For archers, the sight of a nice deer in shooting range is always an adrenaline rush. A substantial rack on that deer can put a guy in a tree stand into tachycardia, something that is equally scary and exhilarating.

Last weekend my good friend Jamie had that experience. Late Saturday afternoon, he had a handsome 10-pointer wander under his tree stand on some choice property we hunt in Illinois. Jamie had been in the stand for just under an hour when he figured a few prayers wouldn’t hurt.

“I said ten Hail Mary’s and an Our Father, and out walks this guy,” Jamie recalled later that evening.

Jamie’s biggest concern that night was his shot placement. He was worried the arrow had struck a little high for a clean kill. The excitement can make even the greatest hunters misjudge distance, flinch or tense up.

The best hunters are always concerned about shot placement. It’s why we practice our shooting skills for long hours in the off season. We hope that our range skills will translate into swift, clean kills. Perhaps the greatest fear a hunter has is that an animal will wander out of tracking range, injured enough to die but not enough to die quickly.

Before every hunt, I quietly say a little prayer I used to see on the door to my grandfather’s shop: “Dear Lord, let me shoot clean. And if I should miss, let me miss clean.” I suspect my grandfather always said that little prayer, too, because he had a reputation for being able to shoot pheasants through the eye while they were in the stratosphere.

Jamie was clearly worried about this shot. He was tense through the evening and even snapped at me, the way a good brother should, when I prodded him about something the way we do at camp.

We had found a small dropping of the buck’s dark blood by a sapling, but no significant trail to follow by 8:00 p.m. Rather than risking pushing him, we chose to wait until the morning to give him a chance to rest and die quietly.

Jamie is an accomplished archer. His 3D range shooting is impressive and his shot placement is quite consistent. But combining the thrill of the hunt with the challenges of shooting an arrow out of a tree stand can make even routine shots difficult. Earlier that morning, I had under-shot a doe I estimated at 22 yards. She was likely closer to 30.

The next morning, the guys at camp spent several hours searching for the deer. We followed what we could of the faint tracks we thought were his, but could not locate any blood beyond the drops near the sapling. We covered the entire south end of the island, pushed through the immense thickets and grass, traversed the banks and covered ground more than once.

The deer was lost. Not entirely wasted, as hungry omnivores would feast. But for Jamie, the loss was heartbreaking. Killing an animal without being able to recover it is perhaps the most difficult part of our passion.

“Losing a deer like this sometimes makes wonder if I want to hunt anymore,” he said that morning. It was a healthy reaction to a difficult situation, even for a former champion power-lifter with a heart as big as his biceps.

He’ll hunt again. And he’ll grow from the experience, both in his desire to improve his marksmanship and his respect for the life cycle only hunters get to witness.