Tag Archives: antlers

Oh deer.

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Don’t you hate it when someone beats you to the buffet line?

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The only thing you can do is use your superior size to muscle out the competition.

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Or so I’ve heard.

The next two pictures aren’t the best quality…blame my zoom lens and our resident buck’s propensity for showing up at dusk…. but I thought someone might be interested to see the antler shedding process.

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One half gone, one to go. Talk about being lopsided.

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Right after the shed. What’s left are big boney bumps with an active blood flow.

It always looks painful to me, but I’m assured it’s not. Though how any anter-less naturalist can vouch for that I don’t know.

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Random critters.

 

I was finally able to grab a few pictures of our resident buck.

 

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Which is getting harder to do as the summer wears on.

 

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But this father son shot was pretty sweet.

 

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Junior’s antlers are growing.

 

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And it always makes me wonder what the felt feels like.

 

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Naturally there are woodchuck photos.

 

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And some close ups.

 

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We have one lone chipmunk this year.

 

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And yes, those pesky red squirrel babies are still here.

 

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Using our deck railing as a cafeteria.

 

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As well as a toilet.

 

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Yes, I’m talking to you.

Clearly your mother didn’t tell you not to shit where you eat.

Bad form. Very bad…..

 

 

Baby buck.

 

Our resident buck with the felt covered mini rack has flown the proverbial coop, which is a shame, because I think most of you…. some of you?…. alright, at least one of you… was enjoying the fuzzy updates on antler growth progress.

But never fear.

 

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Our old doe, who we call pregnant because she always seems to be, has last year’s progeny with her on a daily basis now.

 

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So we’ll start from scratch.

 

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Baby buck antlers.

 

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At this point, they’re just little nubs that he keeps rubbing on trees and rocks.

And can you blame him?

The poor little guy looks like a four legged Frankenstein.

 

 

In case you’ve never seen it close up….

 

Don’t get excited, I’m talking about deer antlers.

 

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And as I was filtering through my hundreds of shots of our buck the other day….

 

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I thought some of you city people might get a kick out of this.

 

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After the fall rut….. (read: deer orgy, where size does matter) ….. the buck will drop his then useless horns.

It’s a slow process that sometimes takes all winter. The blood supply is cut off and they slowly loosen. You often see bucks with one side hanging crookedly… and they’ll rub against trees, fence posts, picnic tables or whatever is around to knock them off.

When this happens, it does look a little bizarre.

 

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And painful, though they assure me it’s not.

 

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But how do the proverbial ‘they’ know?

I doubt anything has fallen off of them lately.

 

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It certainly doesn’t look like fun to me.