"Track or treat" night: Winnie and Jared's first track in pursuit of a wounded deer

Some tracks are more memorable than others but most likely every handler remembers their very first track. This week we received email from Jared Brueggeman, who got a female pup from our only 2016 litter. Winnie (Yola von Moosbach-Zuzelek) was born on July 3, 2016 so she is just turning 4 months old tomorrow.

My neighbor shot this doe on his land at approximately 5:45 pm Halloween evening. He said he heard the arrow hit but was unable to locate it or any blood at the shot site.  A few hours later Winnie, myself, the hunter and two friends took to the field. We started tracking at 9:15 pm.  It was difficult to locate the first blood as there was none at the hit site that we could see. We tracked for quite a distance.  Some heavy blood fading to some light blood and back to heavy.  After several hundred yards and it was apparent that the deer was still alive as we were finding fresh blood that was not dried like at the beginning of the trail.  We never found a single bed.  We pushed the deer to make her bleed and we ended up through the large block of timber where the deer crossed the road.  We located a few drops on the road and Winnie was anxious to push on. Shortly after crossing the road Winnie came upon her first real deer.  The deer was dead and Winnie realized what she has been training  to do. She went right over and started licking the blood and eventually she latched right on and was biting the deer with all she had. She showed no possessiveness as last night I think Winnie realized that we are working as a team.  All of the other people and the lights in the woods were a distraction at times as this was only her second time in the woods at night, once on an artificial line and then this actual call. I would reassure her with a calm tone that she needs “find the deer” and she was back to tracking. We recovered the deer at 11:28 pm. The deer was shot quartering away hitting the gut, liver and a single lung. There was an entrance and exit wound, however, the arrow was still in the deer. She had not been dead long as there were still bubbles coming out of the exit hole near the lungs. The track totaled just about a mile in distance. The Halloween deer that Winnie found will be one I will never forget. Winnie did get on Halloween a little treat of her own, a few slices of fresh deer heart.

On the track there were a few times where I needed to reset Winnie on the last blood found and then she was back on track. She persevered and did great. I was very proud of her as you know she is not even 4 months old yet! I am on cloud nine right now and I have the itch to get back out there and let the sniff hound go find another!  Thanks for being a part of all of this. 

Sincerely, your friend and now fellow tracker,

Jared Brueggeman

Brady Hesington's Wachtelhund Caliber recovers two deer in one day but there is more to this story

A big thank you to Brady Hesington, a United Blood Trackers member from Missouri, for sharing his recent tracking experience.

I'd like to share one of our more memorable tracks of the year.  I received a call on a Monday afternoon from a gentleman who lives about an hour from me.  He related that his son had shot a nice buck the previous evening, and they needed help locating it.  Unfortunately, I was working and wouldn't be available until the following morning.  After taking a phone survey of the shot, I felt that we had a reasonable chance at recovery.  I was also impressed that the father shared his desire to instill in his children the importance of making every effort of recovering animals that they shot as a way of honoring God, their Creator.  The details were as follows...

The father and son were hunting together on a ridge, with the father sitting not far behind his son, Luke.  A buck came up along the opposite ridgeline, along the edge of a field, and Luke took the shot.  The buck ran into the field and the hunters could hear him taking loud, sucking breaths.  Luke asked his dad if he should take another shot, but his father, Jayson, an experienced hunter, told Luke that the shot was through the lungs and that no further shot was necessary.  The buck then dropped his head and laid down.  After several minutes the two stood up to go look at the deer, and much to their surprise it rose and took off into the woods.  Expecting the deer to be down, they followed the blood trail for about 100 yards and heard more crashing, which prompted them to back out.  

The following morning, they scoured the woods along with two additional searchers.  They progressed the trail by about 200 yards, but did not find the deer.   Later that day a large rainstorm blew through washing away all the blood.  That's when I got the call.  The track had led them within 75 yards of a small river, and they had not searched on the opposite side, as they had not received permission.  My hope was that the deer was not far on the other side, and that we would be able to find it quickly if they received permission.  I told Jayson to do his best to gain permission, and an hour later he called back to tell me that he had it.  Later that night he called me back to tell me that his daughter, Sydney, had also shot a deer and after tracking for about 100 yards they decided to back out since I would be arriving in the morning...good idea!  He was unsure of where young Sydney had struck the deer, but informed me that there seemed to be a lot of blood.  

