Farthest track and recovery of animal?

[muskiemanAD]

Was wondering how long you have tracked deer, bear, etc. and still recovered it? I single lunged a buck about ten years ago that went 1/3 of a mile before bedding down before he died.

[hockeybc69]

I love the stories about tracking deer for miles.....

Unless you own about 2 square miles, you would cross about 10-15 different peoples property in our area. LOLLLL.

I dont think there would be very appreciative landowners.

My longest tracking and recovery..... boy,,,, 100 yds max..

Regretfully, there have been a few deer that I didnt recover over the years though. Hard to say if they would have been just over the next hill or what... but ya gotta call it at some point.

[lichen fox]

My longest with the bow was a 130 class buck with a liver-gut hit about 10 years ago...I tracked for 4 hours after dark covering about 2 miles...(he was constantly doubling back)...I quit for the nite around 1 AM and went back at sun up at 6 AM...picked up the track and recovered him in about a half mile...he was still warm and not dead for long...My longest was a low-gut rifle hit on a smaller buck about 10 years before that...I hit him about an hour after sun up and tracked from then until 11 PM that nite...he circled, doubled back several times and made some pretty good straight lines too...We were back and forth, up and down the 1500 acre parcel two or 3 times during the course of the tracking...I'd guess it was about 4 - 5 miles before he gave it up...interstingly, he finally died about 75 yards from where I'd originaly shot him!

[bigbucks]

I can think of 3-4 tracking jobs that were somewhere in the 1-3 mile range all but one were gut shot deer. Yes, we crossed a few landowners, but many of the parcels were at least a couple hundred acres. One deer my Uncle hit & we actually got mixed up with a blood trail from one I had hit. (My cousin found mine & finished it incidentally it went about 1/2 mile.) The one we followed crossed most of the width of my Uncle's place, the neighbor's, another neighbor's, a road & we found a gut pile in the woods of someone we didn't know. It took us 3-4 hours to follow it that far. We did jump it once early on in a cattail swamp, but couldn't see it to get a shot. All of the one save the one below were gut shots with shotgun slugs. You kind of need to just stay on the track in that situation, it's a short season, you want to finish it off & you need to know if you got it or not.

A recent one I can remember was a friend shot one muzzle loader hunting 2-3 years ago & we kept jumping it & not getting a shot & we'd wait a bit & then follow it. It finally dropped & died, bled out. We fortunately came across a farmer feeding his cows & he was nice enough to give us a ride, with the deer, back around to our truck which was probably 5-6 miles around by road.

[Jameson]

About 2 miles in a big half-circle shape. All on public land. A buddy of mine shot it and due to disability he is not able to track deer very far. He shot the leg off of this one and with a fresh coating of snow I was able to keep after it even once it had mostly stopped bleeding. Did have to finish it off as it stood up from where it had laid down.

[Random guy]

Not uncommon to track bear several miles over the course of 48 hours when the shot is bad. 9 times out of 10 three days later they are right back at the same bait they started from.

[paceman]

My longest recovery was probably a 1/4 mile. A liver shot on a doe. she just ran full tilt down the ridge/ down hill till she tipped over next to a swamp. Not a fun drag.

[x1957x]

This is not the longest but one of the neatest and most interesting. I shot a buck through the heart(not trying to)on the edge of where a bean and corn field meet. It ran straight down the edge of the bean-corn field and entered the corn about 60+ yards out. It went in 4 rows and turned back and ran strait back to WITHIN 15 feet and crashed to the ground of where I just shot him. Wished tracking was always that easy!

[BLACKJACK]

All my bow kills have been found within 100 yards but at night, following pin pricks of blood, on your hands and knees, thats a long ways. Anything farther than that is unfortunatley usually gone. Hate it when you have to resort to doing half circles, trying to find a blood trail. Like looking for a needle in a hay stack.

My brother-in law shot a doe with a sluggun a couple years ago, she ran into a four acre food plot. Found blood, she circled around in the corn, we lost her. Driving back home, about 1/2 mile away, saw fresh deer tracks crossing the road into the woods, on a hunch, stopped and looked - blood!!! We were back on the hunt!! Trailing her thru the brush and woods, sent the brother in law up ahead to scan a side hill, told him that there was a good chance she was bedded down, sure enough, he jumped her - and missed. We never found her again. In hindsight we should have went for coffee and came back once we cut the trail, after she had the strength to go 1/2 mile.

[CANOPY SAM]

Once shot a nice buck in ND bounding thru tall sunflowers. Timed his bounding for a neck shot. Turned and running straight away I settled the sites on his neck, waited for him to touch the ground, then squeezed the trigger for a hit on his jump up.

Thought I completely missed, as he made no change in the pattern of his escape, no side lunge, no flinch, nothing. Just kept watching him bound away and disappear over a nearby rise.

My Father in Law, and a friend of his who were watching from the truck said, "You missed, let's go." But I figured, "Hey! I better go check the spot where I shot just to make sure."

Walked over to the spot where I figured he was when I shot (about 70 yards away as the crow flies), and found blood like someone had splashed it around out of a full paint can! I waved to the guys to go around to the other side of the field in the hope they'd catch him coming out if I pushed him thru.

