Would love to hear about yall's hunts/tracking gone awry, here's one of mine.....

So back when I was around 16-17 my family had a lease north of Doss, Tx. We had a small section of 200 acres surrounded by another 1800 acres. Same property owner, different lease's. One morning about mid season, an older cousin shot a nice 10pt that took off immediately, he waits the appropriate amount of time and goes and starts tracking. He's having a seriously hard time only finding a few drops here and there so he gives my old man and I a call to assist. Dad and I show up and start looking hard, finding more and more blood. By the time we pick up a good trail, we're a good 150 yards behind the feeder and coming up quick on the property line. Sure enough, the buck jumped the line. Now, we all know the legality of crossing fence lines, especially while carrying a firearm, at the same time we didn't want to waste this game and didnt have reception to call the land owner, so we left our guns and packs at the fence and make the cross, at least its just trespassing now, right?. Another 200 yards and crossing a creek twice we find the buck laying up on the creek bed. Good deal, or so we thought.... My old man makes it to him first and grabs him by the rack and goes to give him the usual after shot inspection, and this buck starts to get up!!! Now remember, we don't have our rifles, no packs, so no skinning knives. Dads wrestling to keep the deer down, me and my cousin jump on his body to help. The only thing we could figure quick was to cut the poor bucks throat with Dads old Case peanut. Talk about a needles and sucky way to die! The deed was finally finished, we went about getting that dude back to camp. Two things I learned that day, ALWAYS carry a good, sharp pocket knife, and ALWAYS be sure of your shot.

Years ago, Dad wounds a buck from his blind. Gets out, follows the blood trail about 150 yds but doesn't find the deer. We mark the trail and head to the house to eat breakfast. We get my BIL and our dog (not really a tracker, but a mixed-breed bird dog, what can it hurt, right?) and head back out after about an hour. I park near the trail and lead the dog to the marker and she seems somewhat interested. After about 10 minutes of 'tracking' the deer, she takes us back to the vehicle. WTH? I take her back to the marker, same thing, she leads us around but eventually back to the Blazer. BIL says 'screw it' and takes off away from the vehicle and the track, down a nearby draw. I went back to the last spot of blood and began searching for more. About five minutes goes by and I hear a shot from the direction my BIL went. Sure enough, he found the buck. The deer had made a big circle back to his own trail and went down the draw. When I parked near the trail, I parked square on his new trail where he had circled back. Dog told us exactly where he went, we didn't want to believe her.

That's funny!

This happened a couple years ago. MLD lease and season was winding down. We still needed to harvest several doe and the members were bringing guests in an organized doe hunt. My buddy had a guest that shot a doe “right behind the shoulder” with his 7 mag that they could not find. They called me about an hour after dark and asked me to bring my year old pudelpointer. When we got there, there was very little blood and they lost the trail within 150 yards. The hunter was adamant he had made a perfect shot. I put a tracking collar on my dog and put him on the blood and told him to find it. Hunter said he was sure it was close. Within 10 minutes the dog was .73 miles away and across a big creek. The guys started giving me a hard time. They insinuated my dog was just out for a fun run. I suggested we just see what he does. About 5 minutes later I heard him baying and told the guys we needed to go to him. They were talking crap, suggesting the dog had a pig. We found a knee deep crossing in the creek and started across. The banks were roughly 25’ deep and by the sound of things we were close. While we were crossing the creek I shined a light up a 10’ deep gulley leading into the creek and saw his doe.. It was well alive. The dog had it trapped and would not let it out. Since the hunter adamantly maintained the deer was dead, we had not brought a gun and we were about a mile from the road. The hunter who shot the deer formulated a plan to cross the creek and go to the dog. From there he would bail off the bank of the gully onto the doe and cut her throat. There was about a 4’ drop where the gully dumped into the creek to where we were standing in knee deep water. We quickly pulled out our pocket knives to see whose was sharpest. The hunter took my pocket knife and quickly scurried up the bank and made his way to the dog. There is quite a commotion going on at this time. We have a light on the doe. It is trying to exit the gully and the dog is keeping it there. My buddy and I have ringside seats and settle in for the show. All was going to plan until the hunter ran out of courage when he peered into the gully and shined a light onto the doe. After about 15 seconds she flushed down the gully straight at us. I was holding the light when she came off the 4’ embankment. My buddy shuffled to the left and broke down and they met chest to chest. I was thinking “text book form tackle” as he armed her up as she bowled him over backwards and they both went underwater. The doe popped up first but was dazed and hesitated long enough for my buddy to pop up and catch a leg as she started to flee. About that time I saw a brown streak fly past my head as the pudelpointer launched off the embankment and drilled her in the back of the neck and took her down. My buddy and I piled on and helped hold her till the original hunter arrived with my pocket knife and shanked her with my folding case. It was not any of our finest moments with the exception of the one year old pudelpointer. Doe ended up shot in the ham with no bones or arteries hit.

At least you recovered the deer! I hope you called that guy out about running his mouth.

That is a good story.

Shame nobody was running video on that. 🤣😂

No I did not call anybody out. I was pleased with my bird dog and my buddy was instantly raised to legendary status around camp though.