The next morning I arrived at the sight with both my wachtelhund, Caliber, and my BMH, Chloe.  Most of my time tracking this year has been spent with Chloe, as I am trying to develop her skills.  Caliber, sadly, has not gotten a lot of tracking time in the woods, and I was anxious to get him on the 15 hour old track and save Chloe for the 40+ hour old track.  Caliber has shown great ability on tracks of all ages, but is not as motivated on really old tracks with no or minimal sign.  Chloe on the other hand, will dig for scent to track no matter the age of the track.  The problem is she is less discriminating on what scent she takes at times, which is why I have spent so much time working with her this season.  

We decided to start with the "easy" track.  I started Caliber at the hit sight, and true to the report, there was plenty of blood.  Caliber took off without a hitch.  We covered the first 100 yards easily, then progressed the trail another couple of hundred yards past the point of loss.  There was intermittent blood along the way to reassure us.  At that point, Caliber began acting like he was on a hot scent and really began to track fast.  I slowed him down and restarted him a couple of times to get him to focus.  He took the trail to about 600 yards into a field, then made an abrupt turn along the field edge.  After another 100 yards I hadn't seen any sign, so I set him down and searched the field edge for a bit.  Unable to find any confirmation, I allowed him to work the field edge into a thick, brushy area.  He was searching through the area when I heard a LOUD crash up ahead of us.  My brain immediately screamed "leg shot deer" because of all the racket.  Then I saw him jump up out of a deadfall and run into a field.  It was obvious that he was wounded when he ran, and I felt certain that it was a leg shot, but could not see his wound.  Caliber and I took off in pursuit, and after a short chase, I allowed Caliber to bay and hold the deer so that I could put it down.  Caliber was able to pull it down, but suffered a cut along one leg in the process.  He held it while I quickly dispatched it.  A quick inspection showed that the deer was hit just inside the hind leg, dislocating the joint and entering the groin area.  The deer, no doubt, would have had a lingering death had we not recovered it.  This was Sydney's first deer, and she was very excited by the whole experience...as were we all!  When Jayson approached, he initially thought that this was a different deer than what Sydney had shot because one of the deer's antlers had broken off somewhere along the way.  When everyone was gathered, Jayson and Sydney said a prayer of thanks for the deer and for the recovery.  It was special to be a part of this family's traditions.  

Sydney and Caliber with her first buck

After loading the deer, we loaded up and headed to the sight where Luke had shot his deer.  I started Chloe on the track and she followed it "perfectly" along the trail where they had previously tracked the deer.  Unfortunately, there was absolutely no sign remaining after the previous day's deluge, and the hunters had not flagged the trail.  Still, there were plenty of landmarks, and by accounts Chloe was doing a good job of staying on trail.  We proceeded up to the area where the hunters had lost the blood previously.  At this point, there was some confusion about where the deer had made a hard left had turn.  Chloe wanted to track straight where they thought the deer had turned, so I redirected her into that area.  She tracked around in the area, but didn't make me very confident that she was on the deer.  I then let her track in the area where she wanted to go and we ambled along the woods for a ways, and ended up at the end of the small peninsula of land along the river...no deer.  After several restarts we weren't making any progress.  As Jayson had obtained permission to cross the river, he and the rest of his crew went back to the house to pick up a canoe to help us cross. 

I decided to put Chloe in the kennel box and give Caliber a shot at the trail while I waited for them to return.  It took little time for Caliber to pick up the trail and begin tracking aggressively.  He was very motivated after getting to catch the other deer.  Caliber would prefer to bay deer and wild hogs than just about anything in life, so he was highly motivated on the track.  I wondered if he was "cheating" and following our footprints rather than tracking the 2 day old blood scent, but that was soon put to rest.  The deer had run through a large downed tree which had a 4 foot section cut away.  It was an obvious landmark where they had actually found blood on their second tracking attempt.  Chloe, had missed that section and tracked a line 20 yards around it before coming back onto the correct trail.  Caliber, however, nailed the track without missing a beat.  He was definitely not tracking us as we had not walked that route!  Like Chloe, Caliber, also didn't take the hard turn where the hunters had thought the deer may have detoured, but rather took me about 50 yards further before making a sharp left into an area that looked similar.  He then led me straight down to the river.  

As he searched our edge of the river bank, I began looking at the far edge for an area where a deer may have exited the creek.  The river wall was nearly vertical on the opposite side, so there was no way that a deer was going to climb out at that point.  That's when I noticed the brown lump laying on the gravel bank.  I was so excited, that I took off my shoes, rolled up my pants, and waded across the river in 35 degree weather!  Caliber followed along as well.  When I got to the deer, I couldn't see a wound, but upon further examination there was a bullet hole low in the chest just in front of the near leg...a low lung shot.  This would explain the "sucking" sound that Jayson had described to me, and the low forward shot would explain why the deer had not expired more quickly.  

