Ohio Hunter shoots an elk thinking it was a deer

[Pete112288]

So I dont know if anyone has seen this story before but I found it and had to chuckle a little.
http://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/local/2009/12/05/ANELK.ART_ART_12-05-09_B1_GLFT8LM.html
This guy hunting deer in Ohio shot this bull elk cause he thought it was a deer.
I love what one of the officials said "it was a bull elk... a big one"
The weight they said it was made me chuckle, I know since they likely never delt with elk before like that, they may not know. Or maybe I am just too used to the elk I hunt. I have shot 2 nice cows and just meat and front & rear quarter bones weighed in at 350-375.
The other thing that made me chuckle, and it does every time I talk to someone that hunts farther east in the country. The way we call the points on an animal. Like the bull in this story I would call a little 4 by 5 rather than a big 9 point rack. I know its not a big deal and its mostly because our west side way is all I have ever known so it sounds funny to me. If I heard someone got a 9 point bull I automaticlly invision a HUGE monster or just a crazy non-typical rack.
Anyway, check out the story. It made me realize how hard it would be for me to live that far east after being out here, I duno if I could give up all the elk hunting and other game we have here that they dont in the east.

[Eli346]

 I think the same rules apply to wolves in this state since there aren't any, right?

[nwwanderer]

I know the genetics of our elk and the red stag are very similar but that looks more stagy than elky.  Game farm escapee?  Seems likely.

[Pete112288]

That is what I thought. I dont know that much about stags. To me the body looks stag-ish, but I wasnt sure about the antlers.

[BOWHUNTER45]

  THIS HAS HAPPENED MORE THAN ONCE 

[grizzlyadams]

Looks like a mule deer / elk crossbreed to me.


The kill is the satisfying, indeed essential, conclusion to a successful hunt. But, I take no pleasure in the act itself. One does not hunt in order to kill, but kills in order to have hunted. Then why do I hunt? I hunt for the same reason my well-fed cat hunts...because I must, because it is in the blood, because I am the decendent of a thousand generations of hunters. I hunt because I am a hunter.

[RadSav]

reminds me of a Jeff Foxworthy skit

[Curly]

Kind of reminds me of the story of the new elk hunter in Montana who shot a llama thinking it was an elk.  It wasn't until he took it to the butcher that he was informed that it was not an elk. 

[Pete112288]

Sometimes I just dont get how someone can mix up certain animals like this. When I went through hunter's ed in 2004, one of the instructors was a retired gamie, he said he used to work at a check station somewhere around mt st helens, apparently in that area he was at, there had been a bunch of goats get out from a farm years ago and they ran wild for a while. he said for a few years straight there would always be at least one guy roll out of there with a doe tag on a goat. haha

[pianoman9701]

I don't see a problem here except for this statement: ""It was trotting, its head up, like it had been spooked," Tomlin said. "I had just a split second to fire." He saw the dark hair on the animal's belly, and no white on the tail, and knew he had something that would turn into the hunting tale of his life.

He apparently didn't know it wasn't a deer until after he shot. But since they don't have an elk herd there and it wasn't a horse or a llama, good on him for filling up his freezer with good meat!