What lengths have you taken to recover game?

[mowin]

How far have you tracked, or what did you have to do to recover game animals? 

Few yrs back, I was squirrel hunting in January.  One squirrel dropped from the top of the tree only to get hung up 20' high. I walked the 1/4 mile back to my truck, drove home and got my Stihl pole saw to cut that limb down for a tree rat.  

Last year during the holiday hunt, I put a bad shot on a doe. She ended up jumping in the creek and died on the opposite side. While we were going over options, my buddy stripped down to his boxers and in he went.  

[cervidchasers]

Nothing as drastic as your buddy but we lost blood on a deer , let it lay over night. Found it alive the next morning at 10 bumped it.
Came back at 6pm and bumped again. Went back the next morning and found it but this time around sadly the coyotes had gotten to it.

This was by the far hardest and longest track..

[grampy]

20+ years of tracking with DS.......where do I even begin?

For myself, I remember shooting a doe that ran off, leaving a sparse blood trail. Found her wedged in a rock crevasse. All we could see was the top of her back. We tried yanking and pulling from all angles, for hours, and couldn't get her out. We finally went back and got a couple chisels and hammers and after awhile finally got enough to where we could pull her out.

[Bionic]

A few years I had taken a shot on a nice buck.  Unfortunately, it was a bad shot, and it hit the top of his front leg(did not realize this at this time).  Anyways, he walked off, so I climbed down a few minutes later, and saw blood, but obviously not good quantity.  I followed very slowly, watching the woods ahead of me while following light blood.  I walk about 300 yards very slowly, and blood stopped, so I am looking as far ahead as I can, see nothing.  I decided to grid search to try and follow any blood that I can.  Nothing, just stopped.  I decide to turn around, and go back to my stand to gather my thoughts.  Well I take a few steps, and bam the buck is only 20 yards away, he was bedded, I was so focused ahead, that I never saw him, walked right by him.  Now I am overwhelmed, and worried because I know I hurt this deer, and that doesn’t sit well with me.  I freeze, and try to watch where he went, but there are a lot of pine patches here, so distance is limited…I decided to walk very slowly as if I was spot & stalking.  I walked maybe another 30 yards, I see him laying there bedded, watching me, so I shot him once last time.  He got up ran another 40-50 yards maybe, and i watched him pass.  That was a rough morning for me, and the deer.  That did not sit well with me for quite some time, really bothered me, but I was happy to end the suffering.  I don’t have as much success hunting as others due to my stubbornness of wanting to only hunt my home of 5 acres, so this day was a big deal.  

[Bionic]

My dad years back shot an 8 pointer, it was 19 degrees, the deer went down this long steep hill into the stream.  My dad got the deer out, dragged the deer all the way up the hill, and slid all the way down with the deer due to the snow.  I won’t forget that story, I was at school that day.

[Moho81]

Couple of 2-3 hour tracks.

Floated 2 deer out over a mile through waist high water at times for my uncle. Drag one deer 50 yards. Walk back. Drag the other one 50 yards. Rinse and repeat for what seemed like hours. 
 

Countless thorn bushes for small game. 

[Robhuntandfish]

This year tracked a deer for 2.5 hrs in the dark on game trails thru vines and thorns so thick at times we had to go hands and knees.  Ice pellets started dropping and we hear thunder. It's so thick in there it took us to use a compass and GPS to get out in 25 minutes back to a trail.   

It then stormed and poured and then lake effect rain all night.  

Went back in for the am.  Tracked it in huntstand and went 2300 yards and 2.5 hrs in nothing but water.  The whole swamp was flooded so no blood trail just looking for a white belly.  

On the news the next day they had a whole story about this storm. It wasn't predicted.  

That was prob my worst track.  Brought a couple out of some crazy steep gullies.  But this is the first buck I've ever not been able to find.  

[mowin]

1 minute ago, Robhuntandfish said:

This year tracked a deer for 2.5 hrs in the dark on game trails thru vines and thorns so thick at times we had to go hands and knees.  Ice pellets started dropping and we hear thunder. It's so thick in there it took us to use a compass and GPS to get out in 25 minutes back to a trail.   

It then stormed and poured and then lake effect rain all night.  

Went back in for the am.  Tracked it in huntstand and went 2300 yards and 2.5 hrs in nothing but water.  The whole swamp was flooded so no blood trail just looking for a white belly.  

On the news the next day they had a whole story about this storm. It wasn't predicted.  

That was prob my worst track.  Brought a couple out of some crazy steep gullies.  But this is the first buck I've ever not been able to find.  

 You definitely did everything you could to recover that deer. 

[lucky118]

The last time I shot a buck with a recurve. Was a quartering away shot at 15 yrds. Didn't  get the penitration I needed and ended up with a gut shot deer. Tracked him till dark. Got on him the nxt morning and just before dark shot him again laying in some pines. 

Edited November 16, 2023 by lucky118

[Wolc123]

I killed a mule deer buck 5 miles from the truck in the Colorado Rocky mts.  I gutted it and dragged it all the way back myself, mostly on a public hiking trail along a stream, from which I consumed about 4 gallons of water.  
 

About half way back, a pair of large dogs drove me away from the carcass and consumed the heart and liver before I could get to my slingshot or reload my rifle.  Their owners arrived and called them away.

 I told the two women that Bambi had been hurt bad and I was trying to get him to the vet but that their dogs had just eaten his heart and liver.  They said “that’s gross” and continued up the mountain. 

That was the worst tasting deer I’ve ever eaten and I vowed then and there to never shoot another of that species. 

Edited November 16, 2023 by Wolc123

[SilentStalker]

I made a poor shot on a deer that we believed was leg hit. That being said, my buddy and I quickly got on the track and followed him a mile or so into a gorge of a river. This is a rock faced gorge on both sides and the deer went through a crevasse to get down to the river.  Blood was sparce but present throughout the track and the bone pieces we found helped confirm our leg hit suspicions. As we stood out over the river both knowing what was next, we saw the buck laying in the gorge on the other side staring at us. We quickly dispatched him, crossed the waist high river and retrieved him.  It was a two mile walk all uphill back to the camp with temps in the teens. That one was tough and  still get my stones busted by my buddy who was a huge help that day.

 

[The Back 40]

A friend down in Windsor shot a black bear that ran and tumbled down a steep rock embankment. I ended up having to go home and get my ropes and harness to get down to the bear. we ended up rigging a 2:1 system up in a tree and used the 4 wheeler to pull him back up while my buddy guided him through the trees and rocks. We were a sweaty mess by the time we were done, half of his family showed up to "help" most just drank beer and laughed at us.

[mowin]

Few years ago my buddies son shot a moose a good 1000 yrds off the dirt Rd next to a creek.  

It dropped in a beaver pond overflow about a foot deep.  We quartered it as a couple other guys went and got a couple canoes.  Loaded half in each canoe, but had to pull canoes over 3 beaver dams and then up a 30' slope to the truck.  Took us 5 hrs.