I'll start with one that happened to me last year. Long story short, a buddy and I were hunting not too far from a forest road, when we came upon a husky that had got the business end of a porcupine. Thinking he just belonged to someone who was camping nearby, we started to walk him back to find his owner. I had only made it about 30 yards when we heard another bark coming from a group of willows nearby. I started to dig around, and sure enough, there was another husky mix that also picked the wrong fight. They were both in pretty bad shape and my guess was that the one had crawled into the willows for a final resting place. Both still had collars and leashes just like you see in the picture. The one walked while I carried the other. About 1.5 miles later and they were in my truck. Luckily enough, the 2nd dog had a tag with a number. I made it to cell reception and give it a call. The lady broke down crying..turns out the dogs belonged to a nearby landowner with a weekend house about 5 miles away. The dogs had been missing for 5 days. They had searched for 4 days but had no choice but to go back to their hometown. We ended up giving the dogs to a neighbor that was still in the area.
When it was all said and done, I ended up getting an "I owe you" and the landowner offered free pack service if I ever kill anything near their property and wanted help getting it out. The husband gave me his number and the number of the 3 local ranchers and said "just mention my name and tell them the deal and they will get you handled".
Pretty cool story for sure. Definitely not something I was expecting to have to deal with while hunting.
I won't name the hand that used to post on here....but he brought his son out to the area we hunted. We had run into each other in years prior in this area and gotten acquainted but never hunted together. This was back around 2011 or so.
He had read Cam Hanes book on back country hunting and was all jazzed up to put it to work. He told us where he was going, down into a nasty canyon I'd been tempted to go into but never grew a big enough pair. I had taken off down into it once, lost the trail, blew out my legs, and bailed out before I got in over my head....solo.
Anyway off they go. 4-5 days later one of my hunting buddies runs into him and his son. My buddy was on his way back from an evening hunt and bumped into them.......going away from where his truck and our camp were.
He was dehydrated, was showing hypothermia, and was totally disoriented. His son wasn't much better and looked scared. He had every right to be terrified. It was one of the scariest situations I've encountered. If not for my buddy bumping into him there is not telling where they would have gone or if they would have survived. He had tossed aside nearly all his gear trying to scramble out of that nasty canyon. They were soaked, no water, no food.
We got them back to camp, dry, and fed and watered. Thank god for good luck. That was nearly a tragedy. Really drove home to me the importance of planning, knowing your limits, and not taking stupid risks in the western mountains.
Was sitting in a tree seat at ground level, heard a noise turned to my right and a deer was running full speed down the game trail towards me. Skidded to a stop in the leaves about 4 yards from me, then did a head bob up and down trying to make out what the hell I was. Would have been interesting if it had kept going.
