Velvet in November????

[wkydu]

I killed this buck in Calloway County. He still has what looks to be velvet that has turned white on his antlers. He had a rip in the bottom of his stomach that was not bleeding and looked to be somewhat old. You can see it just below the exit hole. My thoughts are that whatever ripped his stomach open also messed something up with his man rocks and caused his antlers not to fully harden. If you look close at the tips of his antlers there is still dried blood. Am I missing something here or is this just because he was injured. Comments?

[killer]

Guy I know killed a buck the same way (no wound though), about 10 years ago in November.

[quackrstackr]

Sounds dead on to me. A coworker's son killed one like that last year.

[Multidigits]

You answered your own question.....he has an injury to his nuts and he's likely sterile and has less teresterone than a normal buck.

[wkydu]

Shortly after I killed it I sent the pictures to a friend of mine that is a green jeans. He sent it to a biologist and this is the reply:

It's almost always caused by an injury to the testicles, as the hunter has read. The only other known cause is an abnormal hormone release. The antlers keep growing, and as is seen in his photo, the tips will continue to grow and will usually be injured as the buck walks around or spars. If the injury was severe enough to be permanent, he would most likely keep his antlers in velvet and would continually keep adding bone. If we had a severe winter with prolonged freezing temperatures, the blood vessels would constrict, blood flow would be stopped and the antlers would freeze and probably drop off.

If the injury was not permanent, he would go back to normal growth whenever it healed.

I've seen it several times, but only one time that I can remember when the injury to the testicles was completely obvious. I think that most injuries heal (at least outwardly) and cannot be seen by an external examination.