warm weather shot

[Fridaythe13th]

If a person hit a cow or bull too far back. (Maybe a gut shot) at 5 PM. Do you leave a elk sit overnight? Temp around 70 degree cooling down to 50. If you do leave it overnight is it still edible? Or do you wait a couple hour and grab the flashlight. Anybody been in this situation?

[Indian Summer]

If you knew for sure it was a "gut shot" and did not hit any lungs you are best to leave the area for at least 8 hours. The temperature is not a factor. Yes it would be nice to find it and get it cooling asap but under the circumstances finding it is the important part. Also.. since it's easy to walk past an animal in broad daylight you should probably just give it the other 3 hours and wait until daylight. get over there in the dark and sit and listen for coyotes a bit. Then make your move as soon as you can see.

You can lose elk meat even when it's cool out so risk of loss in warm weather is high. If you find that elk within an hour or so you may salvage all of it. But there's a good chance that if it's lying flat on the ground you will lose the 2 quarters that are against the ground. But doing the right thing and salvaing some is better than rushing it and having a total loss.

If it is really going to be in the 70s meat can still spoil on the way back out and to the truck/processor so you need to be quick about everything you do. If you don't find the elk until noonish and it is going to be a couple hours after that before you can get it to ice or a cooler you will likely lose all of the meat. When it goes bad it turns green and there is a sour smell. "Bone sour" or loss from lack of cooling happens from the inside out. So once things are obviously bad on the surface you can forget about crossing your fingers hoping you can trim the outer stuff off and salvage the interior....it's a lost cause.

I had a hunter kill a 6 point bull at 6 oclock. Him and a partner couldn't find it that evening. They followed up for a little and realized that it was a marginal hit and backed off. The next morning they had some trouble but found it around 11. When we got there the meat was ok. I thought I noticed a whiff of sour from the ground side quarters though. By the time we got it to town I knew by the smell we lost half. The other half appeared to be ok but the hunter called me a month later and said the first bite was an unpleasant surprise. The whole thing had spoiled along the way.

[elkmtngear]

Gut shot would be tough to track in dry conditions in the dark. I would back out quietly after the shot and come back in at first light. Chances are if the bull didn't make you before you backed out, he would not be too far, dead and down.

Bumping that bull in the dark could would easily result in a lost animal. Chances are the meat would still be OK in the morning, or at least the up side. Partial recovery is better than none. Just my 2 cents.

[elkmtngear]

If you knew for sure it was a "gut shot" and did not hit any lungs you are best to leave the area for at least 8 hours. The temperature is not a factor. Yes it would be nice to find it and get it cooling asap but under the circumstances finding it is the important part. Also.. since it's easy to walk past an animal in broad daylight you should probably just give it the other 3 hours and wait until daylight.

***looks like we posted at the same time, Joe...but you edged me out

[Indian Summer]

One more actual example: A hunter shot a bull at very last light. Good hit too, double lunger. Bull crashed downhill as usual and he gave it the mandatory wait before looking. Actually only a half hour instead of an hour because he knew he drilled it good. But him and a partner came up empty that night. It was probably in the mid 70s that day and didn't seem like it cooled off much below 60 that night. So we got in there really early the next day and found the bull like 30 minutes after you could see. Pretty darn good right. The bull had only gone about 125 yards but it was thick and they had walked within a few yards of it in the dark without even knowing. We got things done as fast as we could but I smelled bone sour right from the start. I bet it hit 80 that day and we got the quarters to a processor by noon and lost the entire bull.

Spoiled meat in high temps is a serious concern. That's why it really is important to wait for a good shot. These are the kind of stories I think about when I read about marginal shots, like frontal shots, being perfectly fine. Enough can go wrong on the slam dunk shots so why risk it.

(here comes the frontal shot debate) lol

I mentioned on here once before about the value of sitting down and going through a week of highs and lows in your mind to prepare for a hunt. Ask yourself how will I feel if I have 2 days to go and things don't look good? So maybe it would also be a good idea to sit and really ask yourself "How would I feel if I killed and elk and the whole thing went to waste?" It's a sick feeling you should do everything in your power to avoid.

