What would you do #SG1

[Steve G]

Its September 16th and you just made a 40 yard shot on a nice cow elk or maybe a raghorn bull one hour before dark but within legal shooting time. You are comfortable shooting out to 40 yards and took what you thought was a good and ethical shot, but after the arrow left the bow, the elk which was standing broadside infront of the setting sun dropped a few inches at the sound of the string temporarily blinding you as the setting sun shines directly into your unshaded eyes.

You hear the arrow smack the the animal, but due to your temporary blindness and the fact that the animal left at an angle that didn't give you a look at the arrow placement, you have no idea where you hit the target or how deep. No arrow is recovered. You see the animal run off at least 80 yards before it dissapears into the foliage or over a rise and you don't hear it crash to the ground. The weather is pleasant (T-shirt weather), no snow on the ground and no rain is expected. The animal could be stone dead 90 yards from impact or may have run off a bit and bedded. You just don't know.

What would you do?
(For sake of the scenario everything in the scenario is perfectly legal where you are hunting.)

[Trumkin the Dwarf]

Wait 30 minutes and go to the impact site. After that it all depends on the blood. I would at least want to mark three spots before dark... Spot I shot from, spot elk stood, and last sight of the animal.

[Gselkhunter]

This is simple:
1 Listen for the animal running away to get direction.
2 Mark the shot site.
3 Mark where the animal was standing at the shot.
4 Find tracks of animal leaving[don't step on them] and mark.
5 Look for arrow[wasting time to let the animal and your brain settle].
6 I go find first blood sign and mark. At this point I decide whether to track or back off because of blood type. However if I made the shot at 40 the animal is dead on the ground. Go find it. Get it boned out and back to camp for a late steak dinner.
By the way I like cows, very tasty.

[easeup]

yes sir Greg said it.
At 40 ......you know; and you heard the report of the rib crack. She is down and in my mind there is no doubt.
Follow the steps as outlined above.

and congrats on a good shot.

[JPD350]

This cow was nearly the same as your scenario and in 30 years the only animal I have ever left over night, if I can help it she will be the last one!
.

This was in

[Steve G]

This cow was nearly the same as your scenario and in 30 years the only animal I have ever left over night, if I can help it she will be the last one!

Wow. That would be a depressing find, though better than no find I suppose. But this really illustrates one of the lessons I was hoping to learn from.

The other. I did mention in the scenario that it was T-shirt weather. I don't have enough experience to know, but in the scenario wouldn't there be a great risk of losing all the meat to spoilage? If the animal lives mostly through the night you might be okay, but if it passes within the first hour and you leave it till morning, I fear that there would be a high risk of spoilage so personally I would risk pushing the animal in order to recover the meat, which is why I shot it to begin with. Any feed back on that specifically?

Thanks.

[WapitiTalk1]

If the elk "hunched up" upon impact (that you could tell with the sun in your eyes), follow steps 1-5 as GS mentioned and back out. This is one of the indicators of a shot too far back. From the scenario description, it sounds like the shot may be perhaps just a bit high so a dead elk is "probably" imminent but the critter may travel a ways. Follow the steps as GS outlined, get the headlamps out, and go track the elk after giving it a good 30-40 minutes. Move slow when tracking in the dark, slow down, and then move slower. Try to refrain from shining your headlamp all over the mountainside, and concentrate on the tracks, direction of travel, and blood. Mark everything. If you find a pool(s) of blood where the elk stood more than once, this is a sign in many cases that the elk will probably not be going down soon and you need to back out or risk jumping him over and over. T shirt weather? Yes sir, that's our season in many years during archery elk. I'm more worried about what happened to JPD's elk than meat going bad if I have to back out and come back in the morning on a bad hit. To date, I have had a few bad hits on elk in the evening, and, have recovered all of them with minimal meat spoilage. It happens.

[Steve G]

To date, I have had a few bad hits on elk in the evening, and, have recovered all of them with minimal meat spoilage. It happens.

All good info. and the excerpt above is encouraging to hear.

[Swede]

There are two main possibilities you have to deal with. I would not consider the possibility that the animal was not severely wounded. If it is not wounded badly, it will heal up and what ever you do makes no difference.
The first possibility is that you have a mortal wound, but it will take a while before the elk is dead and down. The second possibility is that it died right away and will spoil by morning.

After marking where I shot from , and where the animal was when hit, I would plan to leave the area for a few hours. I would look only nearby to see if I could find the start of a blood trail before leaving. I would make dinner and get ready for a night search. I would take some time to pray about the matter. If you have friends nearby, get them to help. I would try to be back at the location I shot from within about four hours. The elk should still be fine. It should be okay if it takes up to a couple hours to track it down. If the elk is very near and died early, you will probably find it soon. If it is farther away, it may be helpful if it survived a little while. Regardless, in this case you thought it out and made the best decision you could. You gave yourself the best possibility for recovering the elk, without prematurely spooking it. I am sorry, there are no guarantees here.

[Trophyhill]

This cow was nearly the same as your scenario and in 30 years the only animal I have ever left over night, if I can help it she will be the last one!
.

This was in the Gila guys. Yes we have wolves in NM. You just do t hear much about them.

