Your most haunting or embarrassing missed shots.

[hayesplow]

I am a guide, and also managed an archery shop for years.

I’ve launched a pile of arrows in my life!


Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

Any future hunting coming up, i don't mind throwing in some $$$ and hunting with ya. *that's if i'm free*

 

[BradNSW]

First one is similar to 5milesback. 1st year bow elk hunting. I'd practiced on targets and dots and was holding 4" groups with 5 arrows at 50yds. Never went to a 3D range, just dots. Anyway, BIG 6x6 feeds straight toward me midday, while I'm eating a snack. I range an opening at 30yds. Draw just before he gets there and he walks into the opening and stops.

All 5 pins of my sight are on elk hair (but no dots? Hmmm?). Just as I pick out the crease and put my 30yd pin on it, he wheels and was gone forever! 5th day of a 6 day backpack hunt...devastating mental blow!!!

Spend a lot of time a 3D shoots now and have a well used buck target in my backyard!!

 

[WannabeHunter]

Most haunting: shot a whitetail doe with 30-06 at about 150 yds. She dropped. I got down, she got up and took off. Blood everywhere, followed the trail for hours, never found her.

She's the only animal I've ever missed or couldn't find. I actually think about that shot more than the successful ones.

 

[nowen22]

2016 Wyoming Elk in the Thorofare wilderness with my bow. We were set to be in for 5 days in mid september and the first couple of days were slow. Called in a couple smaller bulls with no shots with lots of bears. The 3rd day it snowed all morning so we had a late start. Took the horses up on a ridge and ate lunch and glassed. A nice mature bull pushes his cows into a meadow 800 yards below us. We finish up lunch and head down after him and set up about 200 yards away. We called for 1.5 hours and couldn't get him to move (had about 20 cows). We snuck in another 50 yards and started raking a tree and calling more. This really pissed him off. He tore up a small pine and started trotting towards us. A small hump was between us and him and he stops at 25 yards where I can only see his back end antler tips. He lets out a nice lip bawl and comes charging in. I draw back as soon as I see his 3rd's coming over the hump. He swings below me at 4 yards broadside. I chirp, settle my pin right behind the shoulder and let one fly. Long story short, had my single pin set at 50 yards and held too high for a 4 yard shot. Hit right above his lungs in no mans land (Didn't even cross my mind that I would have a shot opportunity that close). He bolts, and we track him for the rest of the day. 2 drops of blood and never to be seen again. 33 mile horseback ride in, a couple years of saving for the trip and countless hours of practice to have it come down to miffed 4 yard shot. That one still hurts. Needless to say I practice as much at close distances as I do at longer distances now with my bow!

 

[kiddogy]

most haunting , without a doubt , would have to be the griz I missed just afore he kilt me!

 

[Yote Klr]

I am a very conscientious reloader. I double check absolutely everything every time especially for a hunting trip. HOWEVER, one time one primer got seated upside down, the one loaded in the chamber in the dark . Reticle on a doe squeeze the trigger...click ,nothing. I held on to the rifle because I thought it was a squib load or something. Several seconds later I ejected the round, re chambered. Got the doe but man that's embarrassing.

Can't believe one tiny mistake found its way to the first round in the chamber.

 

[Rookie]

I’ve had my share of misses. One that is the most embarrassing though is when my brother and I are hiking up some steep nads hill chasing some bulls screaming away. We get close to the bench there on and a rag horn shows up broadside at 30 yard. Brother is right over my shoulder with rangefinder and tell me 30yrd. I take my pin up it’s leg and as my 20 pins hits the crease I let er rip, bull tore out of there with about 2” of penetration in its leg. Used the wrong pin on a dream shot. That hurt bad but did manage to kill a bull a few days later.

 

[SWOHTR]

3 years ago didn’t verify the sights on my .270 because for 14 years they had never been off.

Shot 3 times at a buck that night, clean misses. Next day checked the zero, 18 inches high at 100 yards. I guess that’s what traveling (airlines) can do to your scope.

 

[.270]

I remember passing a shot on a nice sitka blacktail buck that has haunted me to this day. I had stopped to rest on the top of this draw and look down and saw a buck walking up it. I drew my WW2 era Mauser 8mm with open sights on him. His front half was behind a tree when I got situated on him and the only shot, I had was his guts or hind quarters. I had always seen on tv that they just keep on walking till you get that nice broadside shot. That never happened and he turned down the draw and I never saw him again. I know now that I did the right thing and didn’t take a crappy shot but shortly after I left for boot camp and that was all I could think about lying in my bunk thinking about that deer. Haha

 

[hayesplow]

5 years a very good friend of mine Larry died tragically while hunting in Laredo. Apparently he was hunting in the storms and lighting struck his tower stand. He fell out of the tower and his son found him at the bottom.

