SEBEC — A hunter staying at The Rockin P Sporting Lodge called the lodge Saturday morning to say he had just shot an 8-point buck, but upon closer inspection, the buck turned out to be a rare antlered doe.
“I did a little research on the Internet, and it’s like one in 100,000,” said lodge owner Edith Poole who called the Bangor Daily News on Saturday with the news.
Her husband, John Poole, a registered Maine Guide, went to help hunter John Burdick of Paxton, Massachusetts, haul out his take when the discovery was made, she said.
“He wasn’t quite sure what to think,” Game Warden Sara Miller, who went to the hunting lodge to see the animal, said about Paxton. “I think he was a little bit in shock.”
She said while “it does happen,” Saturday’s call was the first time she’s ever responded to such a report.
“The size of the antlers and size of the deer are rare,” Miller said of Paxton’s doe.
In white-tails, antlers allow bucks to advertise and demonstrate their dominance, according to the Maine Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife website.
“White-tailed does sometimes produce antlers, but this is rare,” according to the website. “Does that do sprout antlers typically are older (5 to 15 years old); their antlers are usually velvet-covered spikes. Most antlered does remain fertile.”
Paxton’s doe has no velvet, Miller said.
The antlered doe weighed in at 244 pounds, had a dressed weight of 185 pounds and was tagged out at C&J’s Variety Store in Milo.
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