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Had three nice encounters with a mid 150's 3.5 year old on grandpa's farm. He just needs another year. Far as I know he made it through season, going to head out this weekend and look for sheds.

Here's what stinks, bit of a story:

November 6th, consistent 5-10 mph wind out of the South. On gpa's property the Northern border is a river, so with the wind out of the South I had a perfect opportunity to hunt the river bank.

Friday the 5th I shot a big doe, while I was waiting to get down out of my stand I see a big buck cruising the river bank. He gets directly downwind of where the doe expired, stands there for a minute then just casually walks back to the West where he'd come from. Didn't seem like he was spooked at all which was good.

Saturday morning we get that S wind so I decide to head to the river bank and see if I can spot him again.

I put up my hang n hunt setup and get ready for the day. My dad was hunting a couple hundred yards away and had action all morning.

10am and I hadn't seen a deer, maybe because I'd shot the doe the day before and had processed her? Anyway about 10:20 I see a giant frame walking down the old logging road right at me that parallels the river bed.

Mega framed buck, stops in the road at 15 yard and just stares d at me. I had barely gotten my bow off the hanger (got caught up on the rubber hook from my 3rd hand holder) because of course that would happen when I need to get it off there quickly and quietly.... I should say that this is of no fault of the hanger, thing works great. I just didn't get the bow off the hanger smoothly.

Buck stops dead center of the road and stares up at me. I had my bow in hand, put it in front of my face and squinted as much as possible while staring at his feet. He stares at me for a good 45 seconds or so, all the while I'm trying to hold it together. Buck eventually decides that I was nothing and walks off the trail.

He walks right behind a big tree allowing me to get drawn back. At that point he is 8-10 yards away. I chose not to grunt at him for fear of him taking off since he had just stared a hole right through me, so I decided not to make a noise to stop him so I shot him as he was walking.

At the shot I see a good 3/4ths of my arrow sticking out of high shoulder with the lighted nock mocking me as he bounded off. He runs real hard for about 100 yards, then just stops and looks up the hill away from me.

I thought for sure he was dead, shot placement wasn't ideal but I was using a fixed blade head with a 500 grain arrow-for sure I should have gotten the penetration needed to kill him!?!?!

I get the bino's out and stare at him. So many trees I can only see a part of his body and couldn't see where i'd hit him. He starts to slowly walk off with his head down-I think PERFECT he's going to bed and will die close to there.

I shot at about 10:20, and decide not to move for two hours. That was the absolute longest two hours of my life- I'd text every person i'd ever met letting them know I just killed a huge buck!

12:30 rolls around, I get down and take down my setup as quietly as possible. At that point I took my pack off and laid everything except for my bow at the base of the tree, and walk over to inspect the shot location.....nothing.

I knew what trail he took, and saw that he'd carried my arrow for a ways so I had a good line of travel. I'm walking really slowly, just not seeing any blood which I thought was really weird. About 40-50 yards after I'd shot him he had ran close to a small tree and broke off my arrow. Looked like decent blood on the arrow, but there wasn't much and the blood didn't even go to the label on my arrow. I picked up the shaft and turned off the lighted knock, now positive that I was on his trail, and getting more concerned with the lack of blood.

At the tree where he'd kicked out the back 3/4ths of the arrow he started to bleed, just not very much. I follow a very meager blood trail up to the point where he was standing.

There were 3 decent sized spots of blood, about the size of a dinner plate. From this point I had seen him walk over the hill and out of sight- I had figured that once I crested the hill I'd be staring at a giant waiting for me to wrap my tag around.....no such luck.

It had been two hours since I shot, and I was being very quiet as I took up the trail. I didn't hear or see anything spook as I was walking the trail.

After cresting the hill, the blood trail went from sparse to damn near nothing. I was following his tracks, and there were pin drops every 20 or so yards (literally one or two is all).

I followed that for about 60 yards or so and lost blood and his track entirely. At this point I am at a loss for words. I mark last blood and meet Dad back up on the hill. We decide that we didn't think we'd pushed him, if he wasn't dead we needed to give him some time, so we went to town and changed into lighter clothes more suitable for tracking and got some lunch.

5pm rolls around, and i'm back on last blood. I follow the most likely path, and have Dad walk semi circles in about a 40 yard radius looking for blood or his tracks- we come up with nothing and decide since it's getting dark that we were doing more harm than good-need to let him sit overnight and we'll surely find him in the creek bed in the morning.

