How many days does it take for a deer to bleed out?

[Hackfleisch]

Maybe something changed in the few updates since I last played, but I seem to remember a successful method for hunting deer was to shoot it and see it go down, or shoot it, track the blood for a while, and find the carcass.

Now however, I've been chasing the same deer for 2 days. I've shot it twice, both shots leaving a clear blood smear and a blood trail, but the bastard just keeps on running. Did I accidentally shoot the six million dollar stag? Do I have to chop its head off or drive a wooden stake into its heart?

Of course I have to go back inside to warm up every few hours and because I had food poisoning I also had to sleep in between. I hope that doesn't affect it.

[Makex]

Going inside was problem i think. In one game i shot bear and like any true chicken, i ran inside immediately. When i finally went back outside the bear was healed himself!

Some bug reports might be in order to make this right again.

[odium]

ya there is a bug with the bleed out system.  shoot the deer then avoid any place with a loading screen, he will drop.  i usually just try to follow the blood right after i shoot, even if i dont harvest that day, much less searching the next day

[ajb1978]

Bleed-out time depends on how much damage that initial shot did.  At baseline time of day, a nonfatal shot to the neck will usually drop a deer within 5 real time minutes.  Shoot a leg or something, you might have to track it the better part of a day.

It's also possible to do a grazing shot that inflicts damage and leaves a splash of blood, but no blood trail.  In such situations you will most likely find your arrow on the ground where you hit the deer (sometimes not even broken), and depending on the angle of the sun in the sky and how it illuminates the hoofprints, you might be able to track the deer anyway.

[turtle777]

Bleed-out mechanics are definitely broken as of recently. 
 

I’m on a later Interloper game where it gets cold AF, so it’s quite a hassle. I try to wait in cars or caves. 
 

-t

[Hackfleisch]

Cool thanks for the replies, going inside must've been the problem then. I'd already been tracking it for a looong time and even though I'm only on voyageur I was in Pleasant Valley on like my third day, so I had pretty bad gear, I just had to go and warm up every hour. I also shot it with a rifle so I definitely expected it to go down quicker.

Anyway, the constant headwind in PV became a pain in my ass so I moved to Mystery Lake, spent some days fishing, went out exploring towards Trapper's Cabin, and suddenly shot my first moose, it was just there in the meadow. This was basically my reaction: