2 DEER, 1 ARROW........................IMPOSSABLE???? MAYBE

GONHUNTIN

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5 October, 2003
Bow hunter bags 2 deer with 1 shot; then it got strange
Glen Schmitt
Special to the Times

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Last year's bow-hunting season was a disappointment to deer hunter Jason Debeltz.
But this year, one shot, two deer and an incredible souvenir wiped that out.

The fledgling bow hunter received permission to hunt Rick Saatzer Jr.'s land near St. Joseph last year, but countless hours in a tree yielded one near-miss: a six-pointer he hit but whose blood trail was washed away in the rain, along with Debeltz's hopes for his first kill.

This year, on Sept. 20, Debeltz climbed into the same tree and made up for the disappointment with one incredible shot.

With the sun dropping below the trees, Debeltz heard movement behind him.

To his surprise, there were two deer very close.

As the animals moved in front of him, he saw one was an eight-pointer. That's when Debeltz drew his bow and let fly a well-placed shot.

He watched as the deer bolted in opposite directions and the one he had shot at went down.

But something was strange.

He could have sworn the other deer fell, too.

"I knew there were two deer, but I never focused on that," he said. "I was shooting at the one deer because I didn't want to miss it. I was pretty shaken up."

Shaken up, but also remembering two "whacks" as the arrow penetrated it target.

Debeltz quickly found his arrow, which showed signs of a good hit. As he walked to Saatzer's house to get Rick Sr., who had also been hunting on his son's land that evening, he still wasn't sure just how good a hit it had been.

The proof

"I went to his house and told his wife that I thought I might have hit two deer with one arrow," Debeltz said. "She laughed at me."

After Debeltz and the elder Saatzer made their way back into the woods, they quickly came upon the first deer. It was a nice eight-pointer.

They then walked to the area where Debeltz thought the second deer had gone down. They soon found that deer as well -- a second eight-pointer knocked down by the same arrow.

"If we wouldn't have found that second deer, I would have probably never believed him," Saatzer said. "I've heard of that happening with a gun, but it seems almost impossible with a bow."

"I couldn't believe it; it was a fluke, and an amazingly lucky shot," Debeltz said. "Rick still didn't believe me until he checked my arrows to make sure I still had them all but one."

Since party hunting is legal with a regular archery tag and the two men were in close proximity, the unlikely shot was completely legal. Saatzer tagged one buck and Debeltz tagged the other. The deer sported nearly identical racks; one weighed 172 pounds, and the other tipped the scales at 175 pounds.

The one that got away

Two bucks with one arrow? Wait, there's more.

Remember that six-pointer Debeltz hit last year? The one he felt so bad about wounding but never found? That deer -- the very same one -- was one of the two felled by his miracle shot.

When the deer were being processed, Saatzer found Debeltz's broadhead and 11/2 inches of the arrow shaft from last year wedged beneath the spine of one of the bucks.

It was completely encompassed by new meat growth, which signified the deer had recovered quite nicely.

"Before we started processing the deer, my kid had mentioned it would be something if we found that broadhead," Saatzer said. "There it was, and I couldn't believe it."

Those are the only two arrows Debeltz has released at deer. In a strange turn of events, he managed to recover both animals -- even though one wasn't found until a year later.

Debeltz summed up the once-in-a-lifetime circumstances with a baseball analogy.

"I went from batting .000 to batting 1.000," he said. "I feel a lot better about last year now."
 
Thats pretty lucky, but not very ethical IMO. Know your target and beyond, isn't that one of the three comandments???
 
My uncle shot an elk wiht his bow last year and did ot recover it. However, my cuz shot the same elk with the '06 the first day of that rifle season.
Michael
 
Good story but very unethical. I think he some states he would have been fined for taking two deer with only one tag.
 
I'm sure that if all you "ethical" hunters would have done the same thing by accident you wouldn't be talking about how unethical it was. You would probably be talking about how you did it on purpose. The guy got lucky. That doesn't mean he's unethical. By the way that is just unbelievable. Good Hunt!!!
 

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