... and a question as to what to do about that tailgate.
So, I’m outside cleaning up leaves near my wood piles, when my wife comes out to tell me there’s an injured deer in the front yard. I go around the house to check it out, and it’s a good sized 6-point whitetail buck. I shoo her inside, figuring I’d rather just have to worry about myself if he decides to charge, and observe him for several minutes.
There was no sign of injury. No blood, no broken antlers, no limping... but there was something clearly wrong with him. He was struggling with balance, seemed to be unaware of my presence, and was just walking in a 10-foot circle. He must have circled 50 times in ten minutes, as he slowly made his way around towards my wood piles in the back. He ran into a few obstacles, losing his balance each time, and I was not able to scare him off with yelling or hand waving.
My wife looked up the symptoms for rabies, and every item in the description matched this deer, with the exception it was not aggressive (the article did say “may” be aggressive, not “would” be aggressive). After some phone tag between the state police and the game warden (who had no officers on duty), and my admission that I was inside the 150 yard perimeter to occupied structures required for discharging a firearm in PA, the state police finally agreed to come put him down for me.
Long story short, the cop maybe wasn’t the best shot, as his attempted chest shot at 10 yards hit the deer in the ass. The deer went down, but pretty quickly jumped up and ran into the tailgate of my new-to-me (and very clean) truck 50 feet away. Nice crease in the new tailgate.
After a bit of corralling it around the yard, it fell into a ravine, and he was able to finish it off. The game warden sent one of their contractors out that evening to retrieve the carcass.
Fun story, and perhaps a candidate for the Farmer’s Insurance “we’ve seen it all, because we’ve covered it all” commercials, but now I’m trying to figure out what to do about that tailgate. I resisted asking the guy for a police report, so I could claim it. After all, he was just there to help me out, and I don’t really feel like negating the donations I’ve made to the various police fundraisers this year.
Since there’s no paint damage, I’ve heard there are folks that work out a small crease or dent from the back side, but I have no idea how to find or flush out such a service. Any advice?
So, I’m outside cleaning up leaves near my wood piles, when my wife comes out to tell me there’s an injured deer in the front yard. I go around the house to check it out, and it’s a good sized 6-point whitetail buck. I shoo her inside, figuring I’d rather just have to worry about myself if he decides to charge, and observe him for several minutes.
There was no sign of injury. No blood, no broken antlers, no limping... but there was something clearly wrong with him. He was struggling with balance, seemed to be unaware of my presence, and was just walking in a 10-foot circle. He must have circled 50 times in ten minutes, as he slowly made his way around towards my wood piles in the back. He ran into a few obstacles, losing his balance each time, and I was not able to scare him off with yelling or hand waving.
My wife looked up the symptoms for rabies, and every item in the description matched this deer, with the exception it was not aggressive (the article did say “may” be aggressive, not “would” be aggressive). After some phone tag between the state police and the game warden (who had no officers on duty), and my admission that I was inside the 150 yard perimeter to occupied structures required for discharging a firearm in PA, the state police finally agreed to come put him down for me.
Long story short, the cop maybe wasn’t the best shot, as his attempted chest shot at 10 yards hit the deer in the ass. The deer went down, but pretty quickly jumped up and ran into the tailgate of my new-to-me (and very clean) truck 50 feet away. Nice crease in the new tailgate.
After a bit of corralling it around the yard, it fell into a ravine, and he was able to finish it off. The game warden sent one of their contractors out that evening to retrieve the carcass.
Fun story, and perhaps a candidate for the Farmer’s Insurance “we’ve seen it all, because we’ve covered it all” commercials, but now I’m trying to figure out what to do about that tailgate. I resisted asking the guy for a police report, so I could claim it. After all, he was just there to help me out, and I don’t really feel like negating the donations I’ve made to the various police fundraisers this year.
Since there’s no paint damage, I’ve heard there are folks that work out a small crease or dent from the back side, but I have no idea how to find or flush out such a service. Any advice?