I remember you telling me about that JP. The pic really makes it hit home.

[Indian Summer]

T-shirt weather is the key word. What good is finding an elk even if the predators haven't if it is bone soured by the time you get it back to civilization? None.

I agree with most of the answers above but it is common for elk to not leave much blood in the first 100 yards as they exit the scene in a split second. I'd give it 30 minutes or so and make sure I did the proper investigating before following up the trail a minimum of 100 yards. Since it's warm out there's no hurry to go anywhere so after that I'd sit tight until it was a good hour since the shot and then I'd start looking for another couple hundred yards by headlamp flagging anywhere I found sign. If I had covered 200-300 yards depending on cover and didn't find it I'd go get some sleep and be back looking a full hour before light.

[JPD350]

I have not told many people this story mostly because some of the decisions I made were not what I have always expected from myself, maybe someone will take something positive from this, I know I have.

Even though my shot was a little back and high, I was sure she was a goner by the location of the arrow hole and how fast she had laid down. After the shot she went about 50 to 75 yds and immediately laid down by a little ponderosa even though the rest of the herd was in front of her, the area was a big open grassy area with ponderosas every 100 yds apart, after the shot I knelt down and watched with complete visibility, it was a very moving next 1/2 hour! after she laid down a young bull came back and stood by her for a few minutes then circled her at least 4 or 5 times, he also nudged her a couple times trying to get her to stand but she would not move. As this was happening a couple of crows landed and started hopping all around the cow, even hopping on top of her at times, darkness started to set in and the young bull finally left his cow. I backed out as soon as it was dark enough and I went to find my buddy, the plan was to come back after a couple hours. We approached the area around 10 PM just like we planed, but here is where I screwed up big time, I went back without a weapon because I thought for sure she was dead and that I would just be packing meat, I couldn’t have been more wrong. As I approached I found her right where I left her, I got about 10 feet from her and she slowly lifted her head, you could tell she wasn't going anywhere because she just lowered her head and didn't move a muscle. At this point I felt horrible, beyond horrible! In my mind it was a complete clusterfk, I had no arrow to resolve the issue, nothing. At this point I figured my only option was to leave and come back in the morning, I showed up the next morning just as dawn broke and unfortunately spooked a wolf away from the cow. I walked up to the cow and sat on a small log next to her, I just sat there shaking my head contemplating my options for at least 5 minutes, after thinking some crazy thoughts I decided to tag her and take whatever meat I could salvage which was one and a half hind quarters and one little piece of back strap.

The temps were probably 65 or 70 that night and the down side hind quarter had already started to sour a little by the hip socket which I cut out. Timeline; I left her at 10:00pm alive and found her at 6:00am with bone sour already starting.

My 2 biggest mistakes;
1) Shot was not perfect; this bothers me tremendously since I expect a quick kill shot from myself no matter what, the cow was walking and I guessed at the yardage!
2) Never go back without your bow, the rest of my story wouldn’t have happened and I wouldn’t have had to share my elk with the other animals.
Although I could have shown up at 10pm and busted her out of her bed whether I had a weapon or not and at that point the mistake would have been not waiting until morning to look for her, like some one said there are no guarantees that any scenario will pan out and it is what it is.

[Swede]

If you start too soon after a wounded elk and bump it out of its bed, it will get up and leave. I am convinced they watch their back trail. If you push or bump the elk, you will not likely find it before it is too late. I have tried to help track four bulls people got onto too soon. The latest was last September. All the hunters asked for help after they had bumped the elk. They only waited the customary 1/2 hour or so before going after their animal. Two were tracked after dark. None of these elk left a blood trail that could be followed and none were ever recovered.

[Indian Summer]

The temps were probably 65 or 70 that night and the down side hind quarter had already started to sour a little by the hip socket which I cut out. Timeline; I left her at 10:00pm alive and found her at 6:00am with bone sour already starting. .

Some people find that hard to believe but I have had the exact same experience. The downside goes FAST.

Live and learn JPD. had you known then what you know now things would have gone differently. Nobody is perfect brother. Nobody. But not only have you learned some good lessons you have also manned up and told your story to others. Hopefully they can learn from our mistakes and not make the same ones which means in the long run.... perhaps we have redeemed ourselves.

No question about it, returning to a wounded animal you should always be prepared to finish it off. They are tough beyond words. I've seen elk shot with rifles still alive the next day.

I agree Swede... following up too soon is, or surely can be a huge mistake. But under some circumstances which includes really hot weather and a shot you know for sure wasn't too bad sooner than later may not be so bad. But I will caution that you can't just go about it haphazardly. You have to move as if you know for sure the animal is alive and well and you are stalking an elk that hasn't even been hit. No question though... if you bump a wounded elk from it's bed you will be hard pressed to ever even see that animal again. It really is a tough call. In my opinion only the hunter who released the arrow and knew everything about the shot can make that call. Like you if I walked up on a stranger who said he made an iffy shot and didn't have many details I'd probably lean toward backing off.

[Swede]

Absolutely getting the hide off and the meat separated from the guts as soon as you can is the best solution. I sure like it when I can see where the arrow went in. Guessing is never a good situation. If you are like me, you will usually guess wrong.