[Indian Summer]

***looks like we posted at the same time, Joe...but you edged me out

You did good Jeff considering we have a 3 hour time difference.

At least we didn't both hit the submit button and find out we just totally disagreed with each other.

[Swede]

Most of the elk I kill are shot in the evening. After waiting 1/2 to one full hour it is often near dark. Shooting from a tree stand means the shot goes in high and often there is not a blood trail. I have killed two elk that I did not find until early the next morning. The evening/night temperatures dropped down to about 40*F. Both elk died within a very short time. They just left no blood trail and were hard to follow due to all of the fresh tracks in the area.
I was able to completely salvage both animals except for just a little on one. They were close and the butcher was a little skeptical, but said he would open up the meat and see. As you can tell from the description, things were real close and there was no margin left on those elk. Both were fine and had no bad/sour taste.
The arrow hits were just fine on both elk. A flashlight, no matter how good, does not replace daylight.

[Washington Wapiti]

Great question Fridaythe13th and great answers guys. Thanks. I haven't been in this situation yet, but have always wondered about how long the window is before spoilage occurs. Sometimes you hear the TV hunters say, "Were gonna give this guy 12 hours, before we go in," and it always makes me go (in high pitched voice) "Whaaaaaaaaat??" And then it makes you wonder if they're actually gonna eat it or if it's just another wall mount.

[WapitiTalk1]

One very hot September day, years ago on the WA penninsula in the Wynoochee unit (back when spikes were legal there) I shot a spike . I shot him close to the end of legal shooting light right inside the dark timber beside a clearcut. I did not see the twig hanging across his vitals and my arrow deflected backwards and the result was a complete pass through paunch shot. I marked the spot I shot from, where the elk had been standing, and went back to camp. Came back before daylight with a buddy to track and pack. We followed him by mostly tracks, a bit of blood, and some green gue. Probably wouldn't have been successful if we had tryed to track in the dark with such minimal sign. Found the elk less than a few hundred yards from the shot location and very quickly, quartered him up, packed him to where we parked (we were about a mile or so back in on a gated road), and transported the meat to the processor which was about an hour away. We blasted the AC in my partner's bronco and kept the meat up off the interior bed of the rig which I believe helped us out at least a bit. I did lose some of the meat but not a lot. Lesson learned.. don't shoot twigs, shoot the elk

[rowdycwby1]

I shot my elk right before dark last fall and the temps dropped down into the low 40s that night. We got there right after first light and took 3 hrs to find her cause she bleed mostly internally leaving very little blood to follow. It got into the low 70s by the time we got her quartered and back to the truck and put her on ice and we had very little spoilage. Everything but her tender loins was cold when we found her and we got them cooled of first and they turned out good! It helped she was only about a mile off the road and it was straight down to get there

[ishy]

Courious how many of you are deboning when you say you are taking care of it?
I have had one that I shot at last light on an 75 degree day, not a clue what the night temp was. Found it about 9 am next day due to no blood in waste high grass. Didn't loose any of it. It was in a shady river bottom. I'm glad it didn't take any longer than it did I doubt we had much time to spare. That one we just quartered and didn't debone, but now I would probably debone it one the spot to help cooling and getting meat away from the bone.

[Toby]

Boy, these examples make me very leery of hunting late into the afternoon on a warm day, especially when hunting alone.

[Indian Summer]

Don't sweat it Toby... just make sure that your shot is a good quality one. I've shot elk 20 yards broadside and watched them fall over in front of me. They are only flesh and blood you just need to discipline yourself and not take any risks.

[ctdad]

I'll probably take some heat for this but I think we take a chance every time we shoot an animal. You have to measure your own comfort with each shot and each situation. I never want to lose an animal or meat but that is the chance I take when I loose an arrow. I respect the animals but if you are going to be a Hunter, this will happen to you. It sucks but if I start avoiding late afternoon or warm days, I'll severely limit my already too short season. Don't confuse my attitude with making reckless decisions but I probably have to force myself to be more aggressive when elk hunting based on past experiences.