There was just one problem.  Jayson had told me that his son had shot a "big buck," "at least an 8 point, but possibly a 10 or 12,  and I was standing over a 3 point.  The deer was untouched by any predator or birds (prior to Caliber pulling out all its hair), but looked to have been dead about the right amount of time.  I called Jayson to confirm, and he assured me that it could not be the right deer.  When he arrived on the river by canoe, he again assured me that this could not be the right deer.  Oddly, if this deer had been shot on the opposite side of the river it would have had to jump to its death off a 10 foot sheer bank with a maze of exposed tree roots below.  Not impossible, but questionable.  We did walk down the bank to a point where we were able to climb up and searched the area for a bit, but did not recover another deer.   It's difficult to believe that a seasoned hunter like Jayson would have thought that a 3 point was a 8, 10, or 12 in the heat of the moment, but equally difficult to believe that Caliber would lead me straight down a track that would end up at someone else's wounded deer.  Either way, it made for a great day of tracking!

Caliber and the 3 point...his buck

Tommy gets injured on Saturday while following a one-lung shot deer

Saturday was not a good day. John and Tommy went on a call to help a local hunter recover a lung-shot deer.  At one point John had to drop the tracking leash in heavy brush. He thought that he could recall Tommy, as he had done many times, but this time Tommy was hot on the deer. He was located two hours later tangled in goldenrod 400 meters farther on.

Tommy had already tracked two miles, but he was ready to go, and now three of us tracked another 1/2 mile through a big swamp. We finally quit when the deer swam across a big pond and water became to deep to follow. Actually Jolanta got stuck in the swamp up to her butt. We had smears of blood to verify the line right  until the end. But that's just the beginning.


This is the last leg of Saturday's track with Tommy. Tommy was found hung up in the brush around 4 pm where the yellow marker is, and we restarted him by the red marker. We found the first blood smear on the branch around 1/3 rd into this track leg. Now the swamp is not as big as it is pictured on this google map. Once we entered the swamp we started to see fresh blood smears on swamp grass. We terminated the track where the purple marker is. When we got back to the car people in the house by Rte 157A said that they had seen a deer running by from the swamp direction. This graphic was created by My Tracks, an app for Android phones.

On Monday we noticed a bulge on Tommy's right flank. It looked like a big hematoma, but we took him to our vets since he also had bad eye irritations. We wanted to be sure he did not have a scratched cornea. The eyes were not damaged, but the inner abdominal muscles had been torn and intestines were bulging out as in an umbilical hernia. Thee was no internal damage beyond this and no damage on the surface of his hide. We don't know exactly what happened, but probably he had an altercation with the buck during the time  that he was out of John's control. He was tough enough to keep tracking,  and we were unaware of his injury.

Another problem. We have a bitch that was brought in from southern Pennsylvania to be bred to Tommy. She is not quite ready yet, and we don't want to ask Tommy to breed her right after his surgery. So we must wait until Thursday, after the breedings, to have the damage to his abdominal wall repaired. Tommy does not seem to be in any pain, and he is eating well. But we are watching that hernia! He won't be able to track for 2-3 weeks following his surgery.

When a track is a success?

We all get that question, "What's your success rate?".  In the leashed tracking dog states we have to tell them, "Around 35%" because we know that what they are asking for is the frequency with which we find the deer and tag it. It goes without saying that the non-productive 65% are FAILURES.

If you have tracked for a while you come to realize that it's not that simple. Some of those FAILURES, when you didn't get the deer, actually become sources of pride and satisfaction. Our tracking adventure this afternoon is a good illustration.

We got the call this morning. The buck had been hit behind the shoulder late the previous afternoon with a Rage expandable broadhead. As happens, all too frequently, there had been inadequate penetration, four to five inches. The one thing that made me take the call was detail that the buck was occasionally blowing fine droplets of blood from his nose; a lung had been penetrated, but it was impossible to know how much damage had been done. A deer can go on one lung, and the damaged lung can eventually heal and become functional again.

