Buck Loses Antler To A Coon

Since the invention of trail cameras, hunting has never been the same. Hunters use them to pattern and kill deer and turkeys, and even trappers are using them to figure out when certain critters are in the area.

Trail cameras also let hunters capture some of that wacky and weird stuff that happens in the woods when they’re not there.

The latest eyebrow-raising photo that came into the GON office was sent in by Lynn Robertson, of Winston. For several nights in a row, he had been capturing photos of three raccoons and several small bucks eating at a corn feeder on his hunting property in Douglas County.

At 9:43 p.m. on March 5, Lynn got a picture of a small 4-pointer and a big coon. There was nothing extraordinary about the photo. However, it was the picture snapped at 2:27 a.m. on March 6—less than five hours later—that got Lynn’s attention. The photo is of an antlerless deer feeding on corn while a raccoon fed several feet away with what appears to be a piece of deer antler protruding from its head.

“When I first saw the picture on my camera, I was trying to wrap my head around how it happened or what happened, and I started thinking how the coons and deer had been running each other around my corn feeder,” said Lynn.

Lynn believes there was a tangle between the coon and the small buck, and the result was a hole— complete with a bone souvenir—in the head for the coon.

“It dawned on me when I zoomed in and saw that swelling in the coon’s face that it’s the only thing that could have happened. I would say the buck picked him up, and there was quite a fight that ensued before that antler came off,” said Lynn.

Lynn said three raccoons had been showing up on his camera. However, after the photo was taken at 2:27 a.m. on March 6, only two raccoons have returned. Recent photos have also revealed that the small bucks he had been capturing have all lost their antlers.

Send your wacky Spy-Cam photos to [email protected] or mail to Spy-Cam, 4331 Seven Islands Road, Madison, GA 30650.