Bob Long has been hunting for about 30 years and says he was dumbfounded when he shot a white tail deer in Ballard county Sunday November 11, and realized that a part of a second buck was caught in it’s antlers.
“I was pretty excited. I called about three or four different people right there and told them you are not going to believe what just happened to me,” Long said. “I still can’t believe it. I feel very humbled and blessed to be the hunter that shot the deer.”
Long says had seen other bucks that day, but was waiting for the right one. As it was getting closer to night time he spotted the ‘two headed deer’ across a wheat field.
“When I jumped him, most of the time you jump a deer you don’t get a shot. But he stopped twice because he was having such a hard time I guess,” Long said. “When I shot he moved again about 15 yards and I could tell something was wrong. I shot again, and I think that is when I hit him and he took off running.”
Sgt. Tony Dunker with Kentucky Fish and Wildlife says one of Long’s neighbors shared a photo from a game camera as proof the two deer weren’t purposefully put together.
“As far as the naysayers, we’ve got pictures of the deer on the hoof, alive, with that hanging off of him,” Dunker said. “It was not planted on the deer and I really believe them. He’s really excited about it. Probably going to get it mounted that way.”
As far as how this happened, Dunker suspects the second deer had been dead for weeks before the two sets of antlers got locked up.
“That buck was in rut. He is fighting for territory too for does,” Dunker said. “He sees this deer and he doesn’t know. He goes up to it. Tangles up with it and of course he gets hung up. I guess it was decayed enough that it came loose and he packed around a little while until Mr. Long came along.”
Dunker added that Long used one tag for the buck he killed and he was given a carcass tag for the second decaying dear.
Long does not expect to ever match the experience this particular hunt gave him.
“This is a once in a lifetime thing to happen to somebody if your a hunter,” Long said. “It’s an amazing moment that you just never forget. It’d be hard to top that one.”
Long has already taken the deer to a local taxidermist who donated the good meat to Hunters for the Hungry. Long is hoping that his trophy of the interlocking bucks looks the same way the animal did when he harvested it.