Our rangefinder battery died so I don't know how far the shot was I was guessing around 350-400 yards. Normally that distance is nothing for this kid he is an awesome shot. But the whole hunt he was complaining that he was always cold even in the middle of the day when it was 90 degrees and that he was always dog tired. While he was shooting at the deer he could not stop shivering I didn't know this until after he was done shooting or I would of probably told him not to shoot.
Well soon after we got home he got worse and worse when finally his wife made him go see a doctor. It turns out he had kidney failure disease . The doc said if he had waited one more day he probably would have died. The pore kid is only 22 now he has to go to dialysis every other 2 days its a bad deal but it could of been a lot worse. I'm not trying to make excuses for the kid but you got to admit that's a pretty good one to have when someone ask how come you missed the deer you shot at. The bottom line is that he shouldn't have shot because he could stop shivering but he did.
As far as wounding the buck I don't know for sure but from watching the video in slow mo over and over again I'm pretty sure he never hit the buck and with 3 of us looking we couldn't find any blood or evidence that the buck was ever hit. After the hunter started getting better we both decided that it was good that he missed the buck because no telling what might have happened if he had to pack the extra weight back to the truck. He might not be here today. Some people believe that things happen for a reason and this could be one of those things you never know.
I've decided to pull the clip because no mater what I say there are still going to be a few people that will probably get upset over it. The last thing I wanted to do was to upset anyone. I posted the clip thinking it was great footage of a deer getting shot at but not hit and that people would enjoy watching it. I never once thought people would react negatively to the clip or I would have never posted it in the first place.
Unfortunately missing as well as wounding animals has and always will be apart of hunting. I don't know a single hunter that has not miss an animal at one time or another myself included. No matter how much we try there's going to be some of us that mis judges yardage or flinches just as the shot is taken. How a hunter reacts from these miss placed shots and whether or not they learn from their mistake is how they should be judged and not on the missed shot itself.
For those who replied to this post please don't take this as an attack on your reply this post is not intended that way. I just wanted to clarify my reasoning for posting and removing the clip and give my personal opinion on the subject matter of the clip.
Thanks,
Joe Thatcher
