I was hiking through my bush last week and saw this...or should I say I SMELLED this.
The pictures are in a sequence but it hardly matters.
I hesitated to post it as some people might not be accustomed to the raw side of nature.
The total length of the bones in picture # 1 is about 4 feet...hoof to hip so I would guess this was not a fully mature moose.
My 'recreation' of events is that at some time she got a piece of rope snagged around her leg/hoof and couldn't get it off.
Like most animals she would have panicked and tried to run away and most likely at some point got it further snagged in something...tree,branch...etc making things worse.
If that was what caused her demise it was is a question we'll never know but I have little doubt it 'contributed'.
I have provided a closeup shot I took of the rope and it seems obvious that it is NOT tied around her leg in any way so she wasn't a 'captive', just the bad luck to encounter a VERY stout piece of nylon climbing-type rope.
I say 'she' because I found most of the bones save any antlers and therefore concluded it was not a male.
The females do not grow antlers except I believe in the reindeer and elk group.
It's a kind and at the same time startling warning!
ReplyDeleteTony
Poor girl..shows one what happens when you panic! Awesome story board!
ReplyDeleteDocumentation of real life. What puzzles me is the white bone has been there for some time and the poor girl's leg still has the coat on it.
ReplyDeleteMother Nature is certainly efficient when it comes to getting rid of the dead, I can imagine the stench though because we've come across kangaroo carcasses in the bush and it t'aint roses!
ReplyDeleteThe only answer to the bone question might be that as usual around here, wolves, coyotes or other scavengers have been at it and maybe one was stripped before the others.
ReplyDeleteThe bones were very scattered so I know they had been moved by critters and I only ASSUME the whiter bone is from her...I don't know enough about anatomy to be certain.
Interesting post...It reminds me of my husband's find in our treebelt this summer. Like you, he smelled it before he saw it...a robin tangled up in some bale netting that it was gathering to make a nest...and hanging dead in the tree. Nature's ways can pull at your heartstrings some days.
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