Chuck and 2piper, I really think we are all in agreement that there is an ethical and moral obligation to kill cleanly. I, like 2piper, am rather disgusted by hunters who have not the slightest empathy or sympathy for their quarry.

Hell, my boy (12) and I hunted pheasants in South Dakota on a family farm this year where there was a dead deer, rotting away in a brushy bottom area. My boy apparently asked our guide's son about it. The boy (also 12) told him that the deer was "spooked" early in the pheasant season and ran from its rest straight into a hard to see metal pole and fell dead (or dying). They left it there rather than take it home because between son and dad, with bow, black powder, youth, etc. licenses, they only had nine deer permits and if they kept it they wouldn't be able to kill one of the nine. On top of that, their freezer full of deer meat was something they really didn't like or know how to cook. (To his credit, my boy recalled the story to me with disdain.)

For that matter, I remember reading when I was a lad that bow hunters only retrieve about 20% of the deer they shoot. I hate to think how many deer run off to die a slow miserable death with an arrow in their bodies. I have always had a bit of a bad taste in my mouth for bow hunting tales for want of the many, many we don't hear about.

Having said all that, this thread is about that one shot you recall from the past. I appreciate some of the stories. Even if the tellers wouldn't "try that again."

Best Regards, Jake

Last edited by Jakearoo; 01/03/08 01:25 PM.
R. Craig Clark
jakearoo(at)cox.net