I Love The New Camera...

I finally got pictures of one of the bucks that hangs out at mom's. This guy is not one I have seen around before...I think he is looking for love...
From the front he is beautiful! High and wide. What a perfect shot that this would be!!. From the side, you can see he is just a younger buck...
Just a 3x3. His rack is a bit interesting though. While he has three obvious tines on the left side, he only has a fork on the right. That small tine sticking up at the base of his antlers is called a brow tine and they do count if they are over a couple inches long. He only has the one tall brow tine though. The other side is is either to small to see or he doesn't have one.
People used to gauge a buck's age by the number of tines he had on each side of his antlers. But over the years, studies have proved that the size, shape and number of tines each buck will get is genetic. Optimum growth still has to a lot to do with nutrition though. Huh-sounds like raising horses doesn't it-hehe...gotta start with good genetics and then make sure they have the proper nutrients to achieve optimum growth.

For awhile we had a buck around that had super tall antlers, but they were extremely narrow, he managed to survive a few hunting seasons and pretty soon we were seeing a lot of young bucks with very tall tines, but extremely narrow. That fall, my step-dad asked one of the hunters to cull him as narrow racks are not very desirable. Down at my brothers' and my ranch, my middle brother hunted a monster buck for a couple of years, but never got him. He had a "dropped" tine on each side. A dropped tine is a tine that points downward rather than up. Within a couple of years, almost all of the bucks the hunters took had a dropped tine on one side or both.

The baby bucks all have to start somewhere though and most yearling and two year old bucks start out with a spike or a fork horn rack. They usually get another tine or two each year they grow their horns back, until they have reached their max potential. When they are young(or very old), the main beams are not as thick as a fully mature and in his prime buck. Body wise though, this guy looks to be pretty close to mature and prime. He may have a bit bigger rack next year, but I think he may be about maxed out. This is a mule deer. We have two types of deer in SD-Muley's and Whitetails. They are very easy to tell apart-size, color, rack shape and their tails are very different from each other. My mom's yard used to be filled with Whitetails, but the Muley's have taken over this year. Occasionally, you will see them together, but the species do not cross breed.

And then there was the dirty little Shooter...

He was trying to play with Strawberry across the fence. Typical of a baby though, he spotted his friend and decided he wanted to see what he was up too...
Red Dog is only too happy to oblige his buddy and while Shooter taunts him with that soft, fuzzy nose, Red Dog happily snaps at the air...
These two are hilarious to watch together. Red Dog will wander aimlessly (so he wants you to think) into Shooter's pasture and wait for his big brown buddy to spot him. Shooter is always happy to give chase, running and stomping like he is gonna turn the fat Red Dog into a bloody stain. They make huge loops and when RD thinks Shooter is getting just a bit to enthusiastic with those feet, he makes a dash for the fence. Shooter would like to play the game with Ute too, but Ute don't want nuthin to do with that, he runs for cover the second Shooter drops his head. Guess I don't have to worry about my colt being cowy-LOL. He loves to track the cats too-ornery little stink!!