Another slight complication was that the hunter's son was playing that morning in a high school football game. A good father knows that family comes first! It wasn't until 1:30 PM that Jolanta, Tommy and I  started on a long ATV ride back to where we were to begin tracking. We didn't start at the hit site, which is the normal thing to do, because the buck had been eye-tracked so far the previous night. Tommy, our tracking dog, started on a drop of blood and took off across the very dry leaves and pine needles.

Occasional drops of blood reassured us that we were on a right track.

The hunter and his buddy had done a superb  of eye-tracking, the best I've ever seen, and Tommy stayed on the line for a quarter of a mile into some very thick brush that involved crawling on my hands and knees. It was a hot mid-afternoon, but I was thankful for my heavy nylon coat and chaps. I had to plow along where Tommy  was tracking. Jolanta zoomed in whenever the brush cleared to give Tommy water and encouragement to us both. Tommy was hot, but totally focused on his  work. He was "locked in" on the scent line now 22 hours old. We broke out into an overgrown field where the deer had bedded the night before.

John's worn out tracking coat.

In the field of dry grass and goldenrod we found no blood at all, but Tommy seemed to have footprint scent to work with. Clearly the scent line was fresher now, even though scenting conditions were at their worst. Tommy worked down through the deer runs, checking carefully to make sure at each intersection. This was a hot deer area, but Tommy seemed positive that he was on the right line. "Trust your dog!"

Tommy tracking the lung-shot wounded deer that we could not get.

I began to realize that there would be no "successful find" on this call. This buck had come too far and had stayed strong for too long. If he had been fatally gut shot, things would have been different, but clearly this buck was not  losing blood now  and he was in a condition to keep going, back into the thick stuff, as long as we wanted to follow.

The decision to quit is a delicate matter. I like to have the hunter participate and  agree that there is little chance of catching up to the deer. Would the hunter believe that we were  still on his buck and not just rambling around on hot lines of healthy deer? Then the hunter's buddy, who had been following us closely, found blood, a tiny drop, but it was fresh and still wet. I checked Tommy for briar scratches, which might have left that drop. Tommy was clean, and Tommy was right. We were still on the wounded buck, and the buck was still strong after 22 hours. We pushed on for another 200 yards with Tommy pulling confidently.

We came to an ATV trail through the thickets. Tommy pushed on across but the humans were ready to stop. The hunter knew that the trail led back to where we had originally left the ATV. We called  back Tommy and he seemed to understand. There was no getting this deer even though  he had done his best. The whole tracking adventure seemed  a success, not a failure,  both for Tommy and for the folks who had supported him from  the other end of the long tracking leash.

What do you think? Success or failure?

Going back to the ATV.

Two veteran trackers have started another tracking season with gusto

Hunting season opened in our pat of New York on October 1. John has taken three calls and the last one ended with a successful recovery. This is what he wrote: This buck was shot high through both lungs, but he left almost no blood. The hunter found a few drops in the first 50 yards across a golden rod field--- then nothing. Tommy had no problems with this four hour-old scent line and went another 150 yards to this nice 8 pointer. This was SO easy after the two previous deer calls that did not produce.

John Jeanneney with Tommy

Walt Dixon with Ari

Another Old Timer, Walt Dixon from Tully, NY, also recovered a very nice buck in much harder conditions. Walt tracks with a 10.5-year-old Ari (Ariel von Moosbach-Zuzelek). He wrote: I just came back from Elk Hunting in Colorado and received a call last night that a bowhunter hit a deer at 6:30 pm and after waiting a short while, and before he could start to track, the skies opened up pouring rain washing away any visible sign. He called last night, said he thought he hit the deer near the liver, and I advised him to look for the arrow in the morning and leave the deer alone. It rained again during the night and this morning he called after finding the arrow broken in half near the edge of the woods the deer entered after being shot.

 

With no visible sign, Ari smelled the arrow then entered left the grass field and entered the woods under an apple tree. She seemed to be working hard so I let her go and about 400 yards away she found the buck who was hit in front of the left rear leg, quartering toward the bowhunter, exiting low and puncturing the right rear leg. Intestines hung about 10 inches out of the bottom of the buck and there was no sign visible the entire trail. Even after all the rain, the 15 hour old trail left enough scent for Ari to recover it! This old tracking pair is off and running for another season!

A double-lung shot doe that went further than expected

By Andy Bensing

These lungs show how tough a deer can be and how far they can actually run on even a perfect shot. This doe was arrowed at 10 yards from a low tree stand with a crossbow. The deer was at full alert and had been grunted to a stop before the shot. With the loud crack of the crossbow and being at full alert before the shot the doe took off up hill like a bullet. There had been a very light rain during the evening hunt but immediately after the shot it began pouring and when the hunter was out of the tree there was no blood to be found except two small splashes at 60 yards down the trail the deer ran off on. A two hour body search in the ram at night did not turn up the deer.

