Mike: I found this big old shed hanging in a pine tree. A fellow shed hunter south of me found the match 2 years ago and we thought that shed was one year old then.
I have walked passed this tree 20 times in the last few years and never spotted it. Amazing how you just miss the simple ones!—Kelly K. from South Dakota
Thanks Kelly, I find several things fascinating about your find.
Apparently the buck was rubbing on the tree one winter day when this antler popped off. Maybe the abscission layer that hold the antler on like cement was dissolving and getting brittle, causing the deer’s head to itch?
Also, that rub on the pine has been there awhile, likely made one day in October or November years ago. Did this buck make that rub, or did he just stop and rub it from time to time (multiple bucks smell and rub the same trees from year to year).
Finally, since the antler had been stuck in that tree for 3 years, I wonder how many different bucks had come by and seen it and maybe rubbed the tree above it anyway? It is quite possible that the buck that lost this antler came by the following fall and maybe the next and rubbed the pine again.
That’s a great shedhunting story! Awesome. I have only ever found two sheds in trees- one was taken up a tree and chewed by a porcupine and the other was to a big, massive NT stuck in a willow tree on a riverbank. I remember seeing that one from a long ways away and I’m still wondering how he did that. Thanks for sharing.
Mike I think a lot of us hunters miss sheds due to us being so used to looking for whitetails on our way into the woods, or worried about other things so we don’t pay attention to the details sometimes on our way in. It’s an interesting thought to think this buck may have rubbed the same tree his rack is stuck in and very possible lol Cool post and Kelly congrats on a neat find bud!