Well you won’t see deer showing up at the Loudoun lost and found in search of their antlers but they are starting to drop them now so it’s a good time to be on the look out as you walk along a trail.
Last year, looking out towards our birdfeeder area from my indoor window perch, I spotted something new on the ground….it looked like a stick of sorts but it also looked a little different. So, out I went to check it out. Upon inspection I discovered it was a deer antler. After all these years of seeing deer through our yard, I often wondered where all the antlers were and why I hadn’t stumbled across one. I thought it was a neat nature memento and brought it inside. I like knowing that this antler is from one of the deer that calls our yard home and I still have it today, sitting on a side table in our study.
We had a nice little article in the Habitat Herald about deer and their antlers a few years ago that tells about how deer grow antlers and what happens to them out in the environment. Here’s a fun fact from that article: “The younger the deer, the longer it keeps its antlers. A deer with a full rack of antlers in May is much younger than a deer that lost its antlers in January.” It’s a pretty interesting article, worth clicking on the link above for a quick read.