I know I’m not going to get some magical answer that solves all my problems, I’m just wondering if anybody has ever dealt with a similar situation or heard of anything like this. So Saturday 11/17 I saw the biggest buck I’ve ever seen in my life. He was in brush and there was fresh snow so I wasn’t even even sure if my eyes were playing tricks on me so I took a picture at about 100 yards to be sure, I thought his rack was just snow covered branches. He was real. I shot twice, he took off, I wasn’t leaving this one up to chance so I gave chase, I caught him going around a beaver pond in my woods and I shot again. I started following his tracks and before I knew it he jumped out his bed and bedded back down maybe 50 feet from there in water. I got to about 30 feet from him and sat and watched for about an hour and a half. I was out of bullets. I couldn’t get service, I was trying to send my wife a text to follow my tracks with bullets, wouldn’t work. After a half hour or so he started nodding he head off to the side, he did that for maybe 20 minutes, then he put his head right down. I sat and waited for at least another half hour without him moving, then I decided to walk up. He wasn’t dead and he took off. I figured then I’d let him find a bed and die, I walked back to the house, could barely sleep that night, I couldn’t wait to go find him in the morning. I followed his tracks, he went to a known bedding area, I found his bed filled with bile and some blood but there were a lot of other deer and I ended up losing his track. Monday and Tuesday I went out searching with no luck. Wednesday I got permission from neighbors to search their land as well, I had a couple buddies come over and we grid searched. Before long we found a fresh bed full of blood and bile right over the border of my land, we followed his tracks for hours until we hit a dead end (he doubled back on his own tracks). My buddy had the idea to call a deer tracking dog, I looked online found one close by and he said he’d be over soon, we tracked him til dark and came up with the conclusion he’s still alive. I’ve been out every day until Monday of this week (couldn’t take anymore time off work), I’ve grid searched, I’ve still hunted, I’ve climbed pine trees in an area he works and sat all day. I’ve exhausted all options, I keep finding his tracks now an again, he’s pissing blood bad, find bile here and there, but they’re never so fresh he’s right there, from the night before or something so I follow all day just to go in circles. He won’t leave my woods for long, I have a beaver swamp back there and he tends to stick right around there. I know he’s injured but I can’t believe he’s still alive. It’s been 10 days since I’ve shot him and I’m going nuts, my wife hates me, I know I should’ve quit but I don’t have it in me. I have about 65 hours into this buck. Where I live in Broome County New York he would be a record and if not top 5. He looked like a 10-12 point, a spread of at least 24 inches and g2’s 14-16 inches tall. I could hunt for the rest of my life and never see another buck like this one. Did I tell you he’s smart too? I’m not sure what my next move is, I’m going to keep looking but I think he’s still alive, I don’t know how because a gut shot is fatal 100 percent of the time (not intentional) so idk what I do, wait for him to die of infection?
(I wrote the original on Tuesday waiting for my membership approval)
Update - we finally got a fresh snow since the day I shot him, I saw all these signs of him before but I don’t know when, nothing so fresh I could tell it if it was that day or night. So I guess Saturday I’m going to go out all day and just look for signs of him, if I don’t see any I’m going to try to put on a big grid search, if there is signs then I’m not sure, probably keep hunting him
(I wrote the original on Tuesday waiting for my membership approval)
Update - we finally got a fresh snow since the day I shot him, I saw all these signs of him before but I don’t know when, nothing so fresh I could tell it if it was that day or night. So I guess Saturday I’m going to go out all day and just look for signs of him, if I don’t see any I’m going to try to put on a big grid search, if there is signs then I’m not sure, probably keep hunting him
