Reader Submitted on 10/3/09
I headed out bowhunting thinking that the cool weather might make for some great whitetail hunting. I had a 2.5 year old spike buck come in Saturday morning walking down a cross-fence on our property. He walked within bow range and shot at him at 18 yards. As luck would have it, I hit a wire on the fence and the arrow went straight up into the air!
At this point, I’m thinking, “Man, what’s the chances of that?” Well, the young buck calms back down and starting feeding on some protein pellets I had thrown out. He then gives me another shot, this time slightly quartering away and 30 yards out. The shot looked good, so I let one fly! Just before the arrow gets there, the spike jumps and it sticks him about half way back and high on the boy.
I watched him run across the pasture and into the woods along the creek, with my arrow sticking out of him. I knew it was not a great shot, so I gave him 2 hours and then me and my hunting buddies went looking. We found my arrow where the buck went into the creek and followed a blood trail for about 75 yards. The blood trail was pretty steady, but then it just stopped at the creek bed where he crossed.
We looked most of the day Saturday for that spike and never found anything. I have felt like crap the rest of the weekend just wondering whether he is still alive or not. I assumed it would happen sooner or later while whitetail hunting with a bow, but it sucks losing a buck. I just wonder if he will be able to shake it off or what.