That's why I want my dog to go on the shot, if not before. We wing our fair share and they hit the ground running, but they don't put down very many steps before rocket-dog is on them.
My son winged this bird as we were walking back to the car two years ago, me lagging behind about 75 yards. When I got there Rocket was racing around the fall zone, but son told me he saw the bird run off to the north, into a 30 mph wind. He was out of sight in the tall grass before he could ground-swat him. I told him I'd wished there was a way we could tell Rocket where to look, but we had no choice but to let him try to work it out. Every couple of minutes we would glimpse the bird running out at 50, 60 75 yards. It did not look good.
But then Rocket picked up the trail and off he went north. He had that sucker in about 30 seconds, out at about 80 yards. Good boy!
A couple of weeks ago two roosters went up and I winged the one that went left but Rocket was watching/chasing the one that went right. (It's not a perfect system.) I just poorly executed an easy 20-yard shot. I sent him where the left bird had fallen but, nothing. No trail to follow on that one. So I guessed the direction the bird would run and walked that direction. Of course, Rocket raced to get ahead of me. Out about 100 yards from the fall zone he picked up the trail and ran the bird down, keeping our "lost bird percentage" at zero.
The problem is our shooting (at times). Tighter chokes are not going to fix that. More shot is not going to fix that. But the way we hunt, I don't really care if they come down running. They don't get far, and that is the part Rocket loves best.