I tracked the deer with my Eibe in the morning. We found the doe rather quickly even though the night's downpours washed all visible blood away. The scent was still there. Amazingly the doe had run very hard for 150 meters and would have gone even further. When we found her she was impaled on a box wire fence in the woods. It was quite clear she had hit the fence still going full speed 150 meters from the hit site. Look closely at the lungs and you will see it was a double lung shot and If you look real close between the lungs you will see the aorta was severed as well. Interestingly I was only able to collect barely 10 ounces of blood from the chest cavity. She must have bled out as she ran but the pouring rain washed it away very fast. The area she was in was very thick with vegetation and it would have very unlikely the hunter would have found her that far away just by grid searching even in the daylight. It is sometimes incredible how tough these animals are.

 

Tracking a lung-shot buck with a young dachshund Thor; Bob's tracking tips

Bob Yax from Deer Search of the Finger Lakes who is working with a 7.5 month old Thor von Moosbach-Zuzelek wrote about his 8th recovery:

On Sunday (November 18) we had a chance to go on our first track of a gun hit deer.  A young hunter (Austin) had called into the Deer Search FLC hotline at 10 AM for a buck he had hit 2 hours earlier.  On the phone it sounded like a possible high lung /  liver hit.  Austin and his dad, Eric, had waited an hour before tracking it.  They had a decent blood trail for the first 300yds until they jumped the buck from its first bed at around 9 AM.  When the buck left this first bed, it immediately went onto a neighbors posted land.  Before calling into our hotline, Austin and his Eric had gotten permission from the neighboring landowner to track it in the afternoon – not sooner.   To me this sounded like a good situation, since the deer would be left for several hours to hopefully die in its 2nd bed.  My son Nate and I arranged to meet the Hunter at 2:30 in the afternoon,  6.5 hrs after the hit.   When we met,  Eric who was with Austin in the tree stand when the hit took place,  showed me the hit location on an anatomy chart.  He indicated a spot about 6 inches down from the top of the deer and  just about where the back of the lungs met the liver.  It was a level,  broadside shot with a 12ga shotgun.  He also told me that the reason they had to wait before tracking on the posted land was that a group of hunters were going to put on a drive of the property first!  Great!     If the deer was still alive at that point, it would have been in the next county by the time we got there.

From Austin’s stand location, we found the blood trail in the brushy field and began to follow.  Thor did a great job following it closely.  I  had him on a short leash and was thrilled to keep seeing the blood sign appear behind him as he tracked the 300yds to the 1st bed in about 10 minutes.  From this point on we would have an undisturbed/unknown trail.  After getting up from its bed, the buck had run across an open mowed field towards an area of many mowed trails with thick brushy patches in between.   Through the open field, a blood trail was non-existent,  but  Thor did stop at several places to show us small patches of blood, where the deer must have stood for awhile. It looked like lung blood to me.   Thor continued on the mowed pathways showing us the blood patches (about 2 inches in diameter)  about every 50yds.  At one point just beyond what would be the final blood patch, he started into one of the thick brushy areas, but after going in only a few feet he backed out and then began doing some circles in one of the wide mowed areas nearby.  After a minute or so of circling,  he headed off  down the path along the edge of the thick stuff.  He was again heading in the direction we had been heading before he paused to do his circles.   As we proceeded, I didn’t  find any more blood sign.  The further we went with no blood sign, the more worried I became.  Finally, about 100yds away from his circling area, we headed into an open hard woods – still no blood sign!  After a short ways into the woods, Thor backtracked out of the woods and then stood looking confused.

