First time with the Encore .50 cal.

[coyote101]

I put this gun together a few years ago. It's a Thompson/Center Encore .50 cal. pistol. I had a local gunsmith shorten and re-crown a rifle barrel, and reposition the ramrod thimble. I cut down, reshaped and refinished the forend, and shortened the ramrod. It's topped with a Leupold 4X EER scope. I hunted with it a couple of times last year, but never had a chance for a shot. I broke it out again this year for the muzzleloader season.

I was setup just before legal shooting light and within a couple of minutes had deer in sight. Nothing close, but it's always good to know they are around. About seven thirty I had a mama doe and two little ones heading my way. She got to about seventy yards and spotted my pop up blind. She didn't bolt, but she wasn't coming any closer. She stared and glared for a while, and eventually snorted and walked off in another direction. There were several other deer in the field and I figured she had ruined it for me. They all stayed in the field, but none headed in my direction. Then, about seven forty-five six more deer came into the field about a hundred and thirty yards straight in front of me. They hadn't been there when the doe had snorted, so they weren't alerted to me.

They slowly browsed their way in my general direction and I got ready. I was ranging the lead doe as she closed the distance. I wanted a shot inside fifty yards, and as she approached that, I got the gun up. When she stopped and turned broadside at forty-seven yards, I put the crosshairs on her a pulled the trigger. 

I knew she was hit by her reaction, but she ran toward the woods with the other deer. She stopped short of the woods and just stood there, kind of hunched up. I watched her hoping she would go down, but she didn't, and I worried I had gut shot her. She eventually went into the wood line, where one of the little bucks tried to mount her. When he did, she went to the ground under his weight. He walked off, disappointed no doubt, but she just lay there. I knew she was seriously injured and watched where she had gone down for several more minutes with my binos, and never saw her get up. I decided to give her thirty minutes to bleed out and die before going to recover her.

After thirty long minutes, I headed to where I had last seen her just inside the wood line, fully expecting to drag her into the field for field dressing and hero shots. When I got there, she was gone! I searched for a minute, found blood and started tracking. It was a long, frustrating ordeal. A few drops of blood and then nothing. Good blood and then nothing. Mark the last blood and start scouring for more. Back to the last mark and start again. Walk semi-circles around the last spot hoping to find more blood or spot that white under belly. I knew she was badly wounded and really wanted to find her dead, or find her and put her out of her misery.

Two hours and forty-five minutes after I started, I picked up a pretty heavy blood trail leading across a creek and found her. Unfortunately, she was still alive. She was totally spent, and couldn't get up, but was still breathing. I shot her again to end it. I hate not making a quick clean kill, and know if I hunt long enough it will happen from time to time, but it still sucks.

I had a long drag back to the field where I could get my truck close to her and it was a couple more hours before I was headed home.

You can see the exit wound is a little too far back. The bullet hit the liver and it was a mortal wound, but it was not a clean kill.


It was a long time from gunshot to the hero shot. I blame the shooter, not the gun.


Pat

[pitw]

Got the job done and that has to feel good.  

Nobody likes a non perfect shot but we all sure make them.  I kinda /sorta would like for it to be legal to hunt with a hand gun up here, but if that happened everybody would be doing it. 

[slagmaker]

Congrats Pat.

Loved the write up,

[nastygunz]

Cool gun and you did the work following up on finding her👍👍👍👍

[HaMeR]

I hate that too but unfortunately,,,,   Too many people give up on that part of what we do. It's lazy & disgusting. Job well done Pat!!

[Okanagan]

"Two hours and forty-five minutes after I started..."

That tells us a lot about you.  Good read, good tracking and great perseverance on your part.

That thing looks like a hand cannon!

[JohnP]

Your right, if you hunt a lot your gong to have one of those days.  But you didn't give up and you found her.  Congratulations on the crafting the T/C to your liking and then using it on a successful hunt.

[riverboss]

Great job Pat! and kudos to you for keeping your head and not giving up.

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