tlambert
PMA Member
Well Halloween weekend wasn't a good one for the up and comer's on my farm.
Friday night I got a call from a friend that lives by my farm saying the neighbors found a couple locked bucks. They contacted my cousin and he ended up getting them apart but one was in bad shape. My friend said they called the sheriff to dispatch the deer and get a salvage tag so I figured it was a done deal. He wasn't sure what bucks they were but sent me a 2nd hand pic from a cell phone.
That was the only pic taken of them and I couldn't identify either by it. I tried calling my cousin to see what happened but he had changed his number and I didn't have the right one.
The next morning around 10:30am I got a text from my cuz asking for me to call him. I got ahold of him and he gave me the first hand account. The neighbors had found these buck near the road that runs between our properties. They went and got my cousin to see if he could get them apart....they didn't want to get near them. After a lot of struggling, he finally got them apart and it was about dark out by then. He said the one buck took off right away but the other appeared to have both back legs broken. He said before the sheriff got there, the deer had crawled off towards my property and nobody wanted to go looking for it on mine. Hence the call the next morning...he said I might want to come down and see if I could find the buck since it wasn't in good shape. I got in the truck and headed down, calling the warden on the way. He said he had heard about it and was actually planning on being out there that afternoon to look for it also. I let him know that I'd call him if I found it.
I got to the farm about noon and grabbed my rifle and had my friend meet me at my place. I parked where my cousin said the deer were found and couldn't see any signs of a wounded deer. I started walking up the sand road to my food plot and could see leg indentations in the sand where it was pulling itself along with its front legs. We got to the edge of the plot and the buck was laying by my waterhole, still alive. He saw us and started pulling himself into the woods. I gave the warden a call and after confirming with him that the deer's back legs weren't working, he gave me the go ahead to shoot it. One shot put the buck out of his misery and we headed over to see which one it was.
I was sad to see that it was a young 10 pt, probably a 3yr old, that had amazing potential for our area. He was 16" inside and his longest G3 was 10". He was a small bodied deer and I remembered seeing a little 8 last year with similar beams which leads me to believe he's just 3. We ended up finding out he had broken his back about halfway down his spine.
I called the warden back and let him know it was dead and he said he'd be out to issue a salvage tag.
After we got the deer tagged, I headed to a neighbor's house to see if he'd want the deer. He's always trying to get a deer in the gun season to fill his freezer and never seems to be able to connect, so he was more than happy to take the deer. We got him loaded into his truck and off to the processor.
Its sad to see a deer have to go this way, but something like this is bound to happen sooner or later. The warden said he gets about 2 of these calls per year and in about every case, one deer doesn't survive.
I can't tell for sure what buck was tangled up with this 10, but I hope he's ok and lives to grow another year. My cousin said he had some horn broken off so I should be able to recognize him if I get him back on camera.
Friday night I got a call from a friend that lives by my farm saying the neighbors found a couple locked bucks. They contacted my cousin and he ended up getting them apart but one was in bad shape. My friend said they called the sheriff to dispatch the deer and get a salvage tag so I figured it was a done deal. He wasn't sure what bucks they were but sent me a 2nd hand pic from a cell phone.
That was the only pic taken of them and I couldn't identify either by it. I tried calling my cousin to see what happened but he had changed his number and I didn't have the right one.
The next morning around 10:30am I got a text from my cuz asking for me to call him. I got ahold of him and he gave me the first hand account. The neighbors had found these buck near the road that runs between our properties. They went and got my cousin to see if he could get them apart....they didn't want to get near them. After a lot of struggling, he finally got them apart and it was about dark out by then. He said the one buck took off right away but the other appeared to have both back legs broken. He said before the sheriff got there, the deer had crawled off towards my property and nobody wanted to go looking for it on mine. Hence the call the next morning...he said I might want to come down and see if I could find the buck since it wasn't in good shape. I got in the truck and headed down, calling the warden on the way. He said he had heard about it and was actually planning on being out there that afternoon to look for it also. I let him know that I'd call him if I found it.
I got to the farm about noon and grabbed my rifle and had my friend meet me at my place. I parked where my cousin said the deer were found and couldn't see any signs of a wounded deer. I started walking up the sand road to my food plot and could see leg indentations in the sand where it was pulling itself along with its front legs. We got to the edge of the plot and the buck was laying by my waterhole, still alive. He saw us and started pulling himself into the woods. I gave the warden a call and after confirming with him that the deer's back legs weren't working, he gave me the go ahead to shoot it. One shot put the buck out of his misery and we headed over to see which one it was.
I was sad to see that it was a young 10 pt, probably a 3yr old, that had amazing potential for our area. He was 16" inside and his longest G3 was 10". He was a small bodied deer and I remembered seeing a little 8 last year with similar beams which leads me to believe he's just 3. We ended up finding out he had broken his back about halfway down his spine.
I called the warden back and let him know it was dead and he said he'd be out to issue a salvage tag.
After we got the deer tagged, I headed to a neighbor's house to see if he'd want the deer. He's always trying to get a deer in the gun season to fill his freezer and never seems to be able to connect, so he was more than happy to take the deer. We got him loaded into his truck and off to the processor.
Its sad to see a deer have to go this way, but something like this is bound to happen sooner or later. The warden said he gets about 2 of these calls per year and in about every case, one deer doesn't survive.
I can't tell for sure what buck was tangled up with this 10, but I hope he's ok and lives to grow another year. My cousin said he had some horn broken off so I should be able to recognize him if I get him back on camera.
