I can agree with everything except caring a guy to dispatch the deer that is only doing salvation a deer would do,injures or not when a dog is tormenting it.
What does "exhaust other reasonable means" mean?
You bring up some interesting points and since I am off today, just dropped my deer off with coyotekiller to get it mounted, and just opened a beer I figured I would start the discussion.
I think your first question is-what does "exhausted other reasonable means" really mean?
My definition is based on my experience and knowledge. I would not say I am an expert by any stretch of the imagination, but I have done a lot of tracks, read several books on the subject, and talked with people much more knowledgeable than I. I would not say my dog is the best dog for tracking. To be honest if I shot a deer of a lifetime, there are at least a couple of other trackers in the state that I would call to track for me. With that said, Rebel has been bred and trained to track since she was a young puppy. We have tracked deer for MDC agents, we have worked MDC veteran hunts, and other veteran hunts organized by non-profit organizations. We don't find every deer. No dog does or ever will. Most of the time that is not the dogs fault (I am speaking about trained dogs here.) Not every deer dies. A lot of deer are not found because they are not dead. The only real measurable stat I can give is-there has only been one deer that Rebel tracked and did not find that was later found. We tried to find a deer for Combatmedic that a relative of his shot. It was raining and continued to rain all night. We went out hoping to get lucky knowing that a large amount of rain was going to work against us. They found the deer a few days later and if I recall correctly we walked within 10-15 yards of it. We have had several, that later showed up on game cameras or were seen again. A few even the hunter got a second chance at. There have also been several that we just don't know for sure.
The advice I give people is, first, if you can't see the deer go down from your stand stay put for at least an hour. Go to the shot site and try not to walk around too much, look at the arrow and see what it tells you. (Take a pic) If you have a blood trail follow it the best you can until it stops. When you get to last blood and after 30 minutes or so you have not picked it up again, consider calling for a dog. Keep in mind it may take a while to find someone with a dog and they need time to get there. But that rarely happens. Usually the hunter, and his buddies, and his buddies buddies, spend several hours walking all over the woods looking for blood or hoping to trip over the deer. The whole time the scent is deteriorating especially during early bow season when it is warm and gets tracked all over the woods.
So based on this, yesterday my last blood was at the shot site. I had no arrow. I had already looked and found no blood for the first 75 yards where I thought he had gone. Even after my dog tracked it and I knew the path, I still did not find blood for the first 100 yards and that was a single drop and would have been easily missed. I texted the local agent at 8:50 so I had been looking for almost an hour before sending the text. I didn't start the track until 9:15. In my opinion, I had "exhausted all reasonable means." I had no blood to follow and I did not know where the track was, so I could and probably would l have done more harm than good. Grid searching is not a reasonable means, especially when you have a trained dog available. When I started tracking I did not know if the deer had gone 200 yards or 2 miles, and it was very possible he may not be dead.
I have dealt with several MDC agents and every single one want the deer to be found and are advocates for using trained tracking dogs. Not one has questioned me about what means had been taken. I have never been denied. Actually when discussing this issue with one agent he brought up a great point. The regulation says you must "Contact a conservation agent" nowhere does it say you have to receive approval. This was in a discussion about what to do if I was unable to reach an agent. Keep in mind during deer season these guys work LONG hours and they have to get some sleep or otherwise unavailable. I have been told that has long as I have sent a text notifying them, I have met the requirement of "contacting an agent." Usually I have been successful with notifying an agent in a bordering county. Some agents may not be good with this, but every one I have dealt with has been.
As far as the last part, I may see it a little different than you. There are a lot of different breeds out there that can track and find deer. Rebel and I had done several practice tracks with cow blood which is all I could get at the time before we went on the first track that Beanpile mentioned in the other thread. Dogs and handlers get better with practice and the ONLY way to do that is by doing real wild deer tracks. When I would do a practice track, I would make the trail. So was Rebel really following the blood trail or was she following my scent that I made dripping the blood? Also has I mentioned in my other post, blood is just part of the scent. Many times there is no blood or very little visible blood, (that's why they are calling for a dog
)but there is deer scent from a real deer which is very difficult to create for practice. So if Billy Bob wants to take his **** hound out and try to train it to track deer, I would say go for it. They've got to start somewhere and there is no way possible they are going to get better at tracking real deer than to track real deer. I think most, if not all conservation agents would be very supportive of that. I actually had an agent call me and ask me if I wanted to come and track a deer that was certainly dead just for practice. I did as many "chip shots" when I could with Rebel early on. I told the agent I was doing it to train my dog and they thought that was a great idea. A dog does not learn by being unsuccessful. They learn by doing real tracks and finding a real deer at the end of the track.One thing I would change, MDC should review the regs and make a provision for trackers to carry a firearm for protection. On two occasions, we have found pretty good size bucks that were mortally wounded, but still had enough life in them to hurt or kill a dog or a tracker. Actually the deer in my avatar was one of those. Rebel had him by the throat and he was swinging her like a rag doll at first. When he tired a little I STUPIDLY grabbed his rack and forced him to the ground. The hunter was behind me and came up with a dull pocket knife and cut his throat. It was pretty ugly, down right dangerous, and in my opinion very unethical. Many states regulations allow for trackers to carry a sidearm or a shotgun for personal protection. Some think that could be abused, BUT IMO if a wounded deer lets you get that close they more than likely are going to die and need to be ethically dispatched with something other than a dull pocket knife. Keep in mind a tracking dog is required to be on lead so you are way too close if the wounded deer can get to your dog or vice versa.
Probably a much longer response than expected but sometimes I can be long winded lol. BTW I am on my 3rd beer now lol.
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What does "exhaust other reasonable means" mean?
Things such as infrared drone searching. That should always be used before a dog is brought in.
Funny thing is that there were old timers used dogs long before there was ever anything in the regs. Lot of deer recovered by men who are now long gone, whose blueheeler cattle dog that went everywhere with them, are the ones responsible for sniffing out the deer.
I have also seen several blueheelers make $4000 birddogs look like idiots.(better noses and more brains)
Things such as infrared drone searching. That should always be used before a dog is brought in.
Funny thing is that there were old timers used dogs long before there was ever anything in the regs. Lot of deer recovered by men who are now long gone, whose blueheeler cattle dog that went everywhere with them, are the ones responsible for sniffing out the deer.
I have also seen several blueheelers make $4000 birddogs look like idiots.(better noses and more brains)
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