Prevously-shot birds?

Logical

Logical

Member
I was out this Friday and Saturday. On Friday, I was cleaning my birds, and found that one had some gangrene on his breast, mostly the slimy tissue between the breast and the skin. The skin had previously been opened with shot, so the infection set in.

Saturday, I was cleaning my birds, and one had also previously been shot in the breast. This time, though, there was a 1" x 2" patch of scar tissue, with the base of feathers embedded in them.

Last year, I dropped a rooster coming out of a treeline. He ran off, and I could not find him (I don't have a dog). Three weeks later, I was hunting the same treeline, in the same spot, and a rooster runs out from under the trees. I shot him as he ran, as I wondered if he was the one I had wounded. As I was cleaning him, his entire breast was covered in gangrene, and I had to dispose of the carcass.

How often have others shot previously-shot birds? Last year was the first time I know I shot one. Now, twice this year. I hunt every weekend of the season, so I have ample opportunities, but just have not seen it, before.

Merry Christmas, everyone!
 
I have found a few dead ones and had the dogs pick up cripples, but I can't remember ever shooting a previously wounded bird. Always wonder what happens when you knock a bunch of feathers off one, but it flies out of sight.

Jerry
 
I can remember at least 5 maybe more I've either shot winged & came back b4 season ended &re shot birds that had a hard time flushing that once I skin them had either gang Green or prior injury seen feathers under skin turned to scare tissue...

Shot a few that had gang green or scare tissue & only 1 long spur & 1 wounded or broken spur etc. I guessed it was from gunfire??? 1 last year I thought was frozen in grass I grabbed it by tail it flushed I shot it scared me & I almost missed shot any way short tail & 1 long spur plus scare tissue by breast plate...

Also seen a few wild turkey with same gang green or scare tissue peeled old #4 shot outta a Nebraska gobbler on public lands...
 
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I've shot several that had taken a bb or 2 before, and dogs have caught several that had been previously wounded. Seen a few w/ wings or legs that had apparently been broken & healed crooked but well enough to be effective. Missing toes. Missing spurs. No tail feathers. But a couple weeks ago I shot a young bird that had 3 scars across its breast, each over an inch long. They weren't gross or anything - just hardened scar tissue. Obviously not from being shot. I suppose he lucked out in a run-in w/ a cat, fox, hawk or something. I'd seen plenty of scarred fish before, but that's the 1st scarred bird that I recall that it seemed obvious the wounds were from a predator.
 
I've shot a few over the years that were clearly shot before. Some fully healed and others fairly fresh. I've seen a couple with shot tracks full of puss and feathers through the breast, those are usually ugly wounds. My dog pointed then caught a cripple that was green under the skin, no way I was going to clean that one.

Abut a month ago I had one that had I not seen it I wouldn't have believed it. It was an old bird that looked normal when I initially cleaned it. The next day I boned it out and noticed that one femur was odd. I scraped off all the meat to find that it had been broken and fused back together with a 1/4 inch offset. I dug around on the end of the break and found a wad of feathers with a lead shot in it.

It was a healthy looking big bird with what was clearly at least a year old fully healed wound. I was surprised that a pheasant could not only survive but seemed to thrive with a broken thigh.
I should have boiled off the bone and taken a photo of it.

Tim
 
last year I dropped a rooster on a small grass piece. When I approached/found it in the grass it was still very much alive. When I went to grab him he went to run so I grabbed a hold of his tail feathers which is all I could reach at the time. Once I had a grip he went to fly and pulled every tail feather smooth off. I stood there with a hand full of tail feathers, watching the bird maintain just enough flight to fly out of sight. never did see where he went, but during all of this I distinctively remember seeing his beak had been shot off by my initial shot that dropped him.

Very next week, I'm hunting the same small piece of grass, rooster flushes and I drop him on the first shot, this time folded. Find him dead as a door nail, and what do you know? SAME BIRD, no beak or tail feathers! I'm 100% this was the same bird. The odds of me shooting a bird in the same exact spot with a broken beak, no tail feathers are pretty slim. I wish I still had the picture on my phone of this bird. You could tell he had started rounding off his broken edged beak almost to a nub. He made it all the way through that week and appeared to still be surviving just fine.
 
Amazing drive to survive. Somewhat related....several years ago I dropped one on the tundra around the edge of a slough. When my dog got within a few feet of the little track star, he pretty much ejected every last one of his tail feathers onto the snow behind him. I emailed a guy at South Dakota State University who told me they can jettison the feathers at will as an escape strategy. Who knew?!? Funny thing in this case, though, was that he did it before my dog even got a mouth on him, so there was this running bird who just shot a bunch of feathers out of his behind.
 
I've found a few gang green birds before. One of the most interesting injuries I've found was a bird that had a thicket thorn in it's wing about 2 inches long. I thought it happened when I shot it, but when I cleaned the bird it was all scabbed over.

I saw two birds on one walk that flew away with a dropped leg. Unfortunately, both of those birds were in 3-bird coveys 7 days into the hunting season.
 
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