Yesterday I shot a roe buck with a nose that had been horizontaly cut so that the dividing line between the nostrils no longer existed and the very front of the nose was seperated from the muzzle. Looked painful but was nearly completely healed.

Other injuries I have come across include lots of mended broken legs unoticeable until shot, a fallow doe with the foot of a front leg 180degrees the wrong way and a foreign body in the process of amputating a front foot (high pressure hose ring caught between the hooves and the stoppers)

Anyone else any weird injuries. Konst has a photo of a 3 legged boar, maybe his swing was a little slow that day

2 years ago I shot a 3 legged fallow stag. It looked as if he's lost it either as a very you fawn or may have been born like that. He was missing a front leg from the shoulder, there was no stump. Also his antlers was only about 35cm long, and club shaped, not palmated, at the top they were thick and round. Very strange. I also shot a boar last week that had buckshot imbedded throughout its neck - not an uncommon occurance, - idiot poachers trying long shots at animals. It is also illegal to shoot furred animals with shot pellets here.
Another small boar I shot in Australia had a cancer about half his size hanging from a thread on his ear. It looked like a watermelon! He was very thin and debilitated, I dont think he would have survived much longer...I'll try to get the photos on the net.

While cleaning a deer, my brother cut his finger while cutting the diaghram loose. Upon inspection, we found a broadhead imbedded in the inside of the shoulder, shaft broken off just an inch or so behind it. It was almost completely encapsulated in a ball of scar tissue, but not completely healed, seemingly a relatively fresh injury.

Another time, my brother split a deer with a friend. When he received his part from the buddie's freezer(after much arguing about who got what), he received a couple front quarters from this deer. So, after thawing it out, we started to cut it up. In one of the front quarters, we found a small puss pocket almost completely healed. Inside the pocket was a piece of fence post, about 3" long by 1" wide by about 3/4" thick, still had white paint intact on it. Never could explain that one.

Great topic.

I have stalked a couple of injured deer. One was a roe buck I saw out of my kitchen window. I knew it would be in a certain field later that day at last light and I was waiting up for it. It had been hit by a car some long while before. The wound to the hind leg had healed but the bone had not mended. The muscle of the haunch had all but wasted away on one side (but was very well developed on the other!). The wound had a lot of pus in it and must have been extremely painful.

I shot a fallow buck missing a lower hind leg. Probably a result of a car accident. The wound was clean and had completely healed. He was getting around fine, but I suspect he would have had problems during the rut. A bit like me after ten pints!

The kudu I have shot both had several mended broken ribs. Fighting I guess. I have never noticed this in domestic deer, although I think most of the muntjac I have shot have had ripped ears � probably from fighting and slashing with those teeth.

I've come across a couple of three-leggers, some with shotgun pellets under the skin, one with a big scar (maybe from an auto accident), one with a perfect slug hole through an ear, and have seen a few with wounds above the rib cage but below the spine which seem to heal up fine.

I have dressed out two deer with broadheads imbedded in bone and scarred over (the main reason I won't bowhunt),two years ago one of my hunting partners butchered a six point buck and found three slugs (there goes my theory about bowhunting). He mounted the rack with a little plaque that reads, "Bulletproof Deer". Of course he killed it with a bow

[This message has been edited by 375hnh (edited 04-17-2002).]

I have two stories:

I was on my way to work one foggy morning in the countryside of Berkshire, UK when I came upon a small fallow deer that had just been struck by a car. The little buck was laying in the middle of my lane but had not expired yet but did so as soon as I walked up to it. As I picked it up so as to place it in the boot, I noticed it was missing one front leg just as EXPRESS has described above; no sign of previous injury and no stump nor shoulder blade. The deer must have been born without it. He wasn't very big but he was delicous.

Second time I encountered a deer with an injury was while hunting Whitetail deer in upstate New York with my father. My father shot a small buck that had a rather severe injury to one of its rear legs. Apparently during a previous season the deer had been shot through the back of the lower leg, severing the tendons that keep the leg straight. The foot had rolled back, forcing the deer to walk on the ankle joint. His hide had worn through and the bone was exposed; however, the entire area was dry and not infected. Looked like it had been that way a long time.

not really a wounded deer story. But funny. A friend shot a mule deer, which dropped but didn't die right away. Not wanting to waste a bullet, he walked up to the deer, grabbed a front leg and rolled it over on it's back to cut the throat. The deer, moderatly revived by this, proceeded to kick him three times right where it counts, if I may be delicate. It was SO fast, it was just a blur...

