What happened to this buck?

Don Stokes · April 07, 2011, 09:10:00 AM

I got several pictures of this buck during the last season. He was a spike, and I wonder what happened to him. We have a few bobcats in the area, so that's my best guess. If so, I'll bet it was a wild ride!

owlbait · April 07, 2011, 09:30:00 AM

Barbed wire?

TxAg · April 07, 2011, 09:33:00 AM

Probably barbed wire or briars.

SEMO_HUNTER · April 07, 2011, 09:42:00 AM

I doubt that a deer would have a serious run in like that with barb wire. They can jump a 7ft. high fence with little effort, I don't think they would have any problem with a 4 or 5 strand barb wire fence that's waist high.

Looks like scratch marks to me either from sparring with another buck or getting his tail kicked by one, or a run in with a predator. Either coyote or bobcat would be my best guestimate. Bobcats will take down a deer if they have nothing else available to them or a litter of hungry little mouths to feed.
Coyotes will take them down whenever they get the oppurtunity.

If the pic was taken in the spring I'd say it was losing it's winter coat, but since the pic is in January it's most likely a run in with a predator of some kind. It's amazing what these animals go through on a daily basis.

TxAg · April 07, 2011, 09:54:00 AM

Have you ever seen a buck get scared and go "through" barbed wire? It'll leave a mark!

It could also very well be getting his tail kicked by another buck. I don't see it being a predator.

30pointbuck · April 07, 2011, 10:00:00 AM

Probably got his tail kicked fighting.

SEMO_HUNTER · April 07, 2011, 11:14:00 AM

QuoteOriginally posted by TxAg:
Have you ever seen a buck get scared and go "through" barbed wire? It'll leave a mark!

It could also very well be getting his tail kicked by another buck. I don't see it being a predator.

No I have never seen that, but when we had cattle here they used to run through our hot wire fence all the time. It was constantly broke somewhere and I'd have to go out and ride the perimeter to find where it was broke. I even tried putting orange flagging tape like surveyors use on the wire every 5 foot or so and that didn't even help. That stuff is super strong and I just couldn't see how they could break it, but they did. The cows knew better than to even get close to it. They knew exactly where it was and would only graze up to within about a foot of it and no closer. LOL
Now calves were a different story cause they hadn't learned yet and they were always ducking under it, but when their mama started bawling for them they came right back.

owlbait · April 07, 2011, 11:20:00 AM

I've seen them go under and through the strands on barb wire fences. Sometimes they just don't want to jump, and they are tougher than we think. It just doesn't seem to bother them much.Plenty of other ways it could happen though.

Don Stokes · April 07, 2011, 11:29:00 AM

Barbed wire scars are common, but the ones I've seen have always been down the center of the back. Even big-antlered bucks will routinely go under or through instead of over. This fellow would have had to get tangled up in the wire to get this many scratches all over.

I got this picture in the same place, and one of them could be this buck. Maybe he is a fighter, and didn't have enough sense to know when to quit. Some of those scratches sure look like claw marks, though.

Gatekeeper · April 07, 2011, 11:51:00 AM

The picture is not that great so it's kind of hard to tell, but from casual observation it looks like nothing more then creases in his hair. The vertical lines could be creases leftover from where he curled up in his bed all day and the horizontal line could be a crease in the hair from brushing up against a limb. The only thing that looks like a scar to me is the 3"+- horizontal line on his ham and if that is a scar it could be from anything.

I think it's the IR camera picking up the lighter parts of the buck's hairs. The part of the hair that is closest to the skin.

Don Stokes · April 07, 2011, 11:58:00 AM

Gatekeeper, this deer had the same marks on different days, so it's unlikely to be creases in his hair. I have dozens of pictures of different deer at this spot, and none of the others look weird like this.

Gatekeeper · April 07, 2011, 12:26:00 PM

Cool lets see other pictures so we can compare.

Stumpkiller · April 07, 2011, 01:22:00 PM

QuoteOriginally posted by Gatekeeper:
The picture is not that great so it's kind of hard to tell, but from casual observation it looks like nothing more then creases in his hair. ... I think it's the IR camera picking up the lighter parts of the buck's hairs. The part of the hair that is closest to the skin.

That was about my suggestion: Tailwind.

The "scars" would be in the hide below inches of ticked deer hair. The lighter lines showing through could be just where the outer, darker ticked tips are blown back.

Inconclusive with a single image.

Don Stokes · April 07, 2011, 01:24:00 PM

How 'bout this bad boy:

Or this one:

And a rare daytime buck:

...and here's the scarred buck a few days earlier:

wingnut · April 07, 2011, 01:36:00 PM

We had quite a few with cuts like that this year during the rut on our game cam. I finally saw the problem. One of the dominate bucks had broke a tine and it became a knife blade. He was kicking everyones buts and leaving marks.

Mike

Don Stokes · April 07, 2011, 02:01:00 PM

That may be the case here Mike, or something similar. I think the top two bucks in the last pics I posted are the dominant bucks on my place. Hunting pressure is pretty tough here.

All of these photos were taken within 200 yards of my house.

Bill Skinner · April 07, 2011, 06:09:00 PM

The way the last picture looked, with those two depressions, those look like holes from antlers. The deer that I gave seen that survived predator attacks had their necks and rear leags marked. Dogs and coyotes try to hamstring, cats go for the windpipe and the large blood vessels in the neck. Bill

Don Stokes · April 07, 2011, 06:42:00 PM

Maybe next season he'll big big enough to be legal, and I can put an arrow in him and examine his hide from the inside!

April 07, 2011, 09:43:00 PM

he might have been hit buy a car and took a good tumble down the shoulder of the road, just a thought

huntmaster80 · April 07, 2011, 09:48:00 PM

maybe a bad haircut? lol