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- Oct 27, 2005
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I received this email from a friend. He works for the company that I work for. I thought you'd all find his story and the photos interesting.
The Story from my email.
The landowner who gives me permission to hunt found these two bucks (see photos below) with their horns locked. Apparently they got into a territorial dispute, or a doe dispute. He found them on Nov. 26, floating in the Muskingum River near Beverly, Ohio, although at first he thought it was only one animal, as that is all he could see from his vehicle. Upon walking to the rivers edge where the animal had drifted against the shoreline, he pulled on the one buck. After having much difficulty even getting it to move, he discovered why. To his surprise he noticed there were actually two animals connected together, and that both were bucks. He went for help, and after a lot of hard pulling by a lot of men, dragged the entangled mass onto shore. They loaded them into his truck and took them to his outbuilding, where they now
lay - still locked. After 45 days of drying, and maybe some slight shrinkage, they still can not separate the two racks. The landowners sons and neighbor were there yesterday and also helped drag the two deer out of the water, and all their comments flowed together, they all contributed some information, and I heard nothing to cause me to disbelieve anything they said and cant imagine why any part of this would be fabricated. The evidence pretty much stands on its own.
It must have been a nasty fight, as two of the points of the buck on the left were embedded into the buck on the right one point about an inch and a half deep just behind the right eye, and another into the lower jaw about an inch deep. Although due to some shrinkage, the points are no longer embedded, the holes in the animals skull and jaw are still apparent, although not viewable from the angles I took these pictures.
Notice the size of these deer. The buck on the left to me looked at least 200 lbs. and had a nice 7 point rack, with some broken off obviously due to fighting. He was obviously a dominant buck in his area, and had some age, as can be seen by the diameter of the base of his rack.
But the buck on the right is a behemoth. Its massive 10 point rack has a much larger diameter at its base. Some of the longest tines were about a foot long. But notice the larger girth and thickness in nearly all areas of his body, including legs, thighs, hips, shoulders, stomach, neck and head. When I saw the size of both connected together, and how much area of the floor they took up, and their length, the one on the right actually reminded me more of a cow than a deer.
No one knows which deer died first, who won the fight, nor how/why they got into the water, nor how far they floated downriver until coming to rest at Beverly. Maybe that is the spot where they fought and fell/entered the water and both drowned right there, as neither animal shows signs of bloating that would have caused flotation. A Nov. 6 discovery appears accurate, as there is no decomposure, and although the cold water would have helped, both animals appear rather fresh. It is not known if either deers neck was broken. It is hard to imagine either deer being able to drag the other for a very long period without fatigue or at least some skeletal/muscle damage. I saw no bullet wounds on either animal. The building they are in is not heated, so with this weeks temperatures, they may keep for awhile yet.
The landowner was interested in a taxidermist providing full body mounts depicting the fight, but after getting a quote of $1500 per animal (or $3000 total), he gave up on that idea.
Ill probably be going back down there to hunt some more this Saturday, so if I see the landowner will ask what he does with them.
Its just a shame that something like this happened, but that is life in the wild.
One has to wonder that with these two bucks being in/from the same area, if the smaller was an offspring of the larger, and if its possible this was a father/son dual to the death, in which neither realized who they were battling against.
The Story from my email.
The landowner who gives me permission to hunt found these two bucks (see photos below) with their horns locked. Apparently they got into a territorial dispute, or a doe dispute. He found them on Nov. 26, floating in the Muskingum River near Beverly, Ohio, although at first he thought it was only one animal, as that is all he could see from his vehicle. Upon walking to the rivers edge where the animal had drifted against the shoreline, he pulled on the one buck. After having much difficulty even getting it to move, he discovered why. To his surprise he noticed there were actually two animals connected together, and that both were bucks. He went for help, and after a lot of hard pulling by a lot of men, dragged the entangled mass onto shore. They loaded them into his truck and took them to his outbuilding, where they now
lay - still locked. After 45 days of drying, and maybe some slight shrinkage, they still can not separate the two racks. The landowners sons and neighbor were there yesterday and also helped drag the two deer out of the water, and all their comments flowed together, they all contributed some information, and I heard nothing to cause me to disbelieve anything they said and cant imagine why any part of this would be fabricated. The evidence pretty much stands on its own.
It must have been a nasty fight, as two of the points of the buck on the left were embedded into the buck on the right one point about an inch and a half deep just behind the right eye, and another into the lower jaw about an inch deep. Although due to some shrinkage, the points are no longer embedded, the holes in the animals skull and jaw are still apparent, although not viewable from the angles I took these pictures.
Notice the size of these deer. The buck on the left to me looked at least 200 lbs. and had a nice 7 point rack, with some broken off obviously due to fighting. He was obviously a dominant buck in his area, and had some age, as can be seen by the diameter of the base of his rack.
But the buck on the right is a behemoth. Its massive 10 point rack has a much larger diameter at its base. Some of the longest tines were about a foot long. But notice the larger girth and thickness in nearly all areas of his body, including legs, thighs, hips, shoulders, stomach, neck and head. When I saw the size of both connected together, and how much area of the floor they took up, and their length, the one on the right actually reminded me more of a cow than a deer.
No one knows which deer died first, who won the fight, nor how/why they got into the water, nor how far they floated downriver until coming to rest at Beverly. Maybe that is the spot where they fought and fell/entered the water and both drowned right there, as neither animal shows signs of bloating that would have caused flotation. A Nov. 6 discovery appears accurate, as there is no decomposure, and although the cold water would have helped, both animals appear rather fresh. It is not known if either deers neck was broken. It is hard to imagine either deer being able to drag the other for a very long period without fatigue or at least some skeletal/muscle damage. I saw no bullet wounds on either animal. The building they are in is not heated, so with this weeks temperatures, they may keep for awhile yet.
The landowner was interested in a taxidermist providing full body mounts depicting the fight, but after getting a quote of $1500 per animal (or $3000 total), he gave up on that idea.
Ill probably be going back down there to hunt some more this Saturday, so if I see the landowner will ask what he does with them.
Its just a shame that something like this happened, but that is life in the wild.
One has to wonder that with these two bucks being in/from the same area, if the smaller was an offspring of the larger, and if its possible this was a father/son dual to the death, in which neither realized who they were battling against.
