8 point grossed me out
Earlier this month the game cam on our deck captured a couple of shots of nice little 8pt buck. A couple of days ago Judy and I noticed an odor in the yard and because of the swirling wind couldn't locate the source. Well yesterday I found it. Yup it is the 8pt and he looks to have been dead for a while. The problem is he is in the muck in the marshy corner of the pond hidden by the tall grass that I don't mow because of the soft ground. Last night just before dark I scoped it out from 10 feet away and he looked to have already slipped about half his hair and is bloated like a balloon. This morning I booted and gloved up to see if I can get close enough to get a rope on him. As I got closer in the daylight I realized the hair was all off the hide and the spots I thought were hair were moving. I have never seen so many maggots. Look to be several layers deep covering half the deer and probably a 3 foot radius around it in the muck. Can't get to him with the boat. Can't get to him from shore because of the muck. Guess we won't be having the windows open for a while. Because of the covering of maggots I can't see if he is the victim of poachers or maybe had been struck by a car. Whatever it was weakened him enough to not be able to extricate himself from the muck. Maybe when nature is done with him I can at least recover the antlers. Love seeing the deer around the house and have hunted for 50 years or so but to have a deer wasted like this is upsetting, to say the least 
Bob
Bob
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It could of succumbed to EHD.
We had a bad bout of it 3-4 years ago.
Wiped out hundreds of deer in our area.
Most were found near water with little to no sign of any animal or even buzzard feeding on the carcass.0 -
Lime - bags of it...
And sugar sand or sand box sand...
Copious dump of kitty litter...
Kerosene would do wonders but could get into the ground water and will draw strong objections from a few here...
Your township or municipality public works or roads dept folk should be able to tell you what they use and what their procedure is (and might help you out for a nominal fee)
I would have strong concerns about the close proximity to your home and outbuildings - letting it lie might seem to follow nature's plan but is fraught with peril and Heath concerns.
Mike0 -
You could pick the brain of your local F&G biologist.
It could be something he should know about.
Watch for a larger buck.0 -
Deer die from lots of things. If he is that far gone it won't take long for nature to consume the rest. If you get a rope on him you may just pull the carcass apart trying to pull him out. 0 -
We got 'em dying here in the NC mountains of black tongue. They are usually found in or near water, dead. 0 -
Backhoe and a wood chipper...
Mike0 -
We get these visitors when there's anything dead near our house. They're the most useful birds on the planet. 0 -
Smitty500mag wrote:We get these visitors when there's anything dead near our house. They're the most useful birds on the planet.
Aren't those Obama Chickens?0 -
Ugh sorry. That is disheartening and gross 0 -
As suggested before a couple of bags of lime, granulated if available, will "clear" the air around your place. 0 -
If you had a back hoe bury it! Using a wood chipper would be ridiculous. You would convert the problem to thousands of problems. 0 -
While suggesting using a wood chipper was meant to be humorous - not taken seriously in a case like this were decay and deterioration - liquification was so far advanced...
I know folks who will dispose of some dead pest a varmint animal corpses this way mixed with night soil and mulch for garden beds or non edible cover plants...
Acts like fertilizer I am told.
Like planting corn along with fish parts (Plymouth Rock ring a bell / the first thanksgiving)
So while we can chuckle - it's not out of the realm of possibility.
Mike0 -
it could have been much more gross. as i have wtnessed a cow carcasse doing the wiggling as the OP saw, as i was coverning my mouth and nostrils i then watched as an opposumm eat/claw its way out of the anal area. thats when the puking began in full force 0 -
Thanks for the suggestions. Backhoe is out - can't get it to where I need it. Not sure about the lime as it would all eventually get into the pond - have to do a little research. Wood chipper gave me a laugh Mike. My little area of Michigan is locally famous for the population of turkey buzzards but between the 4 foot tall grass and the muck immediately around the deer, they have flown over but can't find a place to land.
