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Roping a Deer


zeitgeist57

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I LOL'd reading this one...:lol:

 

 

 

ROPING A DEER

 

 

 

Names have been removed to protect the stupid!

 

Actual letter from someone who writes and farms.

 

 

 

I had this idea that I was going to rope a deer, put it in a stall, fatten

 

it up on corn for a couple of weeks, then kill it and eat it.

 

 

 

The first step in this adventure was getting a deer. I figured that, since

 

they congregate at my cattle feeder and do not seem to have much fear of me

 

when we are there (a bold one will sometimes come right up and sniff at

 

the bags of feed while I am in the back of the truck not 4 feet away), it

 

should not be difficult to rope one, get up to it and toss a bag over its

 

head (to calm it down) then hog tie it and transport it home. I filled the

 

cattle feeder then hid down at the end with my rope.

 

 

 

The cattle, having seen the roping thing before, stayed well back. They

 

were not having any of it.

 

 

 

After about 20 minutes, my deer showed up -- 3 of them. I picked out a

 

likely looking one, stepped out from the end of the feeder, and threw my

 

rope. The deer just stood there and stared at me.

 

 

 

I wrapped the rope around my waist and twisted the end so I would have a

 

good hold. The deer still just stood and stared at me, but you could tell it

 

was mildly concerned about the whole rope situation.

 

 

 

I took a step towards it...it took a step away. I put a little tension on

 

the rope and then received an education. The first thing that I learned is

 

that, while a deer may just stand there looking at you funny while you

 

rope it, they are spurred to action when You start pulling on that rope.

 

 

 

That deer EXPLODED.

 

 

 

The second thing I learned is that pound for pound, a deer is a LOT stronger

 

than a cow or a colt. A cow or a colt in that weight range I could fight

 

down with a rope and with some dignity.

 

 

 

A deer-- no chance.

 

 

 

That thing ran and bucked and twisted and pulled. There was no controlling

 

it and certainly no getting close to it. As it jerked me off my feet and

 

started dragging me across the ground, it occurred to me that having a Deer

 

on a rope was not nearly as good an idea as I had originally imagined.

 

 

 

The only upside is that they do not have as much stamina as many other

 

animals.

 

 

 

A brief 10 minutes later, it was tired and not nearly as quick to jerk me

 

off my feet and drag me when I managed to get up. It took me a few minutes

 

to realize this, since, I was mostly blinded by the blood flowing out of the

 

Big gash in my head. At that point, I had lost my taste for corn-fed

 

venison. I just wanted to get that devil creature off the end of that rope.

 

 

 

I figured if I just let it go with the rope hanging around its neck, it

 

would likely die slow and painfully somewhere.

 

 

 

At the time, there was no love at all between me and that deer. At that

 

moment, I hated the thing, and I would venture a guess that the feeling was

 

mutual. Despite the gash in my head and the several large knots where I had

 

cleverly arrested the deer's momentum by bracing my head against various

 

large rocks as it dragged me across the ground, I could still think clearly

 

enough to recognize that there was a small chance that I shared some tiny

 

amount of responsibility for the situation we were in, so I didn't want

 

the deer to suffer a slow death, so I managed to get it lined back up in

 

between my Truck and the feeder a little trap I had set before hand...kind

 

of like a squeeze chute.

 

 

 

I got it to back in there and I started moving up so I could get my rope

 

back.

 

 

 

Did you know that deer bite? They do! I never in a million years would have

 

thought that a deer would bite somebody, so I was very surprised when I

 

reached up there to grab that rope and the deer grabbed hold of my wrist.

 

 

 

Now, when a deer bites you, it is not like being bit by a horse where they

 

just bite you and then let go. A deer bites you and shakes its head --almost

 

like a pit bull. They bite HARD and it hurts.

 

 

 

The proper thing to do when a deer bites you is probably to freeze and draw

 

back slowly. I tried screaming and shaking instead. My method was

 

ineffective.

 

 

 

It seems like the deer was biting and shaking for several minutes, but it

 

was likely only several seconds.

 

 

 

I, being smarter than a deer (though you may be questioning that claim by

 

now) tricked it. While I kept it busy tearing my right arm to sheds, I

 

reached up with my left hand and pulled that rope loose. That was when I got

 

my final lesson in deer behavior for the day.

 

 

 

Deer will strike at you with their front feet. They rear right up on their

 

back feet and strike right about head and shoulder level, and their hooves

 

are surprisingly sharp.

 

 

 

I learned a long time ago that, when an animal -- like a horse -strikes at

 

you with their hooves and you can't get away easily, the best thing to do is

 

try to make a loud noise and make an aggressive move towards the animal.

 

This will usually cause them to back down a bit so you can escape.

 

 

 

This was not a horse. This was a deer, so obviously, such trickery would not

 

work. In the course of a millisecond, I devised a different strategy.

 

 

 

I screamed like a woman and tried to turn and run. The reason I had always

 

been told NOT to try to turn and run from a horse that paws at you is that

 

there is a good chance that it will hit you in the back of the head.

 

 

 

Deer may not be so different from horses after all, besides being twice as

 

strong and 3 times as evil, because the second I turned to run, it hit me

 

right in the back of the head and knocked me down.

 

 

 

Now, when a deer paws at you and knocks you down, it does not immediately

 

leave. I suspect it does not recognize that the danger has passed. What they

 

do instead is paw your back and jump up and down on you while you are laying

 

there crying like a little girl and covering your head.

 

 

 

I finally managed to crawl under the truck and the deer went away.

 

 

 

So now I know why when people go deer hunting they bring a rifle with a

 

scope so that they can be somewhat equal to the Prey.

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