Strange Infection on Buck's Head
12-02-2003, 04:27 PM
#1
Thread Starter
Join Date: Feb 2003
Location: Harford Co. Maryland
Posts: 1,574
Strange Infection on Buck's Head
Hello all,
Saturday marked the opening day of rifle season in Maryland and I was lucky enough to tag a decent-sized 7 pointer. When I walked up to the deer and began gutting it, I soon noticed that the deer had some pus oozing from a spot behind its left antler. My first thought was that this must have been a puncture wound from a fight, but on Sunday I cut the anlters off of the deer and removed the fur and hide from it and found two "BB" sized holes in the skull, where the infection seemed to have been eating away at the deer's skull. Has anyone seen anything like this before? Do you think it was caused by a fight? The holes in the deer's head do not look as if an antler tip could have caused them- they just look like they were eaten away by the infection.
Take a look at the attached photo where you can see the holes and you can also see where the infection had discolored part of the deer's antler.
I'm curious to get some answers on this.
Saturday marked the opening day of rifle season in Maryland and I was lucky enough to tag a decent-sized 7 pointer. When I walked up to the deer and began gutting it, I soon noticed that the deer had some pus oozing from a spot behind its left antler. My first thought was that this must have been a puncture wound from a fight, but on Sunday I cut the anlters off of the deer and removed the fur and hide from it and found two "BB" sized holes in the skull, where the infection seemed to have been eating away at the deer's skull. Has anyone seen anything like this before? Do you think it was caused by a fight? The holes in the deer's head do not look as if an antler tip could have caused them- they just look like they were eaten away by the infection.
Take a look at the attached photo where you can see the holes and you can also see where the infection had discolored part of the deer's antler.
I'm curious to get some answers on this.
12-02-2003, 05:13 PM
#2
Typical Buck
Join Date: Feb 2003
Location: Free Union, VA
Posts: 750
RE: Strange Infection on Buck's Head
I would contact your state biologist on this one. See if they can give you any information. Maryland has a pretty decent web site that lists several parasites. It was useful tome in findout out that the parasite I found on my deer was a "nasal blot" and not harmful to humans.
http://www.dnr.state.md.us/wildlife/deerdisease.html
try to contact someone there and they may be able to help you.
David
http://www.dnr.state.md.us/wildlife/deerdisease.html
try to contact someone there and they may be able to help you.
David
