- Joined
- Oct 10, 2018
- Messages
- 1,377
I dropped a doe on Friday night when I got home from work which has me questioning the accepted practice of waiting 6 - 8 hours before attempting to recover a liver hit deer.
There were three of them calmly feeding in my backyard food plot which is the first time they've been in there during daylight hours. Shooting light was fading quickly and If I mention the distance of the shot I'll probably get banned from this site (the sum of the digits is 8...). I didn't see the hit and thought I missed as I watched them run away in separate directions. That was until I retrieved the arrow which had a trace of blood, no guts or stomach contents but there was the sweet smell of body cavity. This told me the hit was back. I went out to search for her 6 hours later and found her lying on the trail next to the plot not more than 15 yards from where she was standing when the arrow hit her. Necropsy revealed a hole punched through the center of the liver.
Additional data:
- The temperature was 58* at the time of the shot and 45* at retrieval with clear skies/low humidity
- Her belly was bloated and tight as a drum and her body was in rigor
- The arrow was a complete pass through shot from ground level while standing
- Entry was between the 7th and 8th ribs and the exit hole was between the 8th and 9th ribs
- The entry was at the centerline of her body or just below it (hard to pinpoint because of the swelling)
- There was no blood coming from her mouth or nose and I'm pretty sure the chest cavity didn't have blood in it until I cut the diaphram to get to the heart
- The heart was intact
The one thing I didn't do and wish I did was check to see if the lungs were hit and there were a few reasons for this:
- the arrow had very little blood on it
- there was no blood around her mouth and nose
- after seeing the liver was hit I assumed the hit was too far back to hit the lungs
- I was pressed for time and had to leave for work
I have a trail cam overlooking the food plot that captured the sequence of events and it tells an interesting story:
- at 6:04 pm, the doe was captured running from the plot towards the hillside after being hit
- at 6:08 pm, I can be seen driving along the hillside trail on my quad holding the recovered arrow
- at 8:14 pm a single doe walked into view from behind the camera. What it also captured In this picture is my doe lying dead in the background
- at 12:07 am, there's a pic of me walking towards the doe
So sometime after I rode by on the quad and before the second doe came in to the plot to feed, my doe returned from the hillside and expired. The time stamp on the pictures show that the doe was alive for no longer than 2 hours and 6 minutes after being hit. All of this data has led me to further questions and I'd like to hear your thoughts and theories on what I have presented. Here are some that could use answers:
- Is there a major artery near the liver that I may have hit?
- From the shot placement, is it possible I hit a lung or both? If so, then why wasn't her chest cavity filled? Also, isn't it true that lung hits at the back end don't bleed much and deer do survive those?
- Assuming the liver was the only major organ hit, doesn't it seem that she expired rather quickly?
Every deer that I knew I hit the liver bedded down almost immediately within 50 yards. I wonder why this one went up the hillside and then returned. Was it to feed? Or maybe cross the plot to get to the stream to drink water?
There were three of them calmly feeding in my backyard food plot which is the first time they've been in there during daylight hours. Shooting light was fading quickly and If I mention the distance of the shot I'll probably get banned from this site (the sum of the digits is 8...). I didn't see the hit and thought I missed as I watched them run away in separate directions. That was until I retrieved the arrow which had a trace of blood, no guts or stomach contents but there was the sweet smell of body cavity. This told me the hit was back. I went out to search for her 6 hours later and found her lying on the trail next to the plot not more than 15 yards from where she was standing when the arrow hit her. Necropsy revealed a hole punched through the center of the liver.
Additional data:
- The temperature was 58* at the time of the shot and 45* at retrieval with clear skies/low humidity
- Her belly was bloated and tight as a drum and her body was in rigor
- The arrow was a complete pass through shot from ground level while standing
- Entry was between the 7th and 8th ribs and the exit hole was between the 8th and 9th ribs
- The entry was at the centerline of her body or just below it (hard to pinpoint because of the swelling)
- There was no blood coming from her mouth or nose and I'm pretty sure the chest cavity didn't have blood in it until I cut the diaphram to get to the heart
- The heart was intact
The one thing I didn't do and wish I did was check to see if the lungs were hit and there were a few reasons for this:
- the arrow had very little blood on it
- there was no blood around her mouth and nose
- after seeing the liver was hit I assumed the hit was too far back to hit the lungs
- I was pressed for time and had to leave for work
I have a trail cam overlooking the food plot that captured the sequence of events and it tells an interesting story:
- at 6:04 pm, the doe was captured running from the plot towards the hillside after being hit
- at 6:08 pm, I can be seen driving along the hillside trail on my quad holding the recovered arrow
- at 8:14 pm a single doe walked into view from behind the camera. What it also captured In this picture is my doe lying dead in the background
- at 12:07 am, there's a pic of me walking towards the doe
So sometime after I rode by on the quad and before the second doe came in to the plot to feed, my doe returned from the hillside and expired. The time stamp on the pictures show that the doe was alive for no longer than 2 hours and 6 minutes after being hit. All of this data has led me to further questions and I'd like to hear your thoughts and theories on what I have presented. Here are some that could use answers:
- Is there a major artery near the liver that I may have hit?
- From the shot placement, is it possible I hit a lung or both? If so, then why wasn't her chest cavity filled? Also, isn't it true that lung hits at the back end don't bleed much and deer do survive those?
- Assuming the liver was the only major organ hit, doesn't it seem that she expired rather quickly?
Every deer that I knew I hit the liver bedded down almost immediately within 50 yards. I wonder why this one went up the hillside and then returned. Was it to feed? Or maybe cross the plot to get to the stream to drink water?