Box Elder County Family Fears Poaching Responsible For Dead Deer
Dec 10, 2018, 10:48 PM
PERRY, Utah — A family is raising concerns of possible poaching, after they spotted a deer Monday morning that appeared to have died under suspicious circumstances.
Amber Earnest and her children said they were leaving their home, off of U.S. Highway 89, when they spotted the deer with antlers several feet from their extended driveway in an orchard.
“When I got to it, it was not stiff at all,” Earnest said. “It was pretty freshly dead.”
Though Earnest said she did not hear a gunshot prior to leaving, the deer had an entry wound in its side that looked like a gunshot wound.
Earnest said her teenage son came home at lunchtime to help inspect the deer further.
“We just kind of flipped him over and fresh blood started coming out of the gun wound,” she said. “It’s pretty sad. It kind of broke my heart when I saw him.”
Spokesman Mark Hadley said Utah Division of Wildlife Resource officers had not yet inspected the deer as of Monday evening, but were planning to take a closer look at it Tuesday morning.
Hadley said no big game hunts were being held near Perry, but officers were holding off on calling the matter poaching until they could see the animal up close.
Earnest said she did not believe the deer had been shot in the mountains above her home, since family members thought they had seen the deer roaming the property over the past week along with a few others.
Earnest photographed the two deer the previous Monday.
“They just stopped and stared at me for a little while, and so I sat there and took a few pictures,” Earnest said of two deer with antlers she photographed the previous Monday. “He’s just very majestic and very beautiful, and I don’t see this big of a buck around here very often.”
The deer’s antlers were still intact when the remains were found.
“I don’t know if someone’s been watching this particular buck for a while,” she said.
Still, Earnest said she feared an act of poaching was in play.
“This isn’t like a normal place for people to even hunt in these orchards,” Earnest said. “That makes me pretty nervous.”
