Trad Gang

(http://i375.photobucket.com/albums/oo195/m0r3land/scan0004-1.jpg)

In the west we see a lot of mulies, and in this case, elk that get a leg caught between the top strand of a barb wire fence and the second or third.  Coyotes and now wolves have an easy, live meal.

Natures is tough.

I found a doe on our place this last year like that.  It was right up over a little hill not 50 yd. from the living quarters in the barn out on the farm.  unfortunately we never knew it was there until it was too late.

Many years ago there was a 300 pound or more hunter trailing a deer he had shot. Pretty soon he came upon a barb wire fence and layed his bow down to cross it. About half way across he slipped and ended up like the leg in your photo. How? Who knows. The weight of him prevented him from having much luck in just getting out. Good thing he had multi pliers on his belt and could cut the wire. My left leg always starts to quiver when we come up to those fences again.

Growing up in Utah I saw lots of those.  Many of the fences could likely be taken down and save a lot of deer and elk from an ugly and truly cruel death.

I found a White Tail doe's head and cape hung in a fence just like that. It looks like she was going through and was spooked, jumped and her body went over and twisted the wire.

Those stories have made me think twice about how careful I am when crossing a fence. Thanks.

I was folowing a young moose down a road and he jumped over a fence and wouldn't you know it the poor bugger got caught.  It was a heck of a pickle for both of us, I wanted to get in and help him out but with all the flailing I'd have been injured for sure.  Luckily he got himself out within a minute or so.

A buddy and I roaming the woods when we were about the age of 13 or so came across a fine looking bloodhound that had gotten himself in this same pickle.  It was to late to help the dog but we were able to notify the owners from the info on the dogs collar.  They were sad of course but grateful to know why he never came home.

My dad always said that nature is crueler than society.

uh... i have to point out guys... barbed wire ain't natural, nohow.
nature just is, nothing cruel, just the way it is.
barbed wire now, that can be cruel....

I have spent winters fixing the fence every night because of elk knocking it down; and getting stuck in it.

What I have seen happen many many times; is that the elk move in a herd; a tight herd ; and when they come up to a fence- the first ones; and the ones behind them in a declining percent- jump the fence.
If there are 50 or 100 or more elk in the herd; and they come across a fence- the last of the bunch usually have no idea the ones in front are jumping.
So they run into the fence; and get tangled up in it.

For safety purposes- when an elk is hung up; cut the fence & figure out a way to move quickly to a safe spot.

I got stomped really good after the wire around a spike bulls neck-  came to the end; and the body of the elk flipped around and knocked me into the elks ability to reach me.

To those of you who say nature is tough, barbed wire ain't nature.

It happens alot. I carry a fencing pliers in my truck, and have saved one antelope, and two deer. I have seen around 100 elk, deer, and antelope dead in fences over the years. I even saw a coyote that died that way. It would be a bad way to go.  :(

In australia were Im from you very rarely see a fence that is all barbwire like the one in the pic . Most of the time we use plain wire with a barb on top  or ringlock .

When i was in college me and my friend found a doe stuck in a fence and she was still alive but we had to finish her off.

The ground around her looked liked someone had took a plow to the ground, she had really been struggling for a while.

Its something i will never forget and i have never seen anything else like it in the last 24yrs of hunting.

My mind was taken immediately back to a very popular wildlife photographers book on North American Whitetail Deer. I'm sorry that I can't remember either the name of the book or author.

Anyway it had a good portion of the book devoted to what bad things can happen to deer just because they can.

I still have some of those images stuck in my brain.(shiver) It was a real eye opener to see the graphic evidence of just how awful(by our standards) nature can be.

The truth is without us applying our emotions to the situation, there aren't any in nature.(or barbed wire)

While I don't like experiencing any of those feelings personally, I thank God I have them! They are what separate me from the "senseless killers".IMHO

I hope I didn't get too far off track.

God bless,Mudd

I have a buddy who lets me hunt his property where he runs cattle. He is always complaining about elk ruining his cattle fence.  Nice thing is I get to hunt since he wants the elk numbers reduced.  Gotta love that part.  He is always trying to get elk free from his fence that are caught this way.

Same thing would happen to humans if we lived in the forest still..   I can distinctly remember some of the accidents that happened while running patrol operations in the USMC.  I remember a guy in our patrol in the jungles of Okinawa falling off a steep cliff in the dark.  He screamed for quite a while till we got down to him..  Everything from sticks through the eyes, broken legs, broken ankles, bitten by poisonous snakes, etc, occured during those days.  Crap happens to all species while living in the natural world.  Steve

In my bowhunting years I have found two dead doe's hung up in a woven wire fence. I watched a young fawn once that ran into the fence full speed. She did this about a dozen times after it's mother had jumped the fence. I thought it was going to kill it's self before it finally found a hole.

I also cut a young buck out of a fence one morning. I had to get on the opposite side of the fence, otherwise it would of kicked me to death. It just had it's antlers wound up in the fence.

one day i saw a young bull moose feeding on top of a small hump, ten minutes later i drove by again and saw him with his head stuck beetween the very bushes he was eating, some time in the ten miniutes he had sliped gotten stuck and strangled to death.