At that point I knew we had to go back to the last patch of blood and see if we could find another good line away from it.  Once back there, I asked Eric, Austin and his sister along with my son Nate to search for any blood sign coming away from the last blood patch.  Meanwhile I took Thor back to the field where he had circled previously.   This was only about 10yds from the last blood patch.  After only a few seconds, Thor headed off in a totally new direction.  It was nearly a back track from the last blood patch.  Shortly after we headed in this new direction,  Eric yelled “blood” heading off in the same direction Thor was already going  – “now we’re back on it”  I thought.   At this point we were still on the mowed paths as we had been the entire way from the 1st bed about 200yds behind us.  Now I was desperately looking for another sign of blood to verify that Thor was still on it.  After about 75yds,  I spotted a dime size blood clot in the grass – hooray!!!.  After  about another 50 yds with no blood,  Thor finally turned off the mowed  path and headed into the thick brush.   After only a few feet, I was on my hands and knees trying to follow him through the brush.    At that point I began seeing wide swaths of blood on the stalks near ground level.  Then a few blood clots and then more blood on the bushes.  Eric, following close behind me said, “how could that buck get his rack through this stuff”.   With the blood on the stalks so close to the ground, the buck must have been crawling.  Finally, after about 40yds on hands and knees, with more and more blood sign, I saw the dead buck lying about 10yds ahead – we got him !!  -  I let Thor go and get the first chance to chew on his 8th recovery.    In the photo attached you can see that the entrance wound was actually low and forward in the chest – not close to the liver.  It angled back only a little.  It was a lethal lung shot that the deer was able to survive for over an hour and  600yds.

As with most tracks, I came away from this one with more valuable info on how to work with Thor as he and his tracking skills mature.  In the past,  as in this case, I know that he sometimes loses the real blood trail,  maybe when the deer makes a drastic direction change or when hunters bloody boots complicate things.   In this case it was fairly obvious where he may have gone wrong.  It was the point where he suddenly stopped his confident tracking and began circling.  It was also that place where we had spotted the last blood.   To me, the value of Visible blood cannot be overstated.  In many cases the rush to follow the dog where it leads can lead to nowhere.   When in doubt, always go back to the last known blood and try to find more – maybe leading off in a totally new direction.  Good things may result!

Double lung-shot deer did not go far and were found by Andy Bensing and his tracking dog Eibe

Andy Bensing wrote that the other day he had two easy calls.  

 

In both cases rain washed  blood trails away.  Rather than grid searching on their own the hunters called me. Both deer were found in 10 minutes. One was in North Jersey, and then I drove 140 miles on Interstate 95 down to MD where I found the second. Both were high double lungs just nicking the edge of the lungs, and both deer traveled about 200 meters. One walked away and one ran away. The bow shot one walked away and the muzzle loader deer ran. Nice easy ones for the score card. I am cooking along at 10 for 25 so far this year! We have logged 3,400 miles so far. We are 13 calls ahead of 2 years ago when I took 47. I may raise my target to 65! Look out Tim Nichols! Sorry for the lousy photos, it was raining.

 

 

As Joeri recuperates Tommy takes over: first deer call and recovery of the 2012 hunting season

by John Jeanneney

This seven point buck was a good challenge for Tommy who has been living and working in the shadow of Joeri, our tracking dog #1.

Late in the afternoon of our bow season’s opener, October 1, the buck was hit high in the lungs. He had been  grazing  near the edge of a large hayfield.  After the hit, the hunter, Justin Crosier, saw the deer enter the woods on the far side of the field and found a few drops of blood there. He eye tracked perhaps 50 yards and then ran out of blood.

I started Tommy the next morning at the hit site, where there was no visible blood, and he tracked easily 200 yards  across the field and into the woods at the correct spot. By this time he was familiar with all the different scents that the deer had left behind. In the woods he tracked about 150 yards with occasional drops of blood.

Then there was nothing, and he changed direction.  I could see that Tommy was not sure. At my question, “Is that right?” he corrected himself, went back on his own to where he was sure of the line. Confidently he went down through the hemlock woods, although there was no blood to be seen. After another 150 yards there was a small, steep creek crossing and  there on the rocks we saw blood! We tracked out of the creek gorge and into a small field. No blood there. Tommy worked slowly and carefully around the field and into a thick weedy patch where the buck had exited.  No blood, but Tommy’s body language said “I’m sure”. We tracked to another deep, narrow creek bed and I looked up stream to see the deer’s hind quarters. “Here he is!” Tommy and Justin the hunter were both very pleased. I was pretty happy myself.

Justin Crosier with the deer, which was recovered by Tommy and his handler John Jeanneney

How did Darren spend his birthday? Tracking, of course.

On December 27, 2011 Darren Doran wrote:

I took today off from work to celebrate my birthday. I was actually going to practice with my new bow and put out some trail cameras. I was sitting at the table working on the puppy questionnaire when the phone rang. It was a friend that had shot a deer with the muzzle-loader this morning and couldn't find it. The hunter told me that he had white hair at the hit and tracked for about 100 yds and lost it.This guy is a responsible and good hunter and I thought we stood a chance either finding the deer or proving a non fatal hit. Karl and I haven't had any work since Dec 1st and I jumped at the chance to track.

