Sunday, July 20, 2008

Camera Critter Meme #15

I have several friends in the area who were local policemen. One, a Deschutes County Deputy Sheriff, told me a story which relates to my Camera Critter Meme post this week.

It seems one day many, many moons ago, he was called to the scene of an accident on the main road between two local towns. A man driving a pickup had hit an animal trying to cross the road.

When my friend arrived on the scene (it was getting on close to darkness at the time), he was confronted with a truck with a fairly well damaged front end, the carcass of the unfortunate animal and the driver of the vehicle nearby, possibly in shock.

As the deputy went about his business, he learned the driver was from Texas and was passing through the area when the accident occurred. My friend then continued gathering information for his report and watched as the driver paced back and forth muttering something to himself.

A moment later, the driver walked up to my friend and said, "Damn, I'm from Texas and I always thought we had the largest deer in the world there, but these Oregon deer beat ANYTHING I have ever seen back home. Those antlers are HUGE!"

The driver turned, walked away still muttering, while my friend couldn't help but crack a smile to replace busting out laughing.

It seems the Texan had collided with an Elk, not a Mule Deer and my friend didn't have the heart to correct the driver. And yes, elk have some mighty big racks...especially when farm grown.

8 comments:

Cath said...

Oh wow! what a magnificent beast. And he knows it too - he is posing perfectly for the perfect shot.

A great tale to tell too - no wonder he thought it was a massive deer with antlers like that!

Sandy Kessler said...

Wow what a beauty !! sandy

Mom Knows Everything said...

What a gorgeous picture!

Misty DawnS said...

That is definitely a GORGEOUS creature! WOW! I'd love to see that in person!

This Is My Blog - fishing guy said...

Ash: Great story and a good picture of a nice looking Elk. Thay grow everything big in Texas but this turned out to be an exception. LOL

bcmomtoo said...

I certainly wouldn't want to run into one of those! He's gorgeous.

Lilli & Nevada said...

that is a big one for sure

Gayle said...

What a noble looking creature.