Why we shoot deer - an excellent deer story, worth the read!

boschboy

Member
Why we shoot deer in the wild (A letter from
someone who wants to remain anonymous, who farms, writes well and actually
tried this)

I had this idea that I could rope a deer, put it in
a stall, feed it up on corn for a couple of weeks, then kill it and eat it.
The first step in this adventure was getting a deer. I figured that, since
they congregate at my cattle feeder and do not seem to have much fear of me
when we are there (a bold one will sometimes come right up and sniff at the
bags of feed while I am in the back of the truck not 4 feet away), it should
not be difficult to rope one, get up to it and toss a bag over its head (to
calm it down) then hog tie it and transport it home.

I filled the cattle feeder then hid down at the end
with my rope. The cattle, having seen the roping thing before, stayed well
back. They were not having any of it. After about 20 minutes, my deer showed
up-- 3 of them I picked out a likely looking one, stepped out from the end
of the feeder, and threw my rope. The deer just stood there and stared at
me. I wrapped the rope around my waist and twisted the end so I would have a
good hold.

The deer still just stood and stared at me, but you
could tell it was mildly concerned about the whole rope situation. I took a
step towards it, it took a step away. I put a little tension on the rope ..,
and then received an education. The first thing that I learned is that,
while a deer may just stand there looking at you funny while you rope it,
they are spurred to action when you start pulling on that rope.

That deer EXPLODED. The second thing I learned is
that pound for pound, a deer is a LOT stronger than a cow or a colt.. A cow
or a colt in that weight range I could fight down with a rope and with some
dignity. A deer-- no Chance. That thing ran and bucked and twisted and
pulled.. There was no controlling it and certainly no getting close to it. As
it jerked me off my feet and started dragging me across the ground, it
occurred to me that having a deer on a rope was not nearly as good an idea
as I had originally imagined. The only upside is that they do not have as
much stamina as many other animals.

A brief 10 minutes later, it was tired and not
nearly as quick to jerk me off my feet and drag me when I managed to get up.
It took me a few minutes to realize this, since I was mostly blinded by the
blood flowing out of the big gash in my head. At that point, I had lost my
taste for corn-fed venison. I just wanted to get that devil creature off the
end of that rope.

I figured if I just let it go with the rope hanging
around its neck, it would likely die slow and painfully somewhere. At the
time, there was no love at all between me and that deer. At that moment, I
hated the thing, and I would venture a guess that the feeling was mutual.
Despite the gash in my head and the several large knots where I had cleverly
arrested the deer's momentum by bracing my head against various large rocks
as it dragged me across the ground, I could still think clearly enough to
recognize that there was a small chance that I shared some tiny amount of
responsibility for the situation we were in. I didn't want the deer to have
to suffer a slow death, so I managed to get it lined back up in between my
truck and the feeder - a little trap I had set before hand...kind of like a
squeeze chute. I got it to back in there and I started moving up so I could
get my rope back.

Did you know that deer bite?

They do! I never in a million years would have
thought that a deer would bite somebody, so I was very surprised when .....
I reached up there to grab that rope and the deer grabbed hold of my wrist.
Now, when a deer bites you, it is not like being bit by a horse where they
just bite you and slide off to then let go. A deer bites you and shakes its
head--almost like a pit bull. They bite HARD and it hurts.

The proper thing to do when a deer bites you is
probably to freeze and draw back slowly. I tried screaming and shaking
instead. My method was ineffective.

It seems like the deer was biting and shaking for
several minutes, but it was likely only several seconds. I, being smarter
than a deer (though you may be questioning that claim by now), tricked it.
While I kept it busy tearing the tendons out of my right arm, I reached up
with my left hand and pulled that rope loose.

That was when I got my final lesson in deer
behavior for the day.

Deer will strike at you with their front feet. They
rear right up on their back feet and strike right about head and shoulder
level, and their hooves are surprisingly sharp... I learned a long time ago
that, when an animal -like a horse --strikes at you with their hooves and
you can't get away easily, the best thing to do is try to make a loud noise
and make an aggressive move towards the animal. This will usually cause them
to back down a bit so you can escape.

This was not a horse. This was a deer, so
obviously, such trickery would not work. In the course of a millisecond, I
devised a different strategy. I screamed like a woman and tried to turn and
run. The reason I had always been told NOT to try to turn and run from a
horse that paws at you is that there is a good chance that it will hit you
in the back of the head. Deer may not be so different from horses after all,
besides being twice as strong and 3 times as evil, because the second I
turned to run, it hit me right in the back of the head and knocked me down.

Now, when a deer paws at you and knocks you down,
it does not immediately leave. I suspect it does not recognize that the
danger has passed. What they do instead is paw your back and jump up and
down on you while you are laying there crying like a little girl and
covering your head.

I finally managed to crawl under the truck and the
deer went away. So now I know why when people go deer hunting they bring a
rifle with a scope......to sort of even the odds!!

All these events are true so help me God... An
Educated Farmer
 
Maybe you need a rifle and a tranquilliser bullet, rather than treating it like a bull.
 
Excellent
:cuckoo: Farmer.
Remember always check for retinal reaction before you get your hands on.
 
what a fantastic farmer,I think I have heard something similar when Gun Slinger started work at a deer farm. Sorry Mart.
 
Now that is a new technique for live capture!!! Mr Alison i will expect to see a video on that one for 2011!!!!! :D:lol::rofl:

ATB

Rob
243Sako
 
Now that is a new technique for live capture!!! Mr Alison i will expect to see a video on that one for 2011!!!!! :D:lol::rofl:

ATB

Rob
243Sako

Hi Rob,

You might see a vid on live capture in 2011, but I'm too old for that technique now mate. Once you get over 50, it kinda hurts!!!

Happy New Year mate,

See you in 2011

Mike.
 
That had me howling, the mental pictures 'Mr Farmer Man' created deserve an Oscar . Simply Brilliant !

Muhamed Ali nearly summed it up with the phrase 'Rope a Dope'... This should read 'Roped BY a Dope' !

Scary when you think about it, how strong these animals really are. Amazing
 
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