Based on many of the comments being made to posts concerning wounded deer left unrecovered, it seems there may be a wide range of opinion on how often a hunter could be expected to have a deer go unrecovered. And IMO, the discussion should also include missed shots since these often result in wounded deer despite any evidence of a hit.

IMO, losing a wounded deer should be rare simply because of the respect that should be given to the resource. It should not be a yearly occurrence by any means and should only happen very rarely.

As for missed shots, I feel these too should not be an annual event for hunters, but perhaps slightly more common than wounded deer left unrecovered.

NEVER

Should never lose a deer. But unfortunately it does happen, I lost a doe opening weekend, first one I've ever lost. Buzzards showed it to me the next week, it was a sickening feeling

Never

We have 2 guys on our lease that lose deer every year. We find blood but not much. When asked where they hit it the answer is I THINK I hit it good. Oh ya and "well it was running"

I think everyone can agree on the answer, never. But it does happen. Before this year we hadn't lost one in 5 years and normally take 10 to 12 a year.

Exactly one.

Back in my twenties, I took a foolish off-hand shot at a mule deer across a canyon in northern New Mexico. He was at least 250 yards away....we didn't know what a rangefinder was back then.

I can still see him running off swinging a broken forelimb. My buddy and I found a few drops of blood and looked for 2 days....until we had to return home.

If I had bothered to take 3 seconds and find a rest, I wouldn't have wounded him. The thought still nauseates me.

Not trying to offend anyone, but if you are hunting a feeder from a blind, it should never happen. Those are ideal conditions at a set distance, not many excuses for a bad shot.

If you are stalking mulies in the canyons like dawaba, its a whole different ball game. I am not saying there is any excuse for taking a shot you shouldn't, or one beyond your ability. I'm just saying when you are hunting longer distances in windy, unevenm county, it's much easier to have a less than perfect shot.

Still, no excuse for losing a deer more than once a decade imo.

Why just deer Dan? Why not ask about pigs? What about ducks and doves? Everyone one who hunts ducks reads the statistics of wounded ducks that die later.

It happens. Should it? No. But the reality is when you have imperfect, and sometimes stupid, people shooting at the animals with emotion and adrenaline going it's not always a great process. It pisses me off to lose one. Hadn't happened for a while but I lost one last year. Not clipped and saw him again later. Lost. Burned my tag and only shot a pig after that. It wasn't a bad situation, it wasn't beyond my range just a string jump on a very still morning and a bad hit. Does it suck, hell yes. Do I give a dang what you or anyone else thinks or judges? Hell no. I'm more worried about how I feel about it and what is going through my mind each time I practice or sit in a stand or draw on a buck like last week in Missouri. When I make a great shot but the doubt is still there until the end of a short blood trail because last year still haunts me.

anyone who hunts long enough is going to lose an animal.

its a fact.

you are gonna have to either accept that or quit hunting when it does

question. how many deer have you killed in your life?

What does that have to do with anything?

it has to do with percentages. so what is your number?

I just figure you shoot a couple deer a year, once every ten years you may lose one.

I guess you're right, I was assuming a couple deer a year. If you shoot way more or less than that it would be different.

Why don't you want to answer?

Ive hunted since 1996 and killed a lot of deer. I wounded 1 that was never recovered but did not die from my shot and I have missed 2 or 3, all neck or head shots at greater than 100 yards. Took me a couple years to figure out how to self regulate my shooting, but its been good ever since.

It happens to everyone, even at feeders. I think we should do everything in our power to keep it from happening.

Because if you shoot over 100 deer over 10-20 years eventually its going to happen at some point. It's a numbers game. Condition change or the animal moves or just plane human error......it will happen.

I've lost just one so far, but you never know I might lose the next one I shoot at.

Not to offend anyone here, but I think if the hunters you’re referring to were more tenacious about locating the deer; we wouldn’t be having this discussion. Fortunately I’ve never lost a deer that I’ve shot, but there have been a couple that’s taken me hours and hours to find, and I’m willing to bet that some of the hunters we’re talking about in these other posts would have given up on. I’ve helped guys that I hunt with locate wounded deer and some we’ve found, and other’s we’ve not, but we’ve never given up without an exhaustive search. More than once, I’ve spent nearly all night searching only to come back and search more the next morning. It’s just as sickening for me to see a buddy or relative lose a good deer as it would be if I had made the shot myself. Calling off the search is the last thing I want to do, and usually only happens because I have no more time to spend searching.

exactly. when your dealing with so many variables its impossible to bat 100%. if you've killed 6 or 8 or 12 deer in your life, then its certainly possible. if you have killed a hundred or more your gonna have a loss or two.

With a rifle, I have lost 3 deer. two were shot high in the neck and ran off when I walked up to get them. the other was not my fault (lung shot a axis doe while in a Polaris and the second after I drilled it the guy I was with hauled arse over trying to find it, not giving it enough time to lay down)

I have seen bad shots from guys that i'm thinking no way in hell would that kill a deer (I've seen a deer shot thru both hips drop stone dead) and deer shot in the lungs run 150 yards with ZERO blood, it was blind luck that we found it. I've seen deer that were shot right in the boiler room take off and are still yet to be found.

point is, there is no way you can guarantee a kill shot every time you pull the trigger. But you should do everything in your power to make a clean kill

Agreed.

Everyone will agree,it should never happen.BUT it does.Shot a buck in south Texas about 20 years ago as soon as we got in the stand.Took 5 steps and went down.The guide said hes done,but lets keep hunting since its early.Sat there 3 hours,went to recover him,he took off like a shot.Pool of blood,heavy blood trail.Went and got dogs,the dogs found hin lying down and he took off again.Never found him.Only buck I lost.S#%t does happen.

Still don't mean you'll find it. Just last Sunday a friend of mine called for help, he'd tracked one that he shot with a 30-06. It'd dropped at the shot but got up. Tracked it to the fence line 400 yrds away. We called that land owner and got permission to track across his land. I showed up and met him at the fence where she'd crossed. We continued the trail until we came to the next fence 3 hrs later. Couldn't get permission to cross that fence......deer was lost. Google earthed the trail and it was 3.5 miles that we'd tracked.

After looking at the place he had shot we found a piece of skin, some meat, and white hair.......he'd shot low and hit her in the brisket.

+1 I've had perfect neck/heart/lung shots and the deer didn't even hit the ground. Even perfect shots don't always drop deer. There was a thread recently where a bullet didn't penetrate an animals skin. There are too many variables to judge and put a number of what is acceptable.

happens

I'm sorry but I've already seen one comment of "I've never lost one". I call right now. IF, and I do mean if, you've never lost one it's because you haven't hunted much, haven't shot at many or you're not being honest. You may just sit in a stand with a rest and a deer feeder 50 yards away and that helps you be more consistent but a some point it will happen if you hunt enough in varied conditions.

Maybe he hunts with a .50 cal...