Let's hear the "I missed a good one" stories

I guess everyone has one. Let's hear em. I'll start.....When I was about 12 or 13 my uncle would always take me to his deer camp during season. I have always been very safe (thanks unc) with a gun so I could sit in the stand alone while he went to his. One morning I had one of those today is the day feelings, well about an hour after good light, all the way at the end of one of the shooting lanes came a stud, the shooting lanes were very long, my uncle was a marine and could pop one as long as he could see it. Well I was using a scoped 243 and was about as good with it as a kid could be. I put the cross hairs directly on the back side of the shoulder , inhaled real deep and slowly squeezed the trigger during the exhale. BOOM !! that joker jumped up and kicked out with both hind legs. I knew he was hit. It was one heck of a deer and we think it was the one my uncle had been seeing and talking about. I got on the walkie talkie to my uncle before the gunshot had quit echoing. Got one , got one !!! He said buck or doe. I said it's that big one! !!! Well he told me not to get out of the stand until he got there. 30 minutes went by and I could hear the 4 wheeler coming. We went and looked where I knew the deer was. We foundsome white hair and just a fewdrops of blood. Followed tiny drip after tiny drop for a couple hundred yards before it went dry, we kept lookin and lookin but came up empty handed. I'm 27 years old now and I can still say that was a heck of a good buck that I "almost had"...

Well, last season I was 12. Im a smart teenager now I was bowhunting and had a terrible season. I lost confidence in myself because I missed a few deer. Turns out I had bad eyesight and could barely see the deer through the peep sight. But then one Saturday morning me and my dad went to the stand, I brought the crossbow this time. Sure enough, right away a 10 point and a doe come out. They get within 10 yards and their in front of me so I can take the shot. Then an acorn falls on our back porch! ( we were hunting 60 yards from our house) He is all of the sudden alert, he starts walking, I try to stop him but he starts running. Then he stops 20 yards away, aaaaaaaaaaaand I missed.... I was tore up. So then gun season comes along, in late Oct or early Nov I saw him again! I saw him 2 or 3 days in a row! I had my sights on him, I passed on a few bucks through Nov waiting for him. Then the last day of Nov i decided to sit from 9:00-11:00. at 10 or so I decided to rattle. I had just seen a spike before that so I wanted to try to get him to come back in so I could make a video. I hear footsteps off to my right 10 or so mins later. All of the sudden he comes out! I hit him right in the shoulder, he drop, gets back up and runs towards me and drops 25 yards from my stand.


I know this thread was about missing a deer. I just wanted to share my story about how I missed it and then finally killed it.
This was after over 200 hunts last season too. Homeschool is the best!

Which one?

Was hunting here in WV when I was about 14, just climbed up in a permanent tree stand when a dozen deer walked @ 15 yds. Drew back on a big doe, shot, arrow hit a small branch and went right over her back. Another step out, nocked another arrow, shot, she ducked the string, shaved the hair off her back. Buck fever was racing and I went through a few more arrows, might as well been throwing stones at them.

5 years ago I was hunting on some national forest way way back. It was the rut mid to end November. I had a lock on hung and had sat 7 full day sits in a skinny cheap lock on only to see 3 does in 7 days. Well, on the 8th sit the morning was perfect conditions and right at first light I hit the rattle bag together and I see a giant running straight at me down the ridge. he jumped the creek and ran to 10 yds and stopped and looked dead at me. I panicked and took the shot. He circled in the thicket and I could tell something wasn't right. He stopped broadside at 50 yds and looked straight at me. As I raise the rifle to put it on him its completely fogged up and he trots off. I got down and found his kick up marks and as I looked back up at my stand a branch about 2" thick was folded in half. The branch was so close and my scope was on 9 power and I never saw the branch through my scope. Hard lesson learned. He was every bit of 150" public land mtn deer. I was sick and lost sleep for 2 weeks. Still think about that deer to this day

My "I missed a good one" story took place without a single shot fired.

This was probably close to 10 years ago. I had zeroed in on a stud I wanted badly. I had narrowed him down to a small section of the property he would cross through every few days. I finally picked the 3 day window and went all in. Lunches packed and ready to roll. On day two of the hunt, it was overcast and drizzling about as beautiful a day as you could dream of in the first days of November. About noon, I was unable to avoid the call of nature anymore. Not the kind you can drain into a bottle or out of the stand...the kind that forces a man 40 feet down a tree and tight legging it up the trail and out of the immediate area. I didn't make it fully clear of the area and had to squat and grab the pine tree and let it go. Squatting there baring all to nature, I caught a glimpse back down in front of my tree...there he was...in all his glory working a licking branch not 35 yards dead in front of my stand. I wanted to puke...but immediately realized my rifle was laying beside me.......just out of reach. I was in a tipping point...clean up and live to fight another day, or go for the gun and see if I could get lucky while baring what god gave me. I went for the gun. By the time I could shoulder it, he was passing through the thicket with nothing but pieces of his 140" rack and brown fur visible every now and then. My opportunity was over. I was devastated.

I changed the game plan and finally caught up with this buck about 2 weeks later and about 300 yards from this spot. You don't get a lot of 2nd chances at a buck like that, I was fortunate to cross paths with him three total times that season. I finally won.

I like hearing the stories more. This is too much reading

Some folks like to read

This wasn't a "miss" as I never fired but, it was a close one.

Just last season, it was 12/27. Super late season. I had a good season by then. I had two does and a decent buck in the freezer already. With just one more buck I could take from my club (club limit).

