It was the gray dawn hour yesterday, before the sunlight rose and streamed over the ridge to pour onto our north field. The thermometer registered 13°F. As usual, while I dressed, I was looking out the window into the dimness for something interesting along the field’s edge. Suddenly, there appeared to be movement there.
The wary white-tailed buck that I had not seen since November emerged slowly through a curtain of spruce branches and tall grasses into the half-light, ghost-like. He had made it through the hunting season and was in excellent shape. So was his eight-point rack of antlers.
I tossed on a robe, jammed on some slippers, grabbed a camera with a long lens, and snuck out onto the upper deck. (Brrr; don’t tell Barbara.) I got off three, quick 500 mm “shots” in the twilight. He didn’t see me, but he apparently heard the shutter and eased back into the woods, like a passing thought. The day had begun with good news.
In Maine, white-tailed deer bucks shed their antlers during January through March, for the most part. Exactly when they shed them depends on a number of factors, including the following: Age (older bucks usually shed before younger); Stress (the more, the earlier shedding); Nutrition (the better, the later); Testosterone Levels (the higher, the later), and of course that wildcard, Genetics.
(Image taken in Brooklin, Maine, on January 5, 2025.)