He was an outstanding linebacker for Texas A&M in the mid 80s and played 7 or 8 years in the NFL.

 

[kiddogy]

5 years a very good friend of mine Larry died tragically while hunting in Laredo. Apparently he was hunting in the storms and lighting struck his tower stand. He fell out of the tower and his son found him at the bottom.

He was an outstanding linebacker for Texas A&M in the mid 80s and played 7 or 8 years in the NFL.

wow! shocking turn of events.

to soon? seriously , sorry for your loss!

 

[ChrisA]

I grew up shooting a Remington Sportsman 12; a cheaper version of the 870 wingmaster before the Express was introduced. It was stolen when I was 25. I'd always thought the 870 Special Field looked super cool so I found and bought a used one with 21" barrel.

Later that fall I went pheasant hunting back home with a group of friends. I was on the river bank and a good friend was next to me when rooster after rooster started popping up. I emptied the 4 round tube mag, reloaded and emptied it again and never touched a bird.

My buddy was in total disbelief then started laughing his ass off, stating something about the worst display of shooting he'd ever witnessed. I got a lot more shit from the others when we got back to the trucks.

I wasn't used to that short of barrel and the straight English stock, didn't bring the butt up high enough into my shoulder pocket and shot over every damned rooster.

I bought Wingmaster with 28" barrel and all is well now.

Chris

 

[hayesplow]

wow! shocking turn of events.

to soon? seriously , sorry for your loss!

Yes it was way too soon, and thanks....i tell all my hunting budies that safety and precision is what i stand.

 

[dirtclod Az.]

Javelina hunting with my buddy,glassing the sunny side of a hill
when from behind me comes a bark.I spin around and theres a Pig at 10 yards.
Take a shot,Miss!Another Pig comes running up 10yds. shoot,miss!
Look back to the first Pig and he tips over.First shot went right through him.
I yell to my buddy,got one!He yells back thats funny cause a Pig just ran bye wih an
arrow in it!Two miisses NO...two hits! Oh Shite.Not good.He shot the second
Pig and finished it I kept the first.

 

[JohnnyDesert]

Last year... archery elk. I did everything right, picked a perfect shooting lane, the bull came perfectly to my call, 54 yard shot. I got excited and looked around my riser to see where my arrow was going... one of my worst habits as an archer, I thought I had broken that habit. I pulled the shot and got a bad hind quarter shot. Followed blood til the bull sealed it up. I still play that scenario out in my head.

 

[kiddogy]

Yes it was way too soon, and thanks....i tell all my hunting budies that safety and precision is what i stand.

all my hunting buds would love it if I told a joke like that in the eulogy.

 

[Marble]

15 years old, by myself, top of a mountain in a blizzard. Saw several bucks moving at 50ish yards. Took off my scope cover and chased them for an hour. 30+" non typical muley walks out at 50 yards and when I pull up...my scope is packed with snow.

Killed a forked horn 2 hours later.

 

[hayesplow]

I was gutting a bull elk one time and my brother was trying to help and he got his fingers in the way, cut him pretty bad... Made me feel bad...

 

[16Bore]

Ground hog standing still at 160 yards with a 270. Clean miss and he ran like hell. It was kinda funny and I had a witness that still rubs it in.

On the contrary, I nailed one in the head around 30 yards running with a 1911. One shot.

Go figure.

 

[longspeak74]

2010, second rifle season in Colorado. My brother and I both had Mulie tags and I also had an Elk tag. I tagged a decent little Mulie opening day and my brother gets a nice, big deer a couple days later. Over those couple of days, it had dumped several inches of snow on us and temps had dropped. Arise early one morning and make my way down into this basin. Standing against a tree, watching the sun - I see a gorgeous 5x5 starting down the mountain, casual as can be. I follow him all the way down and he comes up out of this little draw at 125 yards broadside. Gun comes up and I push the safety off...click. I swear under breath and he turns his head my way. My mind races and I rack another shell...click. "Motherf...ker" I say in a normal voice as I can't believe what the hell is happening. At this point he is out of there on a run. I had gloves on because the temps had dropped and hadn't pushed the two-stage safety forward all the way. I fall asleep to the same image every night of that elk running away.