The buck ran about 20 yards and stopped, then slowly started back right to left. As he got behind the trees to my front, I recocked and loaded another arrow. I never saw him after a few minutes. So I grabbed a grunt call from my bag and hit it a few times hoping to get him to move. I never heard anything from his direction, but I did hear steps directly to my right. I kept looking because the steps sounded like they were right in my face. After a few minutes I finally saw the deer take a step and I noticed that it was also a buck, albeit smaller. There were a couple twigs between me and him, but since this was my last archery hunt of the year and I had already shot one sapling, I figured the odds were in my favor.
I settled the 30 yard mark behind the shoulder and let it fly. I saw the hit was true but not a pass through. As the deer ran, the arrow dropped after about 10 yards. Watched him run about 50 yards out of sight and heard a crash, then additional movement for a few seconds, then nothing.After about 15 minutes, I got down and retrieved my first arrow from the sapling.
An inch to the right and I would have pegged the 8pt. The insert and broadhead were missing. I found them on the ground about 5 steps in front of the sapling. The Hammerhead had two blades that were broken in the middle, but at least I have my insert.
When I reached my second arrow, this is what I found:
I got roughly 12" of penetration based on the evidence remaining.
The blood trail was good from that point all the way to the deer. The crash I heard was him plowing into and flipping over the root wad of a fallen tree. It had blood all over it. He lay about five yards the other side of it. He made it about 75 yards.
He ended up being a nice fat six point. The Spitfire XXX was lodged just under the skin after breaking through the opposite shoulder. He's the first forked horn buck I've taken with my Micro 335. Our black powder season starts Saturday so this was my last archery hunt of the season. I couldn't be happier to close it out with a buck.
DuckHunt