The rest of us were laughing so hard it was really tough to shoot the deer at that point, but we did. It was the last time the guy tried anything like that.

Not a deer but my dad once shot an antelope in Eastern Montana with a hind leg nearly shot off, just dangling by skin. My dad shot it in place of several larger bucks in the area specifically because he saw that it was wounded. I was young then, my first trip hunting antelope and I can tell you it made a big impression on me... I hate slop hunters. People make mistakes, but you wound something like this YOU SURE AS HELL BETTER FOLLOW IT UP! Nothing deserves to be mutalated like that and left to die!

My buddie took a nice 8 point buck a few years back with a .50cal muzzleloader. Upon caping the animal we found two nice tiny .22 caliber holes through the rib cage. The bullet (probably from a .22 rimfire) missed the ribs on both sides and made a complete pass. The wound was 90% heald and the buck was no worse for the ware.
I would still like to smack the stuffing out of the guy that shot this beautifull animal with a .22, probably before bow season even started in VA.

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Thanks, Mark G

"Everything that lives and moves will be food for you. Just as I gave you the green plants, I now give you everything." Genesis 9:3

[This message has been edited by Mark G (edited 04-17-2002).]

Years ago, I shot a whitetail, with a slug and dropped him in his tracks. He had about a 1" hole on top of his back, the hole was open with some puss around it,but it didn't smell infected. There was no exit wound and nothing inside the deer. When he was cleaned you could see through this hole into the chest cavity. ?????? I have no idea!
Maybe an arrow from above?? He was moving like there was nothing wrong.

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No matter where you go.........there you are!

[This message has been edited by reloaderman (edited 04-18-2002).]

My brother and I were hunting one day and we'd gotten together for lunch. I was hunting with a T/C Contender in 7mm TCU. My brother's eyes got WIDE and he pointed and said, "Shoot it, shoot it" His rifle wasn't handy, so I turned around. There was a little doe (we had a doe permit, but looking back, I would've shot it anyway) Some goddamn fool had shot the bottom jaw off of it and the blood was just dripping down. I shot it at a range of about 20 feet, but you could tell it was in shock. It still turns my stomach. Friggin head shots...worst shot possible. I kinda knew who did it...I'm surprised they waited until the season to start shooting deer.

Three seasons ago I shot a medium sized 6x6 bull elk, no make that put him out of his misery. Upon reaching the animal, who dropped in his tracks, I noticed a a large wound on top of rump on the left side. Further inspection revealed that the wound appeared to be a bullet hole going down through the hamstring and exiting above the knee on the outside of the leg. By appearance this wound was a few years old, completely healed and if looked through from one end to the other daylight could slightly be seen. That quarter was out! During the dressing, that was very bloody and had a unique odor to it, my dad sliced his index finger on a broadhead that was lodged in one of the thoracic vertebrae. This in a pus-sac about the size of a football. There was no apparent wound or telltail scar of an entry wound either. He must have been carrying this one for a while. So after loseing almost two whole quarters of meat we put the entire carcass into the grind. That meat never did taste quite right but my neighbors Lab liked it!

[This message has been edited by DavidReed (edited 04-18-2002).]

I also shot a buffalo once that had a bullet hols hrough one of its horns.

We were butchering a doe and found a plastic disc in the joint at the bottom of the ham, kind of like the wad in a shotshell. The disc said Brenneke on it.

Those of you who know the roebuck, know that he can be nasty fellow when in rut.
Some years ago I was called upon by a farmer who had found an roebuck half dead laying in the middle of a logging road.

I shot the buck with a bullet from a 375 mag revolver, and upond examination, I found two holes it the left chest / ribchage puncturing the lungs. The holes was pencilthick. The left antler was gone as well, clearly broken.

The only possible ansver to his injuries was as I see it, a result from a fight with another buck.
This was a big healty 6 pointer with a nice setup, so his oponent must have been a grand buck.

Besides, shotgun pellets are found from time to time under the skin on roedeer.
It�s legal to hunt roedeer with shotgun in Norway, but it seems that some hunters have problems holding back when ranges strech out a bit.