We met up and proceeded to get started. I was actually surprised with Karl's actions during the ride. He knew we were going tracking but acted much calmer than usual. We got to the hit site and it was as the hunter said. There was white hair at the hit site and the blood started about 30 yds away. He had the line flagged and Karl started right down it. He got to the last blood too quick for my liking and proceeded to track to a small creek. He was still pretty worked up at this point and rather than cross the creek, I restarted him at the last blood hoping he would take the same route to the creek as before. That didn't happen and I restarted him again.

The third time was the same as the second so I crossed the creek and Karl tracked to an empty bed. This was a good sign as the bed was only 200 yds from the hit. Karl tracked on from the bed down a deer run towards a heavily traveled main road. If the deer crossed the road we were done. A one point Karl acted like he didn't have it and I brought him back to the bed. He restarted and tracked through some stick trees and towards an open field. Just as we entered the field I saw a drop of blood and knew he was right. He tracked across the field over a black top driveway and into another woods. We came to another bed and I think we put the deer out. Karl was tracking hard and digging in. I was finding blood and the occasional bone fragments on the line now.The deer had started to make a big loop and was heading back towards the area it was shot at.

We had tracked a little over a mile and we were heading towards the Matchaponix Brook. This river is not wide but is deep with steep mud slick banks. I could see the deers tracks leading up to and along the river. All of a sudden Karl turned and went right down the bank into the river. The next thing I see is a deer swimming up the river with Karl trying to over take him. I yelled to the hunter that I found his deer and he was alive. I got Karl out of the river and the deer pulled its self out and crossed a bend in the river and went back in.We didn't bring the gun so the hunter sent his boy back to the truck for the muzzle loader. We just kept an eye on the deer without getting too close and waited. When the gun arrived the hunter finished the deer. The first shot had entered low on the left side and raked a lung. When it exited it destroyed the right leg at the first joint from the shoulder. This deer would have died but after the first bed, and until we got the deer up the blood trail was very sparse. The hunter admitted he would not have found this deer if it wasn't for the dog.

Classic Deer Behavior from a Classic Poor Shot Selection

by Andy Bensing
November 13, 2011

Here is the story of a track I had that encompassed many valuable lessons about blood tracking with a dog and hunting whitetail deer in general.  When the call came in the hunter reported having arrowed a mature buck from 20 feet up and at the close distance of only 5 to 8 yards.  When I got to the hit sit the distance was actually even worse.  It was only 4 yards at best.  To make matters even worse than that, the buck was facing directly towards the hunter when he shot.  In that configuration, there is absolutely no chance of double lunging the animal and only an extremely very low chance of hitting the heart.  This is a shot that never should be taken with a bow.  The hunter did not see the arrow hit the deer but he reported a bright red blood soaked arrow with short gray or white hairs on it. 

At the shot, the deer barely reacted and walked away 10 yards and stood wobbling for 20 seconds then walked another 15 yards away and lay down behind a tree in some brush.  The deer laid there, with no window for a second shot, for 45 minutes with its mouth wide open panting.  After 45 minutes the hunter reported the deer staggered to his feet and wobbled away out of sight without offering another shot opportunity.  The deer left a solid 2 inch wide strip of bright red blood from a few yards past the hit site to the place it laid for 45 minutes.  After it got up from the 45 minute bed there was not a single drop of blood found by the hunter or my dog the next day over the course of the whole track as seen below.

After hearing the hunter's account of the deer's behavior after the shot, I assumed he had hit back farther than he had aimed and gut-shot the deer.  When I got to the hit sight I quickly discovered that the deer had been single lunged, not gut shot.  There were 2 oak leaves in the 45 minute bed filled with coagulated blood still showing the typical hundreds of bird shot sized bubbles often seen in blood gurgling out of a deer from a lung shot.  From that point forward there was not a drop of blood found.

In retrospect, what likely happened was the razor sharp arrow cleanly slipped between the ribs and pierced one lung without touching any bone and the deer barely knew anything happened other than a sudden shortness of breath and sick feeling.  He walked over, laid down to rest, the lung collapsed and therefore stopped bleeding as Mother Nature had planned.  Mature bucks are masters of conserving energy.  They rarely panic.  That's how they get to be mature bucks.  Once the bleeding stops and the deer has been lucky enough to not go into shock (as a result of not panicking and running off all crazed and losing too much blood too fast) now all you have is a tired anemic deer with one lung.  No different than a person who just came out of surgery after having one of his two lungs removed.

