A Star-of-a-buck in Starbuck, Minnesota.
Whether it’s “First blood gets the deer” or “The person who makes the killing shot?” In either case, it’s not an easy answer.
My friend hunts private property near Starbuck, MN. He usually hunts a fence line dividing two fields. On this day, the neighbors were hunting close by, so he decided to hunt the adjacent woods. From his stand he heard a shot and watched as the neighbors drag a doe to their vehicle. While watching the hunters, a massive buck moving slowly, through tall switchgrass, caught his eye! The deer was between my friend and the other hunters. As the deer moved passed the other hunters, a safe shot presented itself. He took the shot and the deer dropped! You can imagine how excited he was! He yelled from his stand, “I have a big buck down!” The other hunters walk in his direction as my friend climbed down from his stand. The hunters and my friend walked towards the deer from opposite sides — at 30-yards the deer gets up and starts to run. A hunter from the other party shoots and hits the spine — killing the deer.
The Loaded Question?
Later inspection, my friend had hit the deer in the hind quarter. It was a deer of a lifetime! A huge 11-point buck worthy of a wall mount!
As everyone stood around the deer, the question came up, “So who’s deer is it anyways?” The hunter who shot the second time felt it was his deer. My friend feels that if he had not called the others over — that he would have had a second shot. In the end, my friend decided it wasn’t worth arguing over and walked away the better man.
So what do you think? Please share your thoughts.
FML Outdoors.com 
That’s a tricky one. I hope he at least got half the meat.
Wow…what a beautiful buck! That’s a tough pill to swallow in this situation. Sounds like your friend handled an unfortunate scenario pretty well. Every now and then we hear about stories like this and the same questions get asked.
You know me Scott, I hunt A LOT and it’s about so much more than antlers and “trophies”. I believe that in a situation like this the hunter that makes the first lethal shot deserves the deer. Also I’m fairly certain that when the DNR and Conservation Officers get involved in cases like this, that is the basis they use as well to make a decision.
Granted every situation can be a bit different, but I think the same principals apply. I’ve harvested deer that other people had obviously shot before me. If a hunter makes a poor, non lethal shot on an animal, I don’t care how far it goes, or if it’s minutes or days later, or whether it’s been shot in the leg, back or anywhere else – if that same animal travels any distance and is harvested by another hunter who makes a clean, quick, ethical and lethal shot, that’s the hunter who should be able to bring the animal home.
The important thing to keep in mind here is respect. It’s critical to always maintain a high level of respect toward the game we pursue and also respect fellow hunters. What’s right is right and even in situations like this where emotions and tempers have to potential to flare, we have to be careful not to get carried away. Some hunters may be glad to have had a helping hand in the harvest and be ok with the first hunter tagging the animal and others may feel differently. Ultimately it’s up to the hunters, but if it comes down to it…first lethal shot.