Arild

That revolver was ofcourse a 357 magnum, not a 375.
Early morning still here up north......
Arild

I've found a broadhead in a deer, shotgun pellets as well. I put one deer out of its misery that had been shot in the hind quarter. I've found 3 different bullets in animals that I've shot 2 elk and a Wildebeest. I shot a 6 pt elk once that had a fractured skull, obviously from fighting. His right side antlers actually grew out of his forehead. This was all healed over. Where his skull had separated, fresh bone had actually filled in so that his skull was maybe 1" thick in the area where his antler should have been. A couple of years before, a friend took an elk in the same area that had a fractured skull with one antler actually dragging the ground. This injury was a couple of months old, but this animal would not have made the winter. The tip dragging the ground had a big chunk of ice growing on it from dragging through the snow.

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JD

While bear hunting in Manitoba I had my sights pinned on an decent boar but had to wait about 45 minutes before I could shoot him. He was fighting with a sow that had three cubs. They all took turns dashing in and out from the heavy spruce cover. I noticed my intended target had a small mark on one of his rear legs and thought he had just rubbed the hair off.

Finally, when he was in the clear I made sure it was the boar (saw the mark on his leg) and dropped him. I left the area because the angry sow and her dubs were still there. Boy were they angry! Later, when my guide showed up and we went back to recover my bear we looked him over. I told him the story of the big fight and he took a look at my bear and said that sow really did a number on him. But the wound looked funny. Upon closer inspection we saw that it was an arrow wound, that went all the way through that back leg just up from the knee joint, then across his abdomen through the other leg.

It had made a complete pass through. The bear would have spilled his guts from it had it not been for the fact that bears have a real bone in their "privates". There is a very deep cut part way through the bone, which I saved to stir guests drinks with. Great story to go with it too! BTW, the bear fight was awesome, very hair raising!

Second animal, this fall I saw a small buck that had probably been hit by a car as a fawn. His nose nearly pointed backwards. It appeared the whole front half of his face, both the upper and lower jaw had been bent back and healed that way. I did not harvest this buck, tried to but was bow hunting and there were too many branches in the way. It was the ugliest deer I had ever seen. I only saw him once but I will look for him again next season.

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~Ann
Orion Trophy Expeditions

I have shot a three legged Roe doe which had lost her front leg hearly at the shoulder. I have also shot a buck which was limping badly and turned out to a broken leg which was nearly healed.. Also found .22LR rounds imbeded in deer a couple of times too...

I did not see this myself but it happened to a hunting fried of mine. A femail deer startet to act weird around his farm. It even chased his kids around. The vet came and looked at it and they disaided to shoot it. When they looked at the dead deer they found that it had a calf that never had come out. It was partly out. I think the head was out. This was just before hunting season in the autum, deer give birth in spring so she had gone all summer with a dead calf rotting inside. This is the most horrible story I have heard about to this day.
I have found two dead moose but I don't know what killed them. I saw a deer with a broken leg this autum but I didn't get a shoot at it. It still bugs me a lot thath I didn't.

Johan

About 40 years ago the area where my brother and I hunted had a three legged whitetail doe. She was around 4 or 5 years. My brother shot a buck and while skinning it I runed the edge of my knife on something hard. I cut out a prefectly mushroomed 30 cal slug from just under his right chest. It was facing out, so had apparently penetraited his entire chest. It was old and scarred and looked like it had been there a long time. A few years back I killed an elk that apparently lost his left eye during the rut. I mean his eye was missing amd the rut is the only explaination. Two years ago I killed Whitetail buck with seven points on one side, five on the other. OHis right antler was bent sharply downward. He had broken front teeth ahe had was limping. I tracked him in the snow after spotting him a mile distance. I went after him becasue I knew he wouldn't make the winter. After I put him down, I gutted him and found that he had giant pockets of puss in his left ribs and lungs. The stench was something. I figure he got hit by a car and never healed peoperly. Anyway, his rack makes a one of a kind trophy mounted on my wall. I've seen a lot of injured game since I took my first buck when I was 16. Nature does not have an emergency room or social security.

I arrowed a young bull moose,season before last.He had 2-3 fresh puncture wounds in his rump.Probably run off a cow by a bigger bull.Helped a chum skin out a big black bear boar that a small cal. bullet flattened on his forehead,surounded by a few small cracks. ABH

25 years ago my dad shot a large buck in eastern oklahoma. While dressing it he found 2 30 caliber slugs, one on the front shoulder and the other on the hindquarter. He also found a couple of buck shot pellets under its hide. He kept them for years and I don't know what he ever done with them.
I shot a 150 lb boar 2 years ago that had a bullet hole thru and thru behind his last rib. It had lots of puss and discharge, but he was healing nicely, I guess.