I guess all those years of practice with daddy at the range paid off, I got nothing to compete with this kinda stuff.

I think I hunted with that guy last year. Only then he was using a 300 Win Mag. Bless his heart and really a good guy. I have no idea why the blood trail gave out.

This one actually happened on opening weekend of general season this year. Buddy of mine has been hunting hard all bow season for this buck, we go out for the general season opener and he is toting the 25-06, we recently zeroed it at 100 yards and it is ready to go. Saturday afternoon about 30 minutes before sunset a shot rings out, text message to me and our other buddy with us is that he shot the target buck, we are beyond happy for him. Said he feels he made a good shot but he ran off, so our other buddy says he is on the way, I try and tell them to wait, let some time pass and we will all track it after dark. Since we are at their place this weekend and they have been staring at this buck since September only being out at night they both take off in search. Well after finishing up the evening hunt I am walking back to the house, they are already back, inform me that no blood has been found causing our friend to think he missed. Well after about 15 minutes of listening to him talk about how he took his time, focused on the shot, gently squeezed the trigger and the buck seemed to run off "funny" I threw my boots on and wanted a look for myself. After about 2 minutes I found blood, it was on a different path than they looked and a small droplet to start. About 75 Yards later there he was, it was great watching my friend go from this loss of confiendence to the happiest I had seen him in the field and to know I helped that was great.

So here is the tracking gone bad part. After about 20 yards the buck crossed an old fence on the property, 15' drop off into the creek bottom to the left and thick brush along the fence line to the right. Being used to climbing over barbed wire cross fencing from growing up quail hunting with my father and his friends I know the best place to cross is the biggest post. The biggest post happened to be a tree, so right foot on the bottom strand, push up to swing my foot over and "snap" goes the bottom strand. Fell about 16", landing on the top wire, felt a barb dig into my stomach on the way down. After the initial shock wore off I was finally able to bring myself to see how bad I had been sliced open and wondering how many stitches the local hospital was going to have to give me to keep my intestines from falling out. Fortunately is was but "tis a scratch" until three days later I get out of the shower and the bruising has set in. By far the most painful recovery but I would do it again to help my friend.

Three Days Later:

I had a similar incident tracking a hog. 2nd strand from bottom broke on my way up. Sliced my inner thigh about an inch deep 3 inches long but no blood. It's weird looking at a slice of fat. Could have easily hit an artery and could've bled out. I no longer climb barb wire fences.

I was hunting with my brother and Dad. The brother is a decent shot, but never sharpened a knife in his life. We were hunting on a bayou in Louisiana in January. The bayou wasn’t deep at that time, but was frozen over. I saw some tall white antlers shining in the sun, as the buck stepped out of the woods on our side. The brother was closer, so it was his shot. He knocked the deer down, but it got up and splashed across the bayou and staggered into some thick palmettos on the other side. Well, somebody had to cross the frozen bayou, since the deer was down and needed to be brought back, and it was about a mile to the closest bridge. Well, the brother shot the deer, so it’s his job to go get it. He stripped down to his jockey shorts, grabbed his knife, broke the ice and waded across. We could see him till he went into the palmettos. He yelled that he had found the buck, and he went to cut its throat. The buck wasn’t dead and the knife wasn’t sharp. A brawl broke out over there, but we couldn’t see it, only hear it. My brother was making a lot of noise and called for help, but we declined to get into the icy water. Apparently the buck finally ran out of blood, though the knife never penetrated the hide. My brother came walking out absolutely covered in mud and a good bit of blood, most of which wasn’t his, thank goodness.

I’ve been charged twice by wounded pigs i was tracking. If a pig gets into the thick stuff I leave them alone now

Yes when I was a teenager had one I had wounded and was tracking try to come up a creek bank at me. Thankfully his back legs were mostly out of commission. I adopted that same policy.

"Cornered" carries many definitions when it comes to wild animals.

While hunting the buck of a lifetime a limb on my crossbow broke when I pulled the trigger.
The bolt hit the deer in the front leg cutting it good enough to make it bleed. After investigating places that the deer bedded down at we determined that it quit bleeding when it laid down. So we kept pushing it. We later discovered that the deer laying down with its legs folded up stopped the bleeding.
We tracked that deer for 7 hours and 2 1/2 miles till we found it.
The bolt never entered the chest, it missed by several inches only hitting the one leg near the elbow.
This was 4 years ago, and friends still feel that I owe them for that marathon.

My buddy shot a doe and I guess didn't know what direction it went even though it was pretty open. I go help him and it is dark and drizzling. No blood but maybe a drop at impact. He is looking the complete opposite direction. Fenceline was near so I just follow it. I see a lot of hair on top wire and all of its guts below. It was our lease but some others guys area on other side. We cross and fince doe about 20 yards further looking at us. Had to slit the throat but good recovery at least.

