Velvet

The picture might be a bit fuzzy, but then, so are the antlers.

This lovely big buck, with his antlers all in summer velvet, was photographed in our back fields (in fact, that's one of the wings of a cross country jump in the background, so I can tell exactly where he was standing!)

Sheri, Bill, Alli and Zack have seen this chap at least twice. They are doing very well in the wildlife spotting department, having found a wild turkey feather, spotted the fox twice (on his way to the chicken coop, in fact), and tallied up a whole passle of deer.

For those unfamiliar with teh whitetail deer, the bucks will shed their antlers every winter, after the breeding season. It's very hard to find those lovely antlers -- mice and porcupines will chew them up very quickly.  Come spring, the boys start to grow a handsome new set of antlers.  To provide blood flow to these growing racks, the antlers are covered in a soft velvety skin  The antlers themselves are soft at this point, and can be damaged, resulting in a crooked antler.  

In the autumn, as the antlers begin to harden, the velvet dries up and drops off. Bucks will polish that ragged velvet remnant off their handsome antlers by thrashing the antlers against small pliable trees -- we have several around the resort property that show the signs of this antler polishing behaviour.  Once they are all polished up, the antlers are ready to be presented to the does -- nothing like that to impress the ladies -- and also to provide a caution to the young bucks who might challenge the big guns for those same ladies.

8 Points for Brian, a Partial Score...

Undaunted by the rain showers we had today, Brian and David went exploring in the woods. They do this from time to time, on the 600 acres wilderness that is part of Bondi, checking out possible new ski or snowshoe trails, scoping out the wildlife (this is how they found the wolf den, for example) and generally just beating about the bush.

They almost always find something of interest to drag home with them. Brian, in particular, has a knack of bringing back "cool stuff" from all of his excursions, be they in the woods or to the local dump. It is a topic his wife prefers not be deeply explored...

When he pulled up outside my door and tooted the truck horn to get my attention, I didn't know what to expect. And I certainly didn't expect what the boys had found. The truck was decked out like a Texas Red-neck special.

This is the skull of an 8 point buck, who evidently got on the wrong side of the local wolf pack this winter.

If you can get past the "eeeeww!" factor, it's really quite fascinating. The enormous eye sockets, nasal bones, upper jaw teeth, antler attachments and even the ear canals are easily identified. It's not that common to find bones, and especially antlers -- being rich in calcium, they disappear very quickly into the tummies of porcupines, mice and other scavengers that know the importance of strong bones. This specimen is pretty impressive, and an interesting reminder of how Nature cycles, and re-cycles. It's also a reminder that even on a drizzly day, a walk in the woods is worth taking.