Blazer Deer Tracking

What a weekend memory! My 6 year old grandson Sterling went on his first ever deer hunt with me and Harley. With 10 minutes of legal light remaining, Sterling saw deer… I shot, then got a request from a hunter just 4 miles from us! We left, did a track of 150 yards and were back to find my doe 1 hour and 25 minutes after the shot. Quickest coyote destruction I have experienced! Told Sterling, I was disappointed because we were going to donate a”the deer, and he just looked at me and said…”but Papa , coyotes have to eat too”!!!!! The 2nd night in the stand I asked him what he wants to do when he grows up. He looked me in the eye, smiled, made a sweeping circle with his arm and whispered….”THIS!!!!” Man, I love this boy… and this dog!

Congratulations Paul Barnard on another great Kay county buck! Man, I love this dog!

Hunters get a form of PTSD when they keep reliving poor shot placement on a deer. This is a difficult post for me as I’m beating myself up and reliving a poor decision on my 2nd track yesterday. Harley spent about 20 minutes fighting through an aggressive grid search area from last blood. The hunter is not in good physical shape, so he and the ranch manager went back to the trucks. Finally, Harley broke out of the false track and began serious tracking… he was on it. He made a giant loop and after about 15 minutes, we were within 50 yards of the trucks. He took me to the front of the truck parked next to the fence, and I had already DISTRACTED FROM THE DOG and begun talking with the Hunter and the ranch manager who were both standing AT THE FENCE! I told them Harley was on point, but because they were standing there talking, I thought Harley got distracted because he thought they may have known something we didn’t know. I told them I wanted to do a restart and I begin the 150 yard walk back to the hit site. Again they stayed at the truck. THREE MINUTES after I started back, he called and said they found the deer. About 30 seconds after I left them, the ranch manager looks at the fence, WHERE HARLEY TOOK ME, and saw where the deer had jumped the fence about 10 feet away. He crossed the fence, and the deer was 50 yards away just inside the tree line. I HAD TAKEN MY EYES OFF MY DOG AND LET MYSELF GET DISTRACTED! I can’t make this up… this happened and I am still kicking myself over this. I refused the money from the hunter and have apologized over and over to Harley. I wrestled with posting this, but putting it out there, so others DON’T quit paying attention to their dog!!!!! It was tempting to just post the photo and say “another one found.” That would’ve been one of those “half truths”situations! Harley did his job, I didn’t, but what a weird set of circumstances! Oh, one more thing we could have driven on the dirt road right up to the hit site… What are the chances that we would park 10 feet from where the deer jumped!

Between playing rock ‘n’ roll at some private gigs and Tracking this weekend I haven’t had time to post until now!
No grid search vs grid search….
When the Hunter on my first track saw minuscule evidence at the hit site and where the deer went into the woods, he left the scene and called me. We decided to begin the track three hours after the shot as he was unsure of shot placement as it was just after legal light. No blood for 300 yards, and then started seeing some blood and some intestines on shrubs. 200 yards later, we jumped her. Took a two hour break at that point and restarted where she jumped. She had clotted at that point. Harley took us 200 yards to a huge pond and would walk into the water and go to a different point of the pond and go in and swim short circles and come back out and kept doing that and I was afraid she had sunk. He continued working the bank and took us to a small inlet where we found her. She had swam across, leaving odor in the water and was unable to climb the opposite ridge. Man, I love this dog! 

My second track was grid. Search on steroids. Youth rifle hunt. There was bone at the hit site, after last blood after the buck left the woods into a huge field. Three people grid searched for two hours and then took a pick up and drove back-and-forth in the field! After about 40 minutes, Harley FINALLY broke out of the grid search area and took us back into the woods approximately 15 yards from where we had come out of the woods and 75 yards later we had wet, fresh blood for about 15 yards or so and then nothing. They now are convinced it was a leg/brisket shot. I was so impressed that Harley was able to get past such a massive grid search. Have I ever said that I love this dog? When in doubt, back out!