8 Pointer Got Away

[Joel Lehman]

On Thanksgiving morning at 6:30 a nice 8 point whitetail buck walked out of the brush 50 yards slightly to the right of my stand.

I took my time to make sure he was a legal buck in my county. The inside spread has to be greater than 13 inches, approximately the width of the ears. He was legal so I aimed my 54 Isaac Haines flinter at his right shoulder. He was at a slight angle to me.

He went down at the shot, dropping in his tracks. Then about 15 seconds later his head started moving. Next he moved his head from side to side and crawled into the brush. He used his hind legs and left front leg to move.

I thought he would go down again soon so I waited about 15 minutes and reloaded my rifle. There was no buck to be found. There was also no blood on the ground. I saw blood on his shoulder exactly were I aimed. After searching for an hour in the thorny brush and mesquite, I went to get my brother. He helped me search for another hour. We went in cicles in opposite directions but never even found a drop of blood.

Apparently the deer was able to walk or run away.
The ground is very dry and hard and there was lots of oil field truck activity, even on Thanksgiving morning. No buzzards were seen circling the area that afternoon or this morning.

This is the third year in a row that I have shot at a buck and never found a trace of blood. At least this year I know I hit the deer. My load is 80 grains of Goex 3F and a 530 cast roundball. Could my shot have glanced off his shoulderblade?

I'm determined to harvest a buck with my flintlock, but my brothers are giving me a hard time, saying I should go back to a centerfire rifle.

Maybe I should have waited until the buck was completely broadside before I shot. Any ideas about what I'm doing wrong?

 

[750k2]

Everything sounds good to me???
I shoot 90gr 2f and should be on par with 80 3f.
You should have rocked his world...
S*&^T happens???
Keep tryin

 

[rabjr]

Joel,

Sorry this happened to you. I had something simular happen to me. The Buck acted the same as yours and no blood, not a drop could be found. However I did recover the animal and what we found was, the bullet hit the heavy leg bone connected to the shoulder bone, sorry I don't know the name of it. It destroyed the left leg and entered the chest between the first and second rib, comming to rest in a muscle of the right leg. It did not exit and the animal bled internally the whole time. This could be why you have no blood, no exit wound.

 

[Stumpkiller]

Aim lower. Behind the foreleg and two or three inches up above the sternum. Even if you are shooting from an elevated position. I'm sighted 2-1/2" high at 50 yards, and most of my shots are at less than 40. I hold low, and still tend to hit center-of-the-lungs. At a steeper angle you should hold lower on both upward and downward deflections.

My own sad story was with a recurve bow. I was in a tree stand (the last time, in fact, about 12 years ago) and had a nice symmetrical 8-point walk from behind me around my tree. I shot as soon as he got in front of me - straight down between his shoulders. He went down in a heap. 10 seconds later he starts spinning in circles on his side, pumping his legs. Then he rolled onto his feet and took two hops, putting scrub trees between us. I couldn't believe it.

This was on a canoe-in trip on the swampy end of a remote lake and I spent that day and the next two wading in hemlock swamp looking for that deer. I was miserable. Found blood, but no sign of him or any piece of my cedar, yellow fletched, crown-dipped and red creasted arrow. They are 31" long and that was buried up to the dip - 22". My broadheads at the time were 1-1/2" wide Sasquatch. That deer died somewhere within minutes of my hit I have no doubt. I lost all faith in that head and my ablity from treestands and changed both, even though they probably were both OK. With instinctive shooting you can't pull it off with any doubts.

The .54 RB kills whitetail. Move it at 1,600 fps and get it into both lungs and the deer is fatally wounded. I don't know what to say with your situation. Not many blood vessels high in the shoulder. I avoid that area and go below and behind. I've gutted deer full of blood in the chest cavity or abdomen from high lung or liver hits that bled out internally. When using a m/l I hunt more like I was using a 2X range bow instead of a rifle. Go for the target rich, high blood vessel areas and not the bones. No neck shots, no upper shoulder shots.

Low in the lungs. Takes out the aortal arch or heart as a side benefit sometimes.

 

[hawk]

joel look at this site in your mail box.

 

[freetrapper20]

What Stumpkiller said. 99% of the time I don't aim directly at the shoulder whichever way the deer is in relation to me. If they are angling towards me and I don't think I'll get a better shot I draw an imaginary line thru the vitals and thats the path I send the roundball on. From the way you describe shooting at the shoulder with the deer angling towards you it sounds like the shoulder and leg bones helped to deflect the roundball from penetrating into the vitals. Personally, I'm much more crital on shot placement than I ever was shooting a centerfire rifle.

 

[Halftail]

Are you allowed to track wounded Game with a Dog?Sounds to me that you hit that sucker good but got no Exit hole.I,ve knocked the manure out of some deer with a 50 Cal roundball and a few of these never had an exit hole.Keep on plugging with muzzleloader you'll eventually get a nice one... :v

 

[Joel Lehman]

I think it is legal to track game with dogs in Texas. The only problem is that you cannot cross into another property without the owner's permission.

Our local coyotes have surely found the buck by now if he did not survive.