Sunday, December 02, 2007

Lip Curling and the Past Two Weeks



I have had the distinct pleasure of being away from work for the past two weeks. During this time I have spent most mornings and evenings pursuing wildlife. The time was very productive and I will be posting these images for quite some time to come.

Rutting Whitetail Deer have always fascinated me. During the rut bucks that otherwise are primarily nocturnal begin moving freely in daylight checking scrapes and following does in estrus. This in turn gives the Whitetail Photographer the opportunity he has been waiting for. This image depicts a nice young buck exhibiting the lip-curling or flehmen response as he checks for a doe in estrus.

The window of opportunity for photographing rutting bucks in our area was quite short this year with the rut beginning two weeks late. This in turn allowed only a few days action before the rifle hunting season opened, totally disrupting the deer’s normal patterns. With the opening of the hunting season my attention shifted to birds and watching for road-hunters and unwelcome trespassers.


Deer season has been relatively quiet although yesterday we had an incident on our family farm where a hunting guest of a neighbor thought it his “God Given Right” to shoot onto our property and kill a young fawn and then go and retrieve it with out asking permission. Perhaps this individual has a learning disability and cannot comprehend that no trespassing means to stay the “H…” OUT and that includes his unwelcome bullets!

As a footnote we had a problem with the neighbor (his first year living here) last year when he shot an illegal buck on our property, drove his atv in and retrieved it and our District Conservation Officer, allowed it all to pass with only a warning. The Pennsylvania Game and Wildlife Code provides charges for trespass while hunting as long as another game code violation is present. In this case I believe this officer is so opposed to personal property rights that he allowed an illegal deer kill to go uncharged just to avoid pressing trespass charges. He assured me that this individual had “received his message”, now it is quite apparent that was not the case!

13 comments:

imac said...

That is a well captured photo Salty, love it.
Also the story too, love your photos and info's.
Bit of a naughty man from next door
should kep an eye on him.


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dot said...

Very good shot!
I don't think land owners have many rights any more.

Isadora said...

Looks like s/he's talking back to you :) What a great looking animal.

DeeMom said...

I did not know about the LIP thing, interesting.
AS for the interloper, he should be made to make a monetary donation that would be the $ of the meat killed, and give that amount to the local Food Pantry.

Willard said...

Although we were leaning strongly toward retiring, that is the incident that pushed you over the edge, I think. It took one more to make my decision final.

Annie said...

He didn't confuse you with his first desire, I hope.

photowannabe said...

Great picture of the LIP. I have never seen that before.
I just don't understand some people. Seems to me private property and No Tresspassing means just that.
The Law doesn't seem to be helping you either. Somethings wrong.

Meggie said...

Oh Salty: What a sicko to shoot a fawn and, to add insult to injury, it was on private property. Aren't some people just plain obnoxious?! It's one of the reasons I retired early. Great shot of the handsome buck!

Sand said...

Sometimes Fulton County folks make me so angry. It is obvious that hunting is only thing that matters to these natives. Before we moved we often had issues with neighbors shooting deer on our property even though it was a labeled no trespassing zone. Someone even went as far as to pull into our driveway, shoot a deer in our driveway towards our house. They just assumed they were entitled to the deer because they used to hunt there before we owned the place....15 years ago. Hunting season can be a trying time for neighborly relations.

smilnsigh said...

A magnificent photo but... You seem to have a lot of issues... going on around where you live... in hunting season. :-(

Mari-Nanci

Tom said...

What a great picture of the buck tasting the air... and the look on his eyes..
Sorry to here about the tresspass issues.. I hope this dose not carry on happening and if so the 'Law' pulls it's finger out to charge these cretins.

Unknown said...

Oh I love this photo. I have never seen a buck curl his lip before! Very cool!

Kerri Farley said...

Wow - very neat how you got the Lip curling shot. I never even knew they did that!!

Ditto on all the comments above...and how about a Big fine for the trespasser!!