Besides the smell I am upset because this was the nicest rack I've seen around here in years. I don't hunt locally because it seems the neighbors never let a deer get more than 1 1/2 years old. One year we had a 3 legged doe around all winter and the next year 2 yearlings with 2 inch grooves cut across the top of their shoulders. So not only aren't they discriminate about what they shoot at they can't shoot for crap. Bob0 -
I'm thinking that your going to have to put up with the smell until nature takes it's course. 0 -
+10 and it will stay bad as long as it stays moist from the pond, on dry land once it dries and mummyfies the odor does recede a bit, unless you are worried about fish, I don't think the hurt the pond, should lower/raise the ph, can't remember high school chemisty, but if it is slightly touching the water I don't think it would help a lot, as it dries the carcass out and if it is staying wet from pond/swamp it may not help........... we keep a bag of garden lime in the outhouse at cabin, with a cup in it, after each "use" just dip cup lime and sprinkle over the deposit, there is literally no smell in the outhouse, or at least not that knock you over when you open the door smell.wiplash wrote:I'm thinking that your going to have to put up with the smell until nature takes it's course.0 -
Back in the 50s and 60s I would see swollen up cows and hogs floating down the river quiet often after a heavy rain that caused flooding upstream from where I lived. Sometimes the current where the French Broad met the Holston River just before it formed the Tennessee River would cause the debris including the dead animals to turn and come back into the area where my grandpa had his Three Rivers Boat Dock & Resturant located. That would require my grandpa and uncle to tow those stinking animals with their boat back out further into the current to get them to go on down the river. 0 -
Reminds me of a couple of movies. Rob Roy, where poor Rob, while diving off the hanging bridge escapes by gutting and hiding inside a dead rotting cow carcass along the river bank.
Then Dances With Wolves where Kevin Cosner finds the pond that was the fresh water source for the fort, has been contaminated by Indians putting dead deer carcasses into the pond.0 -
So, you are saying the Backstraps are out of consideration? 0 -
Virginia G&F are reporting just what you saw in 2 counties, Franklin and Bedford. They say it is a disease spurred by drought.
Sounds like BS to me!
https://www.wdbj7.com/content/news/Virginia-officials-say-deer-deaths-caused-by-viral-outbreak-562161351.html
"We?re closing in on 100 reports from about 28 counties and about 200 deer, so it?s a pretty active year, especially here in the local area -- Franklin and Bedford counties,? Department of Game and Inland Fisheries Regional Deer Project Coordinator Matt Knox said."0 -
bustedknee wrote:Virginia G&F are reporting just what you saw in 2 counties, Franklin and Bedford. They say it is a disease spurred by drought.
Sounds like BS to me!
https://www.wdbj7.com/content/news/Virginia-officials-say-deer-deaths-caused-by-viral-outbreak-562161351.html
"We?re closing in on 100 reports from about 28 counties and about 200 deer, so it?s a pretty active year, especially here in the local area -- Franklin and Bedford counties,? Department of Game and Inland Fisheries Regional Deer Project Coordinator Matt Knox said."
Since I made the original post the news has been talking about eastern equine encephalitis Or EEE for short. Spread by mosquitos to animals and humans. Serious enough that they have been doing mosquito control by crop dusting planes in some counties including mine. A bunch of deer, dogs and even a couple of wolves in a zoo have died from EEE. I was told my deer was to far gone to check but they already knew about other incidents in this county. The first frost will take care of the mosquitos. Bob0 -
Can't get close enough to lasso the antlers? How good a cowboy are ya? 0 -
We have found 6 dead deer in the creeks here in the NC mountains in the past 2 months. Got to be that blue tongue.
Just last week my brother found a buck with a giant 10 point rack laying on the creek bed. Biggest rack I ever have seen in real life.
Season is 8 weeks away, so, it might have been a poacher, just 40 feet off the road, otherwise blue tongue.0
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