Good luck and good shooting

Figured I'd resurrect this thread as I find it quite interesting.

I myself have shot a young whitetail buck on the evening of a season opener that was missing his back left hoof from a bad shot earlier that morning. The hoof was still attached by a thread of hide and leaking blood, and I have no idea how someone managed to shoot off a deer's rear foot. At my shot, he just collapsed and died without a struggle. When my father and I were skinning him that night we found what I assume was an antler gore wound in his right ham. The hide was completely healed over, but the hole in the muscle was still open and black with infection. We just threw that back quarter to the foxes and hawks. I was very happy to have killed that deer as between the gore wound in the right ham, and the missing left hoof, he was in for a slow, painful death.

The first black bear I killed had a nasty looking circular divot at the base of his skull that was clearly a very old injury that had healed over. The taxidermist that cleaned the skull for me gave me the best guess on that one, thinking that as a cub, another bear had tried to kill him by biting him at the juncture of the skull and neck.

My father has killed two deer with injuries. The first was a deer missing it's lower jaw from a failed head shot by another hunter. The second was a young buck that someone had attempted to poach with a field point tipped arrow. That deer had about six or eight inches of arrow shaft perfectly parallel with his spine and totally healed over. He showed no signs of injury when my father shot him, the hide showed no noticeable scarring, and the back strap holding the arrow against the spine was perfectly edible.

Who else has taken previously wounded game either fully or partially recovered?

I shot a buck some years back the whole front shoulder was atrophied and the neck was bent and locked in place a good 60 degrees to the right.

The front leg was locked in a up position.

I shot him on a full run in very thick woods.

Car accident I would believe

The muscles of the shoulder and neck were so hard that one had to hack through them.

I've shot a couple with leg injuries. One had one front leg blown almost completely off just below the wrist a couple of weeks earlier during our first gun season. I shot him during the second season and he was getting along just fine, chasing a bunch of does.

Another I shot had a funky antler on one side. The front hoof on the opposite side was rotten. I looked back through my trail cam pictures and found one of him during the summer holding that foot up while walking.

The most interesting one though was a buck I shot with a muzzle loader. The antlers were heavy and it was a mature deer but the tines were short and a little non-typical. His left antler had some little spikes and bumps around the base. I didn't think much of it at the time but I had the skull bleached for a euro mount. When the skull came back you could see where it had been fractured. It looks like the skull plate that holds the left antler was broken and pushed in. The real surprise was that it was completely healed and the buck was acting just like a buck should during the rut. I shot him following a pair of does.

Shot a Red Stag during the roar,early April 2012. Took the headskin off and found an injury, punctured bone, in his nasal area. No external evidence but it looked reasonably recent. I presumed he had copped a blow by sparring with other stags. The cape showed bruising under the skin from fighting but that's common on stags during the rut. He also had quite an abscess on the inner side of one jaw. None of the injuries seemed to be a bother as he was quite happily following hinds while roaring lustily when I caught up with him.

I was listening for some hounds grubbing an old feed track from a Michigan black bear. I heard a tink tinkle tink tink coming towards me. Right down the gravel road, just over the hill. Then the fletching and aluminum shaft of an arrow, weaving back and forth, near vertical, tink tink tinkle. Poor little basket rack yearling buck had an arrow stuck in the top of his head. Tink tinkle tink tink. Supported by those little antlers. Placed there by another example of why there should be competence testing for bow hunters.

I shot a black bear in Canada that had a huge slash on the side I couldn't see. It was full of maggots and over all that side was in horrible shape.

Another vehicle hit I believe he was calmly feeding in a blue berry patch,

He had a huge head and paws I put him at over 400lbs if he would have been in prime shape.

Not an injury but I shot a doe Whitetail that had mange.

After much reading I found the meat should be fine to eat. I held my nose and took care of the meat. The meat was fine but the next mangy deer I get is getting thrown in a hole. The F&G will issue replacement tags for this scenario in Montana. It was just nasty dealing with the skin.

I did shoot a Mule Deer doe that was limping along. Had a bruise on the hip and shoulder I think may have been a vehicle wound. The meat was fine.

I shot a moose that had 3 holes in his chest where another moose had hit him.