I continued along a blood trail a blind man could follow thinking all along I'd find him piled up in the sunflowers anytime. Amazingly, he ran out of the field, and across an open plowed section right toward the waiting truck on the road ahead. When I got to the truck I anxiously asked where the deer was? They responded in total dismay. They hadn't seen the buck, and didn't even realize it had already crossed the road before they made it around the sunflower field.

The blood trail was so obvious it was almost hard to believe. Literally pools, and splashes of dark red blood everywhere along his running path. We followed him 3/4 of the way across the next section when he suddenly turned hard right, straight toward a nearby rock pile. We readied our weapons in anticipation of him busting out across the field again, but found him piled up and nearly completely bled out. My Father in Law, and his neighbor were dumbfounded.

He'd been hit thru the carotid artery and jugular vein in the neck, hence the profound blood trail, but I hit no bone, so he just kept a runnin' on pure adrenaline. He covered about a mile and a half before he expired.

On a side note, I was very excited to have made such a difficult shot with an open sited 30-30 lever action Winchester, and to have filled my tag with such a nice 8-point buck. Unfortunately, because he'd run so far, and built up so much lactic acid in his muscle before expiring, he was without question the WORST eating animal I've ever harvested! Honestly think my best Sunday shoes would've tasted better on the grill!

[snapcrackpop]

I'm so glad I've taken up bowhunting. It has taught me to not "poke & hope" and what to do with a gut shot deer.

Gutshot? Waiting a minimum of 6 hours will likely result in finding your dead deer within a couple hundred yards. If you push it earlier you'll likely jump it and loose it.

[ClownColor]

Helped tracked a deer shot in our old hunting group in the arrow head, all on public land. 1 and 3/4 days of tracking, well over 5 miles. 7 holes including a dispatch shot at close range. ABSOLUTE horrible shooting by members. I was young and going along with my dad for help.

Most of the tracking was through swamp and bog if you know the area. Problem was it was the last weekend and very little deer that year,and...to many semi-auto guns (LOL).

Of course the deer was told to have been "huge" by the first person who dropped it so everyone got invovled. Ended up being a small 4. At least the party finished from what they started and got the buck!

[MattL]

I made the mistake back in high school of pushing a buck shot a bit far back. Lots of blood in his bed, but as soon as we bumped him it was all over. Must of went about 1/4 mile as the crow flies, but much further on the ground. Ended up losing the blood trail as he crossed the road into a plowed field.

Most of my bow kills have been about 100 yds or so. It's amazing how far they can travel, even with both lungs and/or the heart taken out. I have had a couple drop within 20 yds of my stand. Those are always nice

[goblueM]

I didn't recover a nice 8 a couple years ago. Shot it (think liver most likely) with a 12 ga slug up near Ely. Backed out and came back 6 hours later. He bedded down 3 times, lots of blood. Tracked him for about 1/4 mile through rough terrain. Finally found him in a cedar swamp, he got up and charged us, jumped out of the way, lined him up, pulled the trigger.... CLICK. Had the chamber empty.

He ran about 3/4 of a mile, the tracks ended in a lake. Found 2 drops of blood on the other side, that was it. Never found him. Guess the wolves ate well

[Random guy]

Secret is the bear butt shot. Same hunter two consecutive archery hunts; first bear was a 437lb boar shot right in the rear ham, it went 16 yards and tipped over, Pope and Young skull. Second bear was 403lb Pope and Young chocolate shot in the hams again, 12 yards and tipped over. Goes to show you never know whats it going to happen when it comes to tracking.

Now off course this hunter is the sharp shooter for a Wisconsin police force...don't mess around in Wisconsin or you will be shot...in the butt.

Then one of his hunting party shot a smaller boar with a 300 Win Mag right in what we thought was behind the heart; video of the hunt looked like a great shot. We tracked until 6:30 the next morning and the bear made a mile and half circle right back to the bait.

[Boar]

Always have been fortunate not to have a long tracking job, its the draging job that hurts. Lst muzzy season on the last opportunity to hunt, I hit a nice doe that was only 20 yards in the feild outa the woods, I was eat of her about 75 yrds along the same edge. The feild was about 150 acres of chisle plowed harvested beans, there is a minumum maintenance road that boarders the west side of the feild that comes to a dead end about 40 yrds from where hte doe was. I sqeezes the triger, an she takes off straight on adead run ou into the feild, I could tell I hit her good, she wasnt doing to well, an I was outloud saying "The other way, go the other way" She was about 200 yrds in the middle of te feild when she must of heard me cause she took an abrupt turn an head back to where she was standing an died in the ditch right where hte road ends. So I butcherd her an drove up an flop her in my hatch back an away i go. "The doe whisperer"

[sticknstring]

350 yds is my longest - that was my avatar buck. A little rattled on that one & made a poor shot. All others have all been 125yds or less.

[fivebucks]

I made a bad shot (or the bullet deflected on a twig ) Anyhow I shot it in the front calf. I let him lay down for a few hours and because there was snow on the ground we were able to track him for about 3/4 of a mile. My buddies gave up and I tracked a bit more and I saw him lying down trying to hid. My only finishing shot way square in the head. It was a tasty northwoods MN spike for me that winter some 20 years ago when I lived up in AK.

[Archerysniper]

I had one doe I had shot with the bow on Dec 28th on the edge of the state park. She was quartering away and turned just as I released the arrow and ended up entering just below the tail burying to the fleatching. We tracked her thyat night and after jumping her a few times and backed out and returned in the morning. 3 miles later I found her passed away in her bed.