My bolt wasn't closed all the way

[vongh]

I was Barbary sheep hunting in Southern New Mexico. We heard the sound of some rocks falling. So we just sat still. I was with my wife and daughter. After about 10 minutes of silence we saw them. There was three of them walking on a high ledge. As we were watching them the lead sheep skylined himself and I couldn't believe the size of him. So I put my cross hairs over him and when I was ready shoot nothing happened. Checked the safety it was off. Looked at the bolt wasn't rotated all the way down. Dope. By the time I reshouldered the rifle the bruiser backed away from his majestic perch. I can't be the only one that has botched a shot at a trophy animal. Am I? Hopefully I am cause I really felt like a dweeb. If not let's hear your stories.

 

[Grumpy_old_Fart]

Oh, damn. That has to suck.

Missed an elk at 80 yards this year. Forgot my rifle was sighted in 2 inches high at 100, jerked a trigger on a neck shot. Missed completely.

 

[vongh]

That happened to me as well. But with a coyote. Round flew right over his head. I my case the rifle was sighted in for 168 grain pills and that day I was using 147s.

 

[Alaskan Ironworker]

I have too many stories to tell. Two involving trophy dall sheep. Another on a 60” + moose. Dont dwell on it, it happens to everyone.

 

[earlthegoat2]

I was deer hunting in western Washington many years ago with a Marlin 45-70 rifle.

I was walking along a deadfall and caught movement in my peripheral vision. I looked and it was a grizzly bear about 30 yds away and looking right at me.

I raised the rifle in a ready position as I made my way back the way I came. I got about 150 yds away before I settled down a bit.

I checked the rifle and somehow the cross bolt safety was engaged.

Never liked those things since.

 

[wombat13]

My story isn’t nearly as interesting. Deer hunting with my FIL for the first time (and one of my first times hunting). Was using my Garand because at the time my only other rifle was .22lr. Trying to do everything right because FIL. Very quietly climbed up the treestand. Very quietly loaded my rifle. An hour or two later along comes a deer. Get nice sight picture and “click!” I “rode the bolt” rather than letting it slam because I was trying to be quiet.

Oh well. At least I got a nice rifle out of it. FIL said “you can’t hunt with that thing. You need a proper hunting rifle.” Two months later my wife gave me a rifle for Christmas.

 

[JDeere]

My story isn’t nearly as interesting. Deer hunting with my FIL for the first time (and one of my first times hunting). Was using my Garand because at the time my only other rifle was .22lr. Trying to do everything right because FIL. Very quietly climbed up the treestand. Very quietly loaded my rifle. An hour or two later along comes a deer. Get nice sight picture and “click!” I “rode the bolt” rather than letting it slam because I was trying to be quiet.

Been there twice way back in my younger days. My dad let me use his brand new BAR in .270. Nice buck just stared at me when she went click. Same thing during another hunt and using an M1 Carbine. Never took another semi auto to a stand stand again and never will...

 

[redneck]

I was on my first deer hunt ever. Was at my uncle's farm and I brought a lyman great plains rifle I had built from a kit (.54 slow twist, cap lock). They mainly did group drives at the time, but I had driven 3 hrs to get there the night before and didn't want to wait til afternoon when the rest of the guys showed up, so the first morning they told me to sit in a stand they knew I could find and I hunted on my own.
I sat for about 2 hrs and started to get cold without having seen anything, so I made my way across the farm back to the house. Came across fresh tracks in the snow and decided it couldn't hurt to follow them a ways. Next thing I know I found a patch of hair where a deer had bedded. Walked another 50 yards and suddenly I was 50 yards from a nice sized buck standing broadside and giving me the eye. I threw the rifle up and pulled the trigger...without taking it off half cock.
Click.
The hammer fell, but not hard enough to set the cap off.
As I realized what happened the buck ran up the hill and was skylined by the time I had recovered, and then it wasn't a safe shot and I had to watch him disappear.
I did get some ribbing for bringing a muzzle loader to a deer drive, and the first morning hunt was a let down, having thought I was going to track this deer to his bed and drop him in a cloud of smoke, but I did end up tagging a buck later that weekend.

 

[jmr40]

the bolt wasn't rotated all the way down.

I prefer to use a bolt rifle that locks the bolt down until the safety is released for this and other reasons. I have, and use some that don't, just saying I prefer those that do.

Forgot my rifle was sighted in 2 inches high at 100,

And this is why I preach zeroing at 100 yards. Things like this happen more often than you'd think. With most common rifles a 100 yard zero will keep the bullet no more than 1" below, or above POA from the muzzle out to 130-150 yards making close shots much easier. The ones you're most likely to take.

