my corn and I keep looking at him through the binos and he is really skinning and walking funny. I examine him further and I see what appears to be a entrance wound on his right side above his shoulder blade but below his spine. So watch him more and he turns to the other side and there is a exit would about the size of a silver dollar down a little from the entrance but still missed shoulder blade and spine. He had licked all the hair around this wound go so it stands out. So I pick the rifle up to get a better look at him through the scope and sure enough he looks bad. So I decide if he gives me a clear unobstructed shot with no branches in the way I would help him out and end it for him. Well for 20 minutes he never gives me a good clean ethical shot. And he walks off in the tree line getting further and further away. Well my lease mate had a few people out with him a 2 weeks ago and he made no mention of anyone taking a shot at a buck and missing but I am confident it was one kid he brings with him who likes to change our feeder times cause he doesn't like how I have them set and tried to make all kinds of changes. He also managed to convince the lease mate to move my blind back about 50 yards from the feeder making it a 172 yard shot so he could see more lanes. I am sure it was him. But all that aside we have rules about young bucks and it was clearly violated more than likely I should say buy a guest. Now the question he looked real bad and I want to try to find him tomorrow but what are his chances of survival should I not help him out. Infection will take over correct? Thanks for the help.

If he's already made 2weeks his chance of survival is pretty good at this point, imo.

Edit: if a guest ever moved my blind or tampered with any gear there would be an issue.

I'd try to put him down as soon as possible. Been there with kids that aren't taught any better messing with feeders. It's infuriating and I'm sorry you're having to go through that.

Deer are pretty dang resilient and can live through a lot. With all the rainfall we have had there is plenty to eat now and into the spring. If he had a bad infection my guess is he would have been at water. I tend to lean towards letting mother nature take its course. If you can, try to get a TC pic of that buck and confront the other people on the lease about it.

Deer are tough animals. If he was walking fine and feeding, I wouldn't be surprised if he healed up and survived.

if he is shot thru the pocket and he could make it easily. if the weather was cool enough to make sure flies dont get in it odds could be better. i would kick the kid in nads for moving my blind

Yeah problem is it is our company lease and it's myself the owner and the CFO. They bought all the blinds and feeders and I put in the work to put them all out and feed the feeders. I do 100% of the maintenece and it is the cfo's people so I am low man on the totem pole with a free lease so can't really complain to much just got to take it in stride. I will be discussing it with the owner of the company though and he will not be happy either as this is supposed to be our big deer domain in the next few years so we strive really hard to only take the right bucks. I think that is the biggest issue I have with the situation is this 17 year old kid who thinks he knows everything about everything hunting doesn't respect the plan. It is very infuriating to say the lease and this one specific was on the no shoot list made readily accessible to all guest via printed photos.

As far as infection what exactly would I be looking for to tell if it has got to him already or not. It's south Texas and it has been really warm since they were here. I fear he shot at it and assumed he missed and didn't say anything to my cfo about taking the shot so I honestly believe he is just as in the dark about it as I am.

He was walking for short legged in the front and kept his legs in really close to his body when walking.

If he is a 3yr old 8pt and looks bad then take him out or like stxranchman said let Mother Nature take its course.

I have seen two bucks hit high above the shoulder,both lived and were much better 2 yrs later.

Ok I'll just keep an eye on him the next couple of weeks and see if he gets better or worse and go from there.

Funny thing is when this kid changed my feeder times cause he is an " expert" he actually got am and pm mixed up on 3 feeders and was that way for a couple of weeks till I came back and noticed feeder didn't throw one morning do went to investigate and found that is only way I found out then checked all of them and they had all been changed. Asked boss man if he did it and he said other guy took the kid down few weeks prior so I asked him and he called him and that's when he came clean. No one was happy with him bout that.

Funny how "experts" always create more work for the rest of us, in all walks of life.

What kind of blind do you have that 1 person can move it?

I'd be fighting mad if anybody ever do that to my stand or adjusted my feeder

If he is able to lick the wound and keep it clean then there is a very good chance he will make it. Biggest deal for him will probably be yotes or 17 year olds...

It's a ranch king little buck and as best I can tell it was him, his brother and a grind of theirs that did it its on a 3.5 foot base. My dad and I put it up just the 2 of us it's not that bad. My whole thing was you wanna move it ok we can discuss it but who in their right mind goes moving blinds around during deer season much less right before rut starts for absolutely no reason other than so more lanes can be seen. What he didn't consider that I did when placing it is down the road about 700 yards to the right straight shot is another stand so they can't be hunted at the same time and down the road to the left about 1000 yards semi straight shot is camp. I put it where I did for a reason.

How do you know it wasn't shot on a neighboring place by someone else? I would bite my tongue without direct knowledge of whom specifically shot the buck, especially on a company lease..Just my take on things for what it's worth.

This x10000

DQ, as I stated in the initial statement they were down here and no one made any mention to anyone about shooting and missing a big buck BUT I am confident the 17 year old kid did it. So in all honesty your assessment could be very likely it is extremely possible that he was shot on a neighboring property but I do feel strongly that it was the kid. I would assume if it was the kid he took the shot and probably didn't see much indication from the deer that it was hit and with a shot that high probably wouldn't have been much blood if any to follow so he looked for blood didn't find any and assumed he missed. If any of the other people on the lease heard the shot which is doubtful anyways all you have to say is came from over the fence. When you were seventeen would you have admitted to anyone that you missed a shot on a big buck? I know this kid pretty well and have even hunted with him on a few occasions. I am just going by probability I don't have any concrete facts no trail cam pics of him shooting at the deer however I do have about a 15 minute window of pics of him on a 30 sec delay down by the feeder looking on the ground which I can only ASSUME he was trying to find blood. Could have been the neighbors across the way but I know this kid and I'm not a gambling man but if I was I know which side I would be going all in on.

I wouldn't put up with punk kids moving my stand or changing my timers at all, not even for a free lease.
Bound to be bigger problems coming (like them likely shooting this buck).

As always, YMMV.

Seems like it's time to have a meeting with ALL the hunters and hash out the problems of setting timers and moving blinds.
I'm sure everyone is aware of who did it, but someone needs to lay down the law or this kid will never learn and become a problem for other lease members down the road on other leases as he enters the real world.

Jimbo I agree I have already had a conversation with the head boss man ( funding for the lease) and he is in agreement that the 3 of us need to sit down this week and put everything out on the table with the 3 member our CFO and come up with a solution. It's pretty sad that when either boss man or myself find out the kid is coming down we either clinch up cause he is the wildcard so to speak or I try to rework my schedule around so I can be here at the same time cause I won't allow these things to happen. Just so happens 2 weeks ago I had my daughters birthday party and there was no way I was missing out on that. Sad thing is CFO and this kid have been hunting together for a long time and are extremely close family friends. Luckily kid only comes once a year when it's time to hunt.

In fairness he is really a good kid who doesn't do much wrong in life itself just a good old hard working country kid however he feels he knows so much about what I impeticular have been doing since I was 4 so roughly 28 years that he doesn't understand there there are reasons why I set this place up the way I did.

Sounds like he needs a good mentor...