I woke up later than I normally do. Not much gung-ho left in me to get up way before light and get out there. So, I finally got my stuff together and just decided I would follow this logging road out back of camp and down into a hardwood bottom. I was too lazy to even carry my rifle. I brought my 44 magnum revolver instead. It was just me and one other guy on the club that weekend, so I just decided I would stalk up slow through the bottom and back to camp.

I started out fine, just enjoying nature, slowly creeping up the creek bottom. Took a break and sat down on a log after a bit. As I was sitting there checking my phone, I hear something come crashing through the woods towards me. I look up and it is a gorgeous mainframe 8. Much bigger than the other buck I had killed. I was able to put the phone down and get my revolver out of the holster before he stopped about 20 yards away behind some thick cover.

So, I'm sitting there with my gun just out of the holster when he pokes his head around the brush and looks straight at me. Stares me down. He finally figured out something wasn't right and turned to high-tail it out of there. I raised my pistol to get a shot but he kept that cover between me and him and I never got a clean shot at him.

That is as close as I have ever come to taking something with a handgun. That was my last hunt of last season. As far as I know he's still out there. Bigger and better this season. hope I can get another shot at him.

Good reading fellas

This happened three years ago...

I went hunting with my uncle and borrowed my cousin's muzzle loader because I hadn't brought mine (didn't expect to go muzzle loader hunting). Right at daybreak I heard some limbs popping off in the woods and figured a deer was coming. It was still dark so I didn't see him until he had come out into the lane with me about 80 yards away on the left side of the lane. Immediately I saw he had a pretty big rack... one of the biggest I've seen with my own eyes in the woods. I got my gun up but he turned away from me and was nosing a hedge limb that was up above him on the edge of the lane. I didn't want to take a bad shot so I had to wait. He was walking down the lane away from me nibbling at grass for a while. When he was facing away from me with his nose on the ground, I could see both sides of his rack sticking out a fair amount on either side of his body. I had to watch him like that for a couple minutes. By then, he had walked down to around 175yds away and had gradually crossed the lane to the right side. I figured it would be very soon or never... he looked around, and just slipped into the woods, turning broadside for only a second but I had had the scope on him the whole time and I fired. We looked for blood for almost three hours, never could find anything... no hair, no blood, nothing. I felt sick.

I went back to the house and got on our range and the rifle was shooting off about 8" to the right and almost 6" low at 100yds. Made the corrections, took the gun with me that afternoon and got a doe at 100yds. When I saw my cousin I ribbed him that he must have messed his scope up on purpose to make me miss

You cant touch this one

Approx ten years ago, I shot a "mature sw Ga" buck on last day of archery season. About five miles from a SW Ga Mgt area, all land here is private - very few if any bowhunters in this county.

Hit him high, was getting really dark but he was under me. Broke off about two inches of ACC arrow and a vortex expanding broadhead.

Not much blood, it rained that night to boot. Looked for days, no sign of him.

Two gun seasons later, last day of gun season our neighbor shoots a buck about four miles up the creek on some rented farm land that they farm, with his gun. The buck is approx 140 gross, has something odd in the top of back when being cleaned- it is a broke off acc arrow with a vortex broadhead. Buck is following does, but down to a very small 135 lbs or so.

Adding insult to injury, they find a muzzy broadhead in his shoulder. Interestingly, I also lost a big buck an earlier season (cant remember what year relative to this event) on Thanksgiving morning - guess what, was using a muzzy broadhead. Location about 150 yards from the other shot and lost buck.

So the question that we will never know the answer - Did I shoot the same buck twice? Remember, a very low bowhunter county...

Okay, beat that story guys.

ps Neighbor showed me the muzzy and the acc/vortex by the way - I didnt want it, he also has the 140 gross mounted buck - yes, I wanted it.

Almost 25 years ago I was on my very first Mule deer hunt in Utah. The buddy I was hunting with suggested I sit tight in a little island of scrub oak about the size of a two car garage while he pushed through some thick stuff on the opposite side of the ridge to see what might come my way. I had absolutely no faith in the plan, But sure enough after about 15 minutes I see the top of a beautiful 4 x 4 rack in full velvet appearing just uphill from me as the deer made its way to me as if on a string. At about 10 yards he turned broadside uphill from me and presented what I thought was the easiest shot I had ever seen.

As he stared a hole through me I panicked and rushed my shot. I had always hunted from a tree stand back home, and had never practiced shooting uphill. Ended up hitting him just below the top of his back. He took off at a gallup and completely cleared out of the canyon. Could not find any blood and one week later my buddy and his dad saw the same buck feeding with two others in the same Canyon. No worse for wear other than the small scab on his back. I still think about that one.

Last season...

Was hunting on a busted dam... Pine thicket to my right Oaks to my left..near the first week of November. The day before work got the best of me, so of course that mourning I got to my blind at day break. i got situated as quietly as I could looked up and heavy deer moving away from me with a purpose. When I went to grab the ole smoke pole it dawned on me I didn't have a round chamberd...but this story ends well..The next week on deer vacation..I caught him slippin...He is the big boy in my avatar..

I was a guest at a friends land in Vidaila and he put me in a stand overlooking a huge field and cutover on back side , rainy morning just before good light ( due to clouds ) and I was just waiting and looked down and there stood a HUGE BUCK and I know what a big buck looks like . Well I could barely see the deer just under the tree and would have been shooting straight down but I didn't take the shot , just not going to take any chance in low light plus I was a guest . We were the only two people on 3,000 acres , I got chewed out for not shooting.