The ghillie suit paid off in a big way on Nov. 8th I was sitting in a thick spot and had seen a couple does that I passed on. I did a short estrous bleat and grunt calling sequence. About 10 minutes later I thought I heard a soft grunt behind me. As I was contemplating if it was a deer grunting or not I caught movement in my peripheral vision and this guy walked out from behind at around 5 yards. I looked at his rack once and then started to concentrate on the shot. I got my crossbow up when he was about 15 yards away and shot him at about 20 yards. I saw the bolt hit tight behind the shoulder with good penetration but no pass thru. First time in over 20 deer I didn't have a pass through with my crossbow. That worried me because I know no pass thru generally equals not much of a blood trail. I waited 30 minutes then walked to where I shot him and there was not ONE drop of blood, my heart sank. I walked the thirty yards before he hit the thick stuff and could not find one drop of blood, hair, etc... My stomach started to hurt. I replayed the shot over and over in my mind and knew that bolt had penetrated to the fletching. I waited another 30 and started into the thick stuff with no blood whatsoever. I started to walk random deer trails and on my third one there he was dead as dead can get. When I field dressed him there was a ton of blood in the body cavity and both lungs were sliced completely threw. he went about 100 yards. He was a good 10 including the trash on the bases and had great mass. Definetly my best public land buck. I hauled him out with a pair of hand trucks which would have been great if the tires would have been bigger.
