On November 12th of this year, I was sitting in a treestand, and had just shot a buck a few moments before when my phone vibrated in my pocket. It was my wife calling me, frantic about what she had just stumbled upon a crazy situation down in the creek below our house. The reception was crappy, but she conveyed to me enough that I needed to get back to the house ASAP!
She has a tendency to be a bit overdramatic, but I figured I’d better err on the side of safety, so I bailed out of the stand and hustled back to the house as quickly as I could. When I got there, she explained to me what she had encountered this morning, while walking the dog down our hill to the mailbox, near the creek in the bottom.
As she got to the creek, she heard quite the commotion and discovered these bucks locked up down in the creek bed. One of them was already dead, but the other buck was trying frantically to free himself.
I had a buddy hunting with me, so I called him and told him what was going on. It was around 11am, so he jumped out of his stand and headed our way. While he was on his way, I went up to the shop and got several things that I thought we might need. I grabbed an old lifeline rope, a sawzall (with a fully charged battery), some heavy gloves, an old blanket, as well as a couple things tha might come in handy, just in case. Went back down to the creek and assessed what might be the best way to go about loosing the live buck without getting stomped into a greasy spot!
Once Chris got there, I told him I thought the best way to go about things would be to try and drag them out of the creek onto a dry spot, throw the blanket over the live buck’s head, one of us pin him down, and the other guy cut through a main beam of the live buck to hopefully free him from the dead buck. I’m pretty sure both of these bucks were 2 yr olds, plus the live buck was exhausted, but it was all we could do to get them dragged out to where we could do what we needed to. Unbelievable how strong that buck was! We grabbed the hind legs of the dead buck and dragged them both out of the creek.
After finally getting them out of the creek and getting the blanket thrown over the buck (somewhat) I did my best to pin him down and get enough of the rack exposed to cut, Chris quickly sawed through the live buck’s right main beam just past his brow tine. I pulled the blanket away and the buck tried to scramble to get away, but they were STILL locked up! We repeated the process again, without the blanket this time, cutting on the left side. About halfway through the left beam, the buck lurched and finally broke free, but only made it to the creek a few feet away and just lay there, exhausted.
The buck lay in the creek, panting like a dog, totally worn out. I thought that leaving him in the creek for awhile would be a good idea, beings he was probably plenty hot and it was in the 60s at the time, so we let him be for a bit. After 20-30 minutes I put a little bit of pressure on him to encourage him to run off. Unfortunately, he seemed to have done something to his back end during the struggle to free him, and was unable to get up in his back end. Before we started to try and free him, he had no issues with his back legs, and was jumping all over the place trying to get free. We ended up taking the rope and got on either side of him, throwing the rope behind his rack, and dragged him up onto dry land, so he wouldn’t end up hypothermic.
Someone started a thread last month, about “hearing a buck growl” This guy bellered three or four times during the encounter.
We checked on him several times during the day, and tried to nudge him to get him going, but he was still unable to gain his feet. I contacted our game warden and told him of our situation, explaining to him I was pretty certain this buck was most likely not going to survive. He said to give him until the next morning, and if he was still unable to get up, to go ahead and shoot him and he would issue me a couple of salvage tags.
We checked on the buck again around 7pm and no change. About 10:30 that night, the coyotes opened up not far from the house. I was concerned about them finding that buck and eating on him while he was still alive, so I quickly went down and checked on him one last time. Fortunately, the yotes hadn’t found him, however he was still in dire straits, so I decided to put him out of his misery, with a .22mag shot to the back of his head :-( I let the warden know what I had done, and he was fine with it.
Whoever thinks hunters are heartless, are just plain wrong. While I get very excited with a well placed arrow, this encounter was the exact opposite. I felt terrible for what these bucks endured and was almost sick to my stomach while putting him out of his misery. After the fact, my wife was pretty certain she heard these two bucks fighting the day before, further down the creek, but thought at the time it was just deer busting through the brush, running off. Now, she wishes she would have investigated it more. Had we found them a day earlier, there’s probably a good chance that possibly both bucks could have survived. Not sure if WE would have, though! It was quite the rodeo with just one live buck!
Nice bucks, shame it happened, but you did good putting him down... Once read in Texas their game department radioed collared locked bucks, and like 70% die after releasing so it's common most die from trauma and/or exhaustion after they're locked for hours...