And some say hunters are cruel...

"Nature's law of tooth and claw are far crueler than any death I could ever bestow" -Fred Bear

Deer can jump real high as we all know. There is this 20 acre water well field that is all fenced in, close to where I currently live. It is at least 6' chainlink toped with three strands of barbed wire and is full of hay and grass. It must be topping 10' tall. I always notice big bucks and doe in it feeding as I drive by and it amazes me everytime that they can clear that height. A few months back I came across a young buck that got tangle up and the buzzards, coyoties and wolves had a go at him.

I've got a little 26 acre spread and have decided to hand build a jackleg fence around the perimeter.
There is old barb around part of it that will need to be removed.
I haven't witnessed what others here have but can imagine the scene.
If I had multitude of acres or sections of land the fence I'm contemplating would be inconcievable.
Nature is beautiful and sometimes cruel.

Yes, seems like a bad way to go.  And it's not restricted to animals jumping over fences.  Several years ago on opening day of bow season I found a barred owl that dove into the shadow of a cedar tree in the moon lit night and broke its neck on the fence wire connected to said tree.  Then just today I was out shooting stumps and scouting my favorite hunting spot and found a hawk hung in the barbed wire.  My best guess is that he was diving at prey near an open spring back in the woods.  Unfortunately it was also along the property line.

is it that life is hard or is it that their is just some bad things that happen

Most of the animals don't die in their sleep dreaming.

On my way to work one morning, I saw a deer that had apparently misjudged jumping a cemetary fence. The kind made w/ square stock every 6" w/ pointed tops. He was hanging w/ one right thru his brisket. It had just happened as he was still bleeding out. At least he didn't go to waste, another guy was right there claiming it.

I occasionally find a whitetail leg just like that... tough to think of what the animal must have gone through before it died.

Crazy how things work sometimes. I just read this thread last night and this morning while out shed hunting I was telling my buddy about the elk leg in the fence and maybe 5 minutes later we find a deer leg in a fence. Nothing else left. Kind of strange after just reading this thread.

In some of the bad winters we've had in the past, I've seen deer remains in the fences surrounding the hay that farmers feed their cattle up where I hunt. Got stuck trying to get to food. I've heard of people round these parts that have had to finish off deer that were almost dead. Haven't seen it in the last couple years though, probably cause of the overhunting of the area that's gone on, not enough deer to get stuck...  

dang fences they are changing to a critter friendly fence here but they still get hung up sad to see when they get hung up thou

QuoteOriginally posted by Bear:
To those of you who say nature is tough, barbed wire ain't nature.

Good thought Bear, I certainly agree with ya!

The early cattle men thought barb wire would be the death of the business,kind of differant now. I like slash gut and aspen worm fences better myself and they keep my brother employed. A 7 rail worm fence sure keeps the elk out better than wire and you don't have to lay it down in the winter. Around her alot of people notch the ears of game they cut out of fences,I'm always surprised how many deer I see with perfect v's in there ears. Dose anyone else notch ears or heard of it or is it just a local thing?

QuoteOriginally posted by wollelybugger:
Most of the animals don't die in their sleep dreaming.

Contrary to what most of the Disney-fied portion of the world would think!!!!!

Great point!

I had a buck get caught in a 4 in cattle wire fence behind my house this year. Unfortunately for him it was during deer season. But he did not have to suffer a slow death.

We put the third and fourth strand of our wire fourteen to sixteen inches apart to prevent deer getting caught.  Lower strands are closer together.

Stuff happens, but this problem is preventable with a little forethought.

Sad deal. I know someone who oddly ran into two whitetails in the same predicament. They were both too badly injured to save. Local MDC sees it all trhe time. After making the call, He put what He could of them to good use. Sad, but just reality sometimes.

Ain't always fence though, came across a young bobcat wedged in the fork of a tree. Looked like he mismanaged his leap or slipped or something. Would be prolonged demise methinks. Poor guy.

I was able to rescue a doe from a barbed wire fence last fall. I was in the yard and heard something "twang" the taught fence by my neighbors pond. Went to check it out and the doe was standing there with only her front hooves touching the ground, rear hooves were off the ground about a foot with the top strand of wire tight under the rear of her belly. After cutting the top strand of wire when she hit the ground  she was immeaditely up and running.

have to agree with homerdave...nature is nature...it's indifferent. It has no interest one way or the other in whether or not the deer/elk lives or dies. Barbed wire on the other hand can be nasty stuff..

I found an old home place on public hunting land here about 20 yrs. ago with what I guess was an old well. Nothing visible above ground, just a hole 4 ft. across. Don't know how deep it was, water level about 2 ft. below ground level. I could see what was left of a deer floating in it.
 If I hadn't been paying attention, might have fell in it myself. I piled some brush around it (well back from the edge) to keep anyone else from stumbling into it.

A philosophical point- Mankind and our devices are part of nature, too. We all live together on this planet. They get us back by jumping in front of our vehicles and making our insurance rates go up.   :)