I finally found him! I went back in looking at first light, and found some blood and hair. Not much blood but not hard to track for the first 80 yards. Unfortunately, when I got to where he started walking the blood became very meager, and I lost blood about where I had last seen him. I walked up and down every trail and criss-crossing the woods looking for anything for hours. Finally, I got a break. About 100 yards from last blood, I found more hair believe it or not. I knew there was a water hole about 200 yards further in that direction so I stalked over there looking for him bedded down. As I was walking around the water hole, I spotted him 50 yards away from it already dead. He was sealed up tight. No blood in the bed and the wound was plugged which explains the lack of blood.
It took half the day, but I was thrilled to recover him. The shot went through 2 lobes of the liver and grazed the gut at a steep angle coming out low. I hated to leave him overnight, but had little choice. With the lengthy recovery and warm weather, i'm afraid we won't be able to salvage much meat.