Hunting on a tributary to the Trinity river one season and a buddy shoots a deer in the spine on the opposite bank. It's sliding down the steep bank to the waters edge and struggling with just its front legs. We were trying to figure out how to get to the deer. I guess with all of the commotion and the deer's thrashing at the edge of the bank Mr Ali Gator got hungry. Yep he came up and decided the deer was his. I had no argument with him but my buddy was P O'd. The deer still thrashing with its front legs disappeared under the water. I wish we would have had cellphones with cameras back then. I'm just glad it wasn't one of us getting dragged off because my buddy was about to wade to the other side. Our other buddy, who's family the place belonged to said "Oh i forgot to tell yall not to hunt by 'gator's lair'." His grandpa just laughed and said "well get you another one."

When I was stationed in Kentucky I introduced a buddy to archery. He was also a lefty so to save him some jangle I just let him use my back up bow and release. He shot at the house all summer and was ready to go!

We got on a small lease just north of Lexington. We ran cameras all summer and had a few nice bucks. Season opens early in September so there was a real chance at a good velvet buck. Fast forward to our first hunt of the year, evening hunt-- My target buck and his running buddy come out but I get busted. Now I'm pretty much just waiting for dark to climb down when I get a text "BBD!!!". Now- mind you this would be his first archery deer ever and so I had somewhat low expectations about the size of the deer. When I get up to him, he has climbed down and marked the shot location and then waited. He was still shaking and telling me about this huge 8pt he shot at 10 yards.

We find the arrow and it is for sure hit back so we wait and darkness quickly follows. We used his shot arrow to mark the initial hit position-- he now has 3 arrows left in his quiver. After a 2 hour wait (we had formation at 6am the next morning and we were 2.5 hours from base) we start SLOWLY tracking and within 100 yards we bump the buck. Just a glimpse but he was moving slow and hurt bad as he headed down the hillside. We waited another hour... past midnight now. Knowing there was a large pond at the bottom we broke off the track, circled to get downwind and started checking the edge of the pond.

Sure enough, the buck was bedded right at the end of the pond. My buddy has his bow-- only two arrows now because one got knocked out of the quiver while we tracked. When I hit the buck with my flashlight he is every bit as big as he described and maybe more. We sneak in, keeping the light on the buck and try to finish him off but after two misses and no more arrows the buck had enough and struggled another 10 yards away before bedding again. Our only option now was skinning knives- I had a fixed buck knife with a 3" blade. I readied my knife had my buddy hold the light and I snuck behind the deer.

The plan was to keep the buck distracted with the light and I would come in from behind and finish him off because he was obviously in a bad way already. The plan worked perfectly until the knife blade went into the buck. It instantly breathed life back into a now pissed off 147" 8 pt Kentucky buck that was likely well over 200lbs on the hoof. My knife went flying and I grabbed horns while body locking the buck with my legs. My buddy jumped in too so now there is zero light and the fight is on. Well the smartest thing anyone did that night was my buddy jamming this bucks rack into the muddy pond bank which did a good job of keeping it in place. My legs were now in a figure 4 around the bucks neck and somewhere between the arrow wound, the knife wound and all the fighting/twisting/choking the buck expired.

We got a four wheeler to drag him up the hill, gutted him quickly, packed him full of ice and hauled A$$ to formation before sneaking back out and getting the buck to the butcher. It remains my buddy's only archery buck and he was scored as a nearly perfect typical at 147".

Buddy of mine was actually serving as a "guide" when this happened. We had previously spotted a really nice buck at the "Octopus". This blind was in thick brush with 8 senderos going off in all directions. We had an older hunter come in and one of my favorite people, the "guide" took him out there. Sure enough, the stud walked out and the older hunter took his shot. It was true, but the deer ran off into one of the patches of brush in between the senderos. The "guide" jumped out way too soon, ventured into the brush and pretty quickly jumped the buck. He saw good blood where the deer had laid down and, of course, pressed on. He got to the sendero and the old man came walking up and indicated the buck had crossed the sendero into the next batch of brush.

The "guide" (I say that loosely) pressed on once again and got in to the brush. Working his way in, he saw the buck laying in a very small opening. He had a clear shot and immediately shouldered his rifle to dispatch the animal. The deer noticed this movement and since the "guide" still had his scope covers on, he could not see a darn thing and the deer got away - again. This time the hunter wasn't in the stand and he was hoping he could find the buck. Luckily, the blood trail led to a now deceased animal.

I still can't believe the detail in which the "guide" replayed the story.

My dad used the back of his truck as a rest to take a shot at a turkey in one of our fields. Only problem is he was shooting across the truck bed and blew a hole in the other side. A few years later he went to pull his gun out and it discharged and shot the drivers headrest. I'm always asking him if his safety is on or if he has unloaded his firearm. He makes me nervous.

One of my close friends that is not much of a hunter, did a similar thing once. We were at his property target shooting over the cab of his truck. Now I knew that just because you can see your target clearly through a scope, doesn't mean your barrel has a clear shot, especially when you're shooting over the cab of a truck. Anyway, I didn't think to mention it, and long story short, the goober lodge a .30-30 round into the roof . I like to bring that story up from time to time when my buddy starts getting to big of a head!

New thread needed!! Knew a guy who shot through my buddies floorboard into the catalytic converter....