Horrible feeling

Today started off great except for the snow and wind. Lots of gobbling but lots of hens chirping back. That kept us busy for a good two hours then things went quite. Took a break at my cousins place that backs into the turkey woods to warm up and have a coffee. We decided to tough it out and give it another hour. 10 mins in a hen pops out then another then another, after five hens came out, two tight lipped toms followed behind. They could care less about my decoys and followed those five ladies as fast as they could. One stopped which gave me enough time to raise the crossbow and let an arrow fly. The Tom takes it hard and falls over and starts flapping. Then he gets up and fly's over to the neighbouring property and crashes down and starts flapping again. Im running over to grab him and he does the same thing and runs off. After obtaining permission from the neighbour to look for the bird, three guys looked for this turkey in some thick swamp (the last place I had eyes on him) for two hours but could only find pools of blood. We didn't find the bird and I feel like crap that this has happened. I wanted to post this because people tend to not share there faults or don't think it can happen to them but it sure does. At least this was an experience for me and my cousin to learn more about distances and proves how tough this bird can be. I practice a lot at different rages and felt a clear 30 yard shot would have been fine but going forward I'm sticking to 20 yards and under. sorry for the long rant just needed to vent a bit.

Tough thing to have happen, but I think many hunters will have experienced this type of shot over the years of hunting.
Mine was a young 6-point buck a few years ago in the bush on the family farm - a 20 yard heart shot at him standing broadside with my crossbow, and a new mechanical Rage broadhead. I spend 3 hours hunting for him in a bush I had hunted for 50 years, and never found him. 3 weeks later I found his remains lying in a weedy low area I had walked thru 3 times!! Threw the rest of those broadheads in the garbage!!

Tough lesson to learn. We’ve all been there.

Thats a tough one Tom.
Hey, stuff happens thats out of your control.
Like Genec says, sometimes, unfortunately, you just can’t find them, deer or turkey.
By the sounds of it you were well within your range though.
If it were me i don’t think i would change anything i was doing.
Pick yourself up, dust yourself off, and go at it again.

When I hunted turks with my crossbow I used magnus bullhead broadheads. When you connect it's good night! If you miss the bird will live another day. I use a shotgun now... ;)

Never understood the whole bow thing for turkeys. Why not use a gun???unless its sunday in certain areas, or a no discharge.

I've taken a handful of birds with my compound and everything went as planned until what looked like a perfect shot and the Tom flopped off into the bush and I didn't find him until a week later. since that point all archery kills on turkey have been with decap heads. you either lop their heads off or clean miss. i've even shot a coyote in the neck with a decap broadhead and it was probably the most graphic kill I've witnessed

sorry about the shot, try not to feel too bad about it... perhaps shoot a few coyotes, trap a few racoons, nest predators when you can (where legal) it really helps those hens lay eggs and perhaps will make you feel better about the shot..

I know from your posts you are a passionate turkey hunter, get back out there and get that next Tom! best of luck to you this season!

No discharge where my cousin is. Other wise I wouldn’t be in this position. Lol

Thanks for all the support everyone