I'd get the skulls cleaned and somehow glue the horn back on... Would make a really cool display...
Wow, what a crazy encounter and thanks for sharing it.
Bummer about the bucks not making it but good on you all for doing everything possible to save them. I also commend you for ending the suffering when you saw he wasn't going to make it.
T-roy, sorry for the loss of 2 great bucks. You always do the right thing and I commend you for it. On a positive, that site might make a great ambush point for coyotes for a week or two.
Amazing story. The most amazing thing to me honestly is that those bucks were just two years old. What a place to hunt deer good on you for doing the right thing
My friends girlfriend runs an wild animal rehab/recovery I guess you would call it. Saves a lot of wild animals and then lets them go free. He had the same thing happen to a big buck caught in a fence. She told him after awhile the deer release an enzyme through their bloodstream and they will never be able to recover. I don't know if it is true or not but it seems like if you don't catch them early enough they always just lay there until they die. Sad for sure.
You did your best Troy. Amazing how strong they really are, even when worn out. Thanks for sharing this. Reminded me of a internet pic from awhile back
Yes sometimes nature is a mother. Kudos for all your effort. For what it’s worth I’ve pulled a number of deer off fences & out of basins at work & not one survived. I guess the stress is often just too much.
You did the right things as hard as it was. I jumped a spike once and tried to hold it down due too it wondering back and forth across a road like it had gone crazy. It was one wild ride but I finally got it down and feet tied by another hunter. Took it back into the woods where we found a small stick deeply embedded into it skull. I pulled it out and freed it. It walked back into the woods and I never saw it again. I bet if your deer had been fresh you would of had a real rodeo on your hands.
Dang, was hoping for a better outcome for your efforts Troy! I've never found locked up bucks before, but feel your pain. Once found a buck fawn caught in a fence, freed him up only to find he had broken bones at the hip and had to put him down. Tough day for sure.
Tough break Troy...great effort on your part! I believe you are absolutely correct, that anti's will never grasp we revere the animals we hunt and consume...never wanting a single animal to suffer unnecessarily. Thanks for sharing this experience with us. Kevin
"My friends girlfriend runs an wild animal rehab/recovery I guess you would call it. Saves a lot of wild animals and then lets them go free. He had the same thing happen to a big buck caught in a fence. She told him after awhile the deer release an enzyme through their bloodstream and they will never be able to recover. I don't know if it is true or not but it seems like if you don't catch them early enough they always just lay there until they die. Sad for sure."
I believe lactic acid build up in the blood stream is what she was talking about and yes it kills deer when they get too stressed. Sad situation but glad you tried to help.
Bummer you couldn't save one of them, but really cool part of nature to witness. You gave it a shot, which counts when you sleep at night. Thanks for sharing!
Thanks for the comments, guys. To answer a couple of questions:
12yds…..I didn’t do an autopsy on him, but did poke around a little bit. It didn’t seem that there was anything wrong with his rear legs or hips, and I couldn’t see or feel anything unusual along his spine, either.
buckeye…….I didn’t try to salvage any of the meat. No telling how long the first buck had been dead, plus I would think the second buck would be full of adrenaline and lactic acid, as Mint & wytex alluded to.
Thanks for posting the video, Nick! You’re definitely no Fred Zeppelin…..well, I’ll just leave it at that;-)
Fred Zepp is the man for GIANT bucks! Love his content.
Heck of a story T! I bet there was some pucker time there as you waded into that mess. Too bad you lost a couple good ones. Thanks for sharing, and congrats on the 11/12 buck! You kinda glossed over that and went right to the rodeo...
t-roy, great job getting them separated without one of you getting hurt. As a deer hunter, I think that’s one of the toughest things to come across. Terrible way for any deer to die. I’ve got a set of locked skulls, but I didn’t find them until after nearly a year and they were just skeletons.
I’ve got a good friend who had a similar situation happen 2 years ago on Thanksgiving day. 2 locked bucks in a deep creek. He put an arrow through one and once it was dead, he used a sawzall to free the other buck. He had to drag the live buck out of the creek, but after a while it seemed to somewhat recover but didn’t walk off. He left it alone and went back that evening and it was gone. Several days later he found it dead about 60 yards away. He tagged the buck he shot and I believe got a salvage tag for the other buck.