At 200 yards most are around 2" low. And at even 300 yards very little hold over is needed. If you can just see daylight between the crosshair and a game animal's back the bullet will fall into the kill zone. If you're going to be shooting much beyond 300 with any cartridge there is enough drop that you probably need a good range finder and a scope with dials.

But even with that I've had similar situations where I blew the shot. Once while walking on a fire break I jumped a bedded doe about 10 yards to my left. She ran about 50 yards and stopped. I was trying to put horns on her head and moved my scope from 2X up to 7X for a better look. It was a good 30 seconds later that a very nice buck lost his nerve, jumped up and ran. They had been bedded down together in some thick brush. On 7X I couldn't find him in the scope at close range.

Nearly blew a shot at a coyote doing the same thing. We were calling them when one showed up at about 300 yards. I moved the scope to 9X for the shot. About the time one came out of some brush about 10 yards to my right. For a right-handed shooter to twist 90 degrees to the right is a tough shot. And I had a hard time finding him with the scope on 9X. But I did manage to make that shot.

 

[Armored farmer]

I've certainly had my share of screw-ups....two on one trip!
I had my 30-06 sighted for 200yds with 180gr bullets. Somehow I managed to get 150gr ammo in the 180gr box....? I managed to miss two pigs down in TX. I decided to use my spare rifle....old trusty ruger SR556 . Like @wombat13 I rode the bolt trying to be quiet in the pre-dawn darkness. When the big spotted pig came into the watering hole, I had nothing. After I cycled the bolt, all I had to shoot at was tracks.

 

[Chuck R.]

I've certainly had my share of screw-ups....two on one trip!
I had my 30-06 sighted for 200yds with 180gr bullets. Somehow I managed to get 150gr ammo in the 180gr box....? I managed to miss two pigs down in TX. I decided to use my spare rifle....old trusty ruger SR556 . Like @wombat13 I rode the bolt trying to be quiet in the pre-dawn darkness. When the big spotted pig came into the watering hole, I had nothing. After I cycled the bolt, all I had to shoot at was tracks.

Happened to a friend of mine a couple weeks ago while we were hunting coyotes. He didn't fully seat his mag, and rode the bolt FWD on an empty chamber. A coyote ran in and stopped just short of the caller/decoy. Then "click", then a rack, then another "click", then a "****!!!", followed by another rack then another "click". The whole time the yote was staring at us from about 45yds out. When it started to run I shot it with my M7.

My personal screw up was on a chamois in Austria before the days of laser range finders. The Jagermeister estimated 350 meters and I thought I knew better and put a round right over it's back. Luckily, at the shot it jumped, ran in a small circle and came back to about the same spot. For the 2nd shot I went with the guides range estimate.

 

[The Bushmaster]

"Skylined"...Hummm. Wonder where the bullet would have gone if you had a through & through or missed?

 

[BreechFace]

A good reason why I love 3 position safeties on my Winchesters and Rugers.

@The Bushmaster brings up a valid point above, not something we should neglect to think about.

What a bummer, score one for the Barbary sheep.

I once tried to time a shot with a buddy on a couple of deer and ended up waiting too long and lost the opportunity for a shot. I'm sure everyone has stories, thanks for sharing yours.

 

[Patocazador]

On my 1st mule deer hunt in 1975 I flubbed the shot on a 6x5 that I jumped. He stopped and looked back as they used to do. So I tried to jack another round in my Weatherby Vanguard when the bolt came out in my hand. I couldn't get it lined up to reinsert it because I was so jittery. My buddy next to me handed me his Browning BAR and said, "You owe me big-time." That muley is the second biggest I have ever killed.
I sold the Vanguard later that year.

 

[Patocazador]

I checked the rifle and somehow the cross bolt safety was engaged.

I hate the one on my Marlin .22.

 

[Howland937]

Wasn't a trophy, but a respectable sized whitetail doe.
I was sitting between branches in a downed tree during muzzleloader season and one walked in on me. I had no shot til she got within about 10 feet, and by then all I could see was brown even with the scope turned all the way down.

Glanced over top of the scope, but was already convinced I couldn't possibly miss. Squeezed the trigger and immediately got peppered with debris. First thought was ramrod still in the barrel, but nope. I managed to shoot a 3" limb about 2 feet from the muzzle.

 

[NIGHTLORD40K]

I was deer hunting in western Washington many years ago with a Marlin 45-70 rifle.

