Kill them when you find them

[Smokey Bear]

Did they end up killing him?

I was wondering the same thing. But I would think he would have been more clear if they took a shot off on it?

 

[Soj51hopeful]

Did they end up killing him?

Yes. I walked up and congratulated the old boy. This was several steep miles in the wilderness that I had been backpacking into. I ended up killing a smaller but still decent deer the next day.

 

[Soj51hopeful]

I was wondering the same thing. But I would think he would have been more clear if they took a shot off on it?

Going with the long story short. There’s more to it but figured it’s old news.

 

[robby denning]

Ya you’ve mentioned it quite a bit and as well Jason Carter. Heard it multiple times and proved to help me that day! Also met you at the expo, I’m the guy that was lost on the way to the seminar on Friday… lol it was nice to meet you!

oh ya. Room 254 is not easy to find. good to meet you too

 

[TheGDog]

RE: kill them where you find them

Since I've starting focusing on this Alpine area now... when I was hiking in my first time in there at "go-time"... with another location in mind.. at some point I hear "POW!.... POW!, POW!"... and it's coming from way up high on this ridge my path is parallel to.

So then I'm like "Welp, shoot. Ya know whatcha gotta do. This is what you came here for. If they're shooting that means there was a buck there." and proceed to grind it out in a full frontal direct assault straight up that ridge completely covered in buckthorn.

It eventually resulted with me making a like, 60-70yd shot on a buck that was retreating away. Wasn't great angle, didn't recover him, because instead of trying for a "Texas Heart Shot" I tried my best to "angle-in" just past his hind quarters to his lung area.

but I'm thinking it must have been a non-fatal hit that probably just broke a crap ton of ribs or something. Because I saw him immediately SLAM down where he was standing. Then he kicked off that boulder he was upon and fell into a hedge below it! When I saw that, I was enthused, thinking he's down for sure!

But by the time I gathered my pack and climbed those 60-70yds at 30% slope. I get there no sign of him at all!

Then I hear something, look down more like where I WAS... and here's a buck escaping away, side-hilling.

I'd seen another shadow of a deer when I fired on this first one, so I didn't wanna potentially shoot and inure ANOTHER buck by mistake, and it didn't make sense to me in that moment that this buck I was seeing was the same one I'd hit. Seemed to be moving to "pain-free" so I figured it wasn't the same one. So not wanting to mess-up and injure another buck... I held off on shooting this one I'm now seeing below me.

So then I decide maybe that WAS him, so I should try to side-hill and follow.

I get down to where this one was below me... and I'm beyond exhausted, so I had to stop and eat something. and wouldn't you know it? The second I started getting some food into me? "KAKOOOOOM!!!" T-storm..quite-literally broke.. I sh!t you not.. what sounded like DIRECTLY.... above my location. F-M-L!

So anyhoo, OK, this is life now. So side-hill slowly like 300 yds (which costs A LOT of energy in this very steep location). Didn't see any blood or anything. Was almost out of water, so had to call it and start back down that horrible hill.

This year I'm going to be scouting different routes to get me up to that same location so I don't have to do that full frontal assault. I'm sure it'll take A LOT mor etime to get up there the round-a-bout way... so I'll have to budget time by leaving home even earlier. But it'll payoff when it comes to packing-out. Because packing-out straight down that hill would be quite the sketchy task.

 

[Gbleet]

Buddy of mine found this buck when he was hunting with a first time hunter on opening day. They tried to get on him but lost him as they got closer to where they had seen him. After they couldn’t find the buck they decided that hiking a buck out of there wouldn’t be a good experience for the hunter (thank goodness) , he messaged me and told me it’d be a buck worth chasing. He mentioned that coming in the morning would be a good move! I said if you’re leaving him I’m going in right now! My dad also thought a morning play would be good but i knew this buck had to be right there and ya gotta kill them when you find them. After a little convincing, me and my dad hiked 6 miles in and started to work slowly down where my buddy had first seen the “big buck” (we didn’t know if it was even big with no footage but I trust my buddy) At about 5:30 pm I spotted him feeding in open daylight and as soon as I got my spotter on him I recognized as the double eye guard buck I got a few trail cam pics of in June! After losing him and finding him back in his bed I was able to touch a few rounds off and kill my biggest buck to date. Shoutout to Robby for the multiple times he’s mentioned “kill them when you find them”, it really did make a difference in my mind set and proved to be a key in killing this buck! Im curious as to if anyone has stories where they decided to wait til the morning and regretted it. I know sometimes it can be better to wait, but in this case it was worth the evening chase!View attachment 1024015

Congrats! Waiting would’ve cost you that buck.