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death by the park The call came at eight-thirty. One of my wardens. A man called to report a dead deer in his back yard. Would I be willing to check it out? Well, the warden's six miles closer (out of seven miles total), but yeah. I'll go. I know he's busy packing for a week-long family camping trip. Aaaand... if I want a CWD sample from this thing (Although we already know it didn't die from CWD. Man said it looked fine and healthy yesterday. That doesn't mean it doesn't have the disease.), it'll have to be pulled tomorrow, in daylight. And it looks like that needs to be me. Did give me a chance for a few sunset shots, as I drove the interstate into town. I recognized the man's name, of course. The same vice-principal we watching receiving worms, both gummy and alive, at the high school graduation last month. But I didn't know he lived right next to the park where the deer all like to hang out. He said he's had 50 deer at a time in his yard. And this isn't the first one to die there. No idea why this young buck died. Lots of blood foaming out the mouth, but he was horribly bloated by the summer heat, so that doesn't necessarily mean much. A small bald area in the lower belly, with bubbles of blood just under the skin. Perhaps a result of advanced decomp, or perhaps some sort of injury. Much too rank for almost all the possible lab tests. No need, nor point, to hauling the carcass to the lab. I warned the vice-P we would probably never know why it died. He was cool with that. As I drug the heavy, wobbly mass of what used to be deer out to the street, I found out the V-P's daughter has been working for our outfit as a temp for two years. Up in grizzly country, working on brucellosis research. She even managed to get her father up there to help trap elk. This spring, while I was following our collared elk from the air, she was on foot and horseback tracking and picking up the radio transmitters they had inserted into pregnant cow elk last winter. Elk gives birth, and the transmitter falls out with the calf and starts broadcasting. Tells you exactly when, and more importantly where, those cows were going to calve out. He says she likes the work. Well, yeah. Duh. About the only drawback to her job would be the bears. Me, I get to wait until the sun rises tomorrow, and then I get to cut the throat of a really stinky deer carcass and get the lymph nodes for testing. Maybe I'll try the new cutting technique... |
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