I was walking along a deadfall and caught movement in my peripheral vision. I looked and it was a grizzly bear about 30 yds away and looking right at me.

I raised the rifle in a ready position as I made my way back the way I came. I got about 150 yds away before I settled down a bit.

I checked the rifle and somehow the cross bolt safety was engaged.

Never liked those things since.

 

[.308 Norma]

I can't be the only one that has botched a shot at a trophy animal. Am I?

Hardly. Our usual way of mule deer hunting here is to move to a “likely” spot where we can see a ways (like a saddle), then sit and glass. When I’m hiking from one spot to another, I don’t carry a round in the chamber.
Of course you have probably already guessed how that worked out for me once. I was hiking between saddles when a real nice mule deer buck crossed the bare ridge 50 or 60 yards in front of me. He was just walking, and I even had time to drop down prone and rest my rifle on a convenient rock. I pushed my Ruger Model 77’s (30-06) thumb safety off and squeezed the trigger hoping to put a 165gr BTSP in the buck’s ribs.
At the “click,” the buck spun his head and looked right at me as I was trying to chamber a round. I didn’t have time - two jumps and the buck was bounding down the side of the mountain through the brush.

A while back, I wrote about another botched up shot here on THR. My wife and I were sitting in a clearing of sorts, and watching the other side of the canyon when we heard the unmistakable sound of a mule deer trying to sneak through the brush about 30 yards below us. First I saw his huge, 6X7 rack. Then his whole head and part of his neck came into view. I put my 30-06’s crosshairs right behind his ear, pushed the safety off, and squeezed the trigger. BOOM!!! A quaking aspen no bigger around than my thumb, and 3 or 4 feet in front of my rifle’s muzzle, tipped over - as my wife’s 243 barked beside me.
My wife’s 243 bullet went right behind that buck’s ear, and he went down kicking. He was the biggest deer anyone in my family has ever killed. I’d killed a little quaking aspen. My wife called me “Quakey Shooter” for a long time after that.

 

[vongh]

"Skylined"...Hummm. Wonder where the bullet would have gone if you had a through & through or missed?

You have a very valid point. Maybe that was God's way of saying no go. Thank you for bringing up that it may not have been a safe shot.

 

[gspn]

When I was much younger I was hunting a power line about 120 yards downhill from an ag field, and I decided it was time to go in for lunch. I was walking up the power line and I thought I heard something so I stopped. I didn't hear it anymore and began walking again, just kind of looking at the ground 20 yards in front of me and thinking about where I'd go eat. As I crested the hill and could see onto the field I heard a great noise again and looked up just in time to see a monster public-land whitetail absolutely thrashing some saplings. He turned and looked directly at me as I unslung my rifle, but by the time I got my rifle in hand, he had bounded into the woods. I had a trick up my sleeve though and I figured he'd head downhill and away from me, so I ran up to the crest of the field and waited for him to cross the far side of the power line trail. Sure enough, he came trotting right out. I raised my rifle, swinging with him so I'd be right on him when I shouldered it...and everything went black. What!? I'd forgotten to remove my scope cover and it absolutely destroyed my chance at killing that deer.

I was still fairly new to deer hunting then, and that deer taught me a few great lessons that day. Lesson number one: You hunt from the time you leave the truck til the time you get back. There's never a time where you're "just walking to the truck". Lesson number two: If you thought you heard something, you did.

 

[Legionnaire]

I was hunting the Connecticut Hill WMA below the finger lakes in NY because I couldn't get a Deer Management Permit (doe tag) closer to home in Onondaga County. It was cold with icy snow on the ground so I couldn't walk without crunching. I found a seat under a blowdown that gave me a good vantage point within 50 yards of a couple of crossing trails. After a while I heard several deer approaching. As they passed, I scoped the three good-sized does looking for antlers. As the last one disappeared into the brush it dawned on me: I'm here because I have a doe tag! Only deer I saw that day, more's the pity.

 

[Patocazador]

Another one. I have been using a Baaa call for stopping deer that are moving but it seems I never remember to do it on the first bow hunt of the season. Once I had 2 big does at 35 yards just walking parallel and took a shot. The arrow was placed perfectly IF the doe was standing still.

It seems I do it almost every year. It burns me no end.

 

[Coyote3855]

"Skylined"...Hummm. Wonder where the bullet would have gone if you had a through & through or missed?

Wouldn't have gone anywhere because he didn't shoot.

 

[The Bushmaster]

Now that's a hell of a comment. He would have, if the bolt had closed.

 

[LoonWulf]

My favorite ones are the "CLICK" and the slow head turn to stare at you............