Long story short- never did find blood or tracks again, after searching all over the property all day Sunday. I looked up blood tracking dogs-earliest one could get to me would be Wednesday-by that time the meat would be spoiled anyways, don't bother. If he was dead, as hot as it was going to be plus with that long of time, the birds/coyotes would be on him and I'd at least have closure.

Come Tuesday evening i'm scrolling a hunting pages instagram and see a picture of a huge framed buck. I message them and get ahold of the hunter in the picture.....he had shot that buck at 6pm on Saturday (same day I shot him) less than 2 miles away.

Mega giant 8 point, "officially" B&C scored (hasn't completed the 60 day drying period) at 186 7/8ths- as a true 8 pointer.

To say I am heartbroken would be an understatement. I'm super happy for the young guy that shot that buck, it's a trophy of a lifetime, and well eclipses the current state record for an 8 pointer.

I never did end up finding another buck to chase. Long story short- there's a broken hearted bearded bowhunter in Iowa with a now worthless buck tag, who wishes like he'd made a better shot. I believe I hit that buck in the crest of the scapula, and the wide 4 blade fixed head was just too big to push through. I also have suspicions that the arrow broke on impact, as a 500 grain arrow coming out of a 67# new compound should have plenty of @ss behind it to get through the shoulder blade.

I'm going back to my old reliable arrows (Easton Axis) and outfitting them with HIT inserts and collars from Iron Will Outfitters, as well as one of their broadheads for next season-should square up the gear issue.

As far as the dumb@ss issue (my shooting error) I put my index finger release into the box of old hunting stuff that probably needs donated, and am going to order a back tension style release that reinforces what I already know to do, which is shoot correctly (I had just gotten lazy with the index release).

End of the day, while I'll never forget that buck, I am trying to take solace in the fact that I did (mostly) everything right. Hang and hunt on a new spot based off of recent sign, let immature bucks walk and put myself in position for what would have been my largest buck to date.

So ends my 2021 deer season-spotted a giant across the river and haven't seen/heard of him being killed, so as long as he wasn't poached or hit by a car, I've got another target that I'm going to try my best to get in '22.

Thanks for reading!

I have to imagine I had some equipment failure (as well as d!psh!t syndrome on my part for making a bad shot in the first place).

So did the guy that killed it tell you where your hit was?

Do you think the fact that you shot the buck while he was still walking contributed to the poor shot placement?

Matt

Stay positive, the next "big one" is out there waiting for all of us.

Ah, the game of chasing one mega deer. Its not for everybody and this is only a part of that game, unfortunately. There's a silver lining. Many hunters will never have that opportunity, no less having a chance to hunt that size animal. Heck you may not even of had the opportunity and you neighbor could have shot him anyway, they know no fences. Sounds to me like your a very good hunter and in that respect, you will have learned from this and will have another opportunity, especially with your attitude. We all learn.

Well done and get back on the horse, there will be other days. You will see. Best of luck to you!

I wasn't happy at all with the performance of the arrows and heads on the other two deer I shot, as well as how they did on the occasional miss when practicing.

I marked up the young mans face, not sure if he wants to broadcast it.

Again, can't hardly believe I didn't get a pass thru, or at least enough to get a lung? Maybe he was just a tough old buck I guess.

Thanks for posting the pic. Amazing deer.

2 miles is a ways to go for a buck in a day anyway IMO and hurt ? just sayin ... and wow, what an 8 !!

My buddy shot this buck with his recurve two seasons ago on our lease. Heavy 500 something grain arrow topped with a Valkyrie broadhead, the bow was about 47lbs at 12 yards.

This trail cam pic was about a week later.

He still walks.

I’m sure the broadhead is in there.

Really sorry for you on that one, what more can a guy say. We all have memories that haunt us. Big whitetails are so rare to get in bow range (for all of us except T-roy) that when a situation doesn't work out those memories have a way of sticking around...

I also need to practice walking shots. I still think I made the right call by not stopping him, just haven't practiced moving shots before. Going to have to figure out a way to be able to do that!

I also need to practice walking shots. I still think I made the right call by not stopping him, just haven't practiced moving shots before. Going to have to figure out a way to be able to do that!