Stern Game Recovery

04/02/2026

Get em while they're hot! - bear apps are now open! 🐻 Good luck to all our hopeful bear hunters!

11/30/2025

A little snow doesn't slow us down! We busted our tails this morning for a trophy buck that didn't seem to know what hit him. He didn't bleed a drop, ran down an I-95 of a deer trail, and didn't seem to give off much of the "oh sh*t" cocktail of adrenaline and cortisol that Stern is trained to track..

Luckily for our hunter, Stern and I are stubborn as old mules, even when it's 7° out and I can't feel my fingers.

It took some fancy footwork and using the wind to our advantage, but we still got the job done on this massive buck in under 30 minutes and reunited the hunter with one of her best bucks!

Congratulations to the hunter, and thanks for trusting us to find this bruiser for you, even when we really had to work for it.

We can track your deer too. 218-760-5671

11/22/2025

How does a deer run for 300+ yards with an arrow in his heart, and barely leave a blood trail?!

THE RUT.

As the human half of the tracking team, a big part of my job is understanding the anatomy of the animal we are tracking, and the forensics of shot placement + wounded animal behavior that can help me spitball for the hunter what might be going on.

But ultimately, nobody knows more than a well trained tracking dog. Not even their handler!

When I was told the details of this track - a low broadside non-passthrough, shot from 20 yards with a mechanical broadhead, with 200 yards of known blood before running out of sign to follow - it sure didn't sound like a heart shot.. It's just not very often that you nail a deer in the boiler room and they don't pile up close by.

But regardless of what I think of a shot description, Stern and I will track just about everything we can physically cover, because you never do know unless you go.

I sure am glad we went today, or we'd have missed out on seeing this gorgeous northwoods buck. He went another 100 yards past where the hunter lost him last night, leaving a single drop of blood behind him. Stern had him on the tailgate in a minute and thirty seconds. (No doubt the hunter would have found this deer without us if he grid searched hard enough - but it sure would have taken him longer than it took us!)

This track is a great reminder of how incredibly TOUGH these deer can be - and how even an experienced hunter can do absolutely everything right, and still need a little help with tracking. 🐾🩸🐕‍🦺

Congratulations to our hunter, and thank you for trusting us to find your trophy buck!

11/16/2025

11/15/2025

We've been working our tails off to help rifle hunters this week!

It's a great feeling to recover trophy bucks that just didn't bleed past the hit site. Our hunter made a good shot, but the deer turned toward him at the very last second and the round exited further back than he anticipated - leaving very little blood to go off of.

This is a great scenario to call for a qualified tracking team. We made short work of a bloodless 200 yard track, and reunited this hunter with (in his words) "the best 8 point he'll ever shoot in his life!"

Thanks very much to the hunter for trusting us to find this bruiser, and congratulations on a really nice deer.

We can track your deer too. 218-760-5671

11/09/2025

The weather might be miserable, but Stern sure isn't!

Matt shot this buck yesterday morning and tracked it for a few hundred yards before he lost blood. We came in about 8 hours later and jumped this buck in a thicket another few hundred yards away.

Thankfully Matt, Stern and I are all equally stubborn. We came back again this morning to pick up the trail where we last saw the buck yesterday, and although high winds and a backtrack made it challenging, we found him dead in his fourth bed.

Congratulations to Matt on this nice wide 6 pointer, and thanks for trusting us for two consecutive days to find him for you!

We can track your deer too. 218-760-5671

11/09/2025

11/09/2025

A good tracking dog is always a safer bet than hours of grid searching.

Maggie shot this neat lopsided buck early this morning and watched it bed down close to her stand. When her folks came through searching for another deer, they booted her buck out of its bed and it was gone like the wind.

Her folks spent all day grid searching for it but they came up empty handed - not for lack of trying, they looked hard! Stern and I got there as soon as we could (after a long day of helping other hunters) and we were able to put Maggie's deer on the tailgate in about 20 minutes flat.

Congratulations to Maggie on a nice deer - we're grateful for her patience, persistence, and trust in us to find him!

We can track your deer too. 218-760-5671

11/09/2025

We hit a hard earned milestone today - 100 CAREER RECOVERIES! 🥳

It took a hell of a lot of blood, sweat, and swearing to get to this point in our career, and there's plenty more work ahead of us yet.

But for today, I'm just real proud of my partner and all of the teamwork that got us here.

CONGRATULATIONS to our hunter Connor, who made a great shot on a very stubborn deer yesterday and called us in this morning to help - his buck ran 500 yards after catching an arrow to the back of the lungs, and only bled for the first hundred yards of his death march. Somehow this deer was still warm and very limber when we found it this morning - absolutely amazing how tough they are this time of year.

On to the next!

11/08/2025

My favorite way to start the day.. a good recovery!

Brian is an experienced hunter, he's never needed a tracking dog. But when this buck took a step forward at the same instant that Brian let an arrow fly, he knew that the shot hit further back than he would have liked - and he handled everything flawlessly by backing out for the rest of the day after finding 80 yards of blood and an empty wound bed.

Stern and I were on the case this morning and recovered the buck another hundred yards away in his second bed. No doubt that wait times made this a much easier drag - if Brian had kept pushing yesterday before the deer had time to die, it would have gone a lot further. Dead deer don't run!

Congratulations to Brian on a real nice buck, and thanks for trusting us to find it!

We can track your deer too. 218-760-5671

11/08/2025

Terry is old school. He's never needed a tracking dog before. He shot his buck this morning and watched it go down within sight of his stand, so he had no reason to think he'd be needing our help today.. except when Terry came back with dragging rope in hand, his buck was nowhere to be found.

The buck made it another 300 yards while Terry was gone. It died running, leaving almost zero blood in its trail. Terry told me he was downright amazed by Stern, and that he never would have found his buck without us. That's what we love to hear!

Congratulations to Terry on a nice buck, and thanks for trusting us to find it!

We can track your deer too. 218-760-5671