When I started my dog Eibe on the 24 hour old track she had a bit of difficulty getting going.  I am guessing that with all the massive blood the first 30 yards the area was flooded with scent and she had a hard time figuring out what the deer himself smelled like.  We knew what direction the deer had walked out of the bed but I let Eibe take 4 or 5 trial runs in several directions for 30 or 40 meters each until she finally locked into the deer's individual scent.  There was no blood to be seen and she started poking her nose down into the fluffy oak leaves and checking hoof prints in the soft underlying ground.  Once locked into the correct buck we tracked bloodlessly for 1000 meters through open forest and field and up a steep hill to a briar and laurel thicket.  The trail went about 100 meters into the thicket on the top of the hill and then began to hook back. 

At that point I said to the hunter that I believed we were about to find a dead deer or jump him still alive. This deer had shown typical wounded deer behavior.  He had rested till he got his wits about himself and then headed efficiently back to a safe bedding area to hold up.  Deer will often make a button hook, as indicated on the map above, before bedding down.  This allows them to watch their back trail and see predators coming and slip away before the predator is right up on them.  And that is exactly what this buck did.  After hooking back 100 meters and laying on the edge of a bench 70 meters off to the side of his back trail, this buck saw/heard us coming and slipped away before we saw him.  Eibe got stuck for about 5 minutes at his bed in the button hook I assume because of the abundance of scent there from being there all night.  Once she got that worked out she shot off like a rocket and I suspected then we were on the buck's hot trail but could not be sure as there was no sign except for the classic pattern the track had been taking. 

After 500 meters on the hot trail with no confirming sign I was starting to worry that maybe we were not on the correct deer's trail.  Most of the hot trail showed no hoof prints or sign at all except I had seen some small fresh tracks that went with some very small, warm to the touch droppings.  Not a good sign as these could not possibly have been from our buck.  The small prints eventually disappeared and the trail then began to curve around to begin to make a circle and large prints from a running deer appeared on the line.  I believe the buck initially just walked away from his button hook bed but we eventually got closer and he began to run and therefore started making easily visible tracks. 

I still wasn't absolutely sure Eibe was on the correct deer but when I saw the path of the deer on my GPS circling back to his original trail from the day before my confidence level began to rise.  What are the odds that some other random other deer would take this course?  Not very high in my estimation.  I told the hunter that if the deer we were following continued to loop back towards the button hook bed then we could be pretty darn sure it was the buck we were after.  Deer, just like rabbits and other prey animals make circles back over their previous course of escape to confuse their pursuers. 

Well this buck did not use that strategy but used another strategy that I have seen before.  When he got to the place I expected him to circle back to the button hook, he instead ran right through an overgrown field filled with deer paths everywhere but took the exact course through the field that he had gone the day before but in the opposite direction for 250 meters.  Clearly no coincidence.  If I had had any doubts, they were gone.  This was the correct buck that had been shot the day before through one lung.  The other thing I was pretty sure of was that he was too strong to catch up to with a tracking dog on a leash.  I forgot to mention the other strong, evasive maneuver he used that worked pretty well for him. 

I am sitting here typing this out with my arm in a sling because at one point when he started the 250 meter retrace in the field, it appeared he purposely avoided an easy crossing of a 7 foot deep by 4 foot wide ravine and jumped across the ravine at an awkward spot.  Well, his pursuer, me, fell into that ravine when a log he used as a bridge broke!  But I am pretty tough too so I handed the leash to the hunter for awhile and hobbled along till I got my wind and could take the reins again.  The buck continued back right past the original hit sight and eventually got on the back trail of the trail he had followed before he was shot.  At this point I considered all the following information I knew about the deer:

1.    One lung hit that collapsed and stopped bleeding.
2.    Hole out bottom of chest but not really that much blood likely lost.
3.    Was willing to go up a very steep hill within one or two hours of being shot the day before.
4.    Never let us get close enough to see or hear him even in some very open hardwoods after chasing him
1½ miles after the button hook bed.
5.    Appeared to be able to run through the forest at will without struggling 24 hours after the shot.
6.    Made a very large 500m circle and had enough wits about him to throw in a 250 meter back track.
7.    Tried to kill his pursuers (and almost did) by setting up a booby trap at the ravine :-)

I decided to give up the trail.  As long as this deer can fight off any ensuing infection, this deer has a good chance to recover from his wounds.  I hope my shoulder heels as quickly!