Skull with antlers still attached...can you take it?

[Bean Counter]

how do you explain all the skulls we have laying around the house or in the garage?  Do you all keep tags with them?  I surely dont have a tag on every head in my garage.

Tags are to be kept with the largest portion of meat remaining--not the hides/skull.

[boneaddict]

I picked this one up in Idaho last year.  I left it and found a warden...showed him the pics, presumed it was winterkill as it was intact and where it was and then got the OK to go back and get it.

[boneaddict]

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[WAPITIHUNTER]

Look at the back tine on that thing. . Nice find Bone.

[boneaddict]

He has alot of moss too which I love.  I can't believe he tried to winter where he was.  HOLY MOLY

[andrew_12gauge]

Unfortunately the laws in this state are pretty clear on this. Dead animals must be left to lay where they are and may not be kept. Even winter kill animals with obvious signs that it was not taken recently must be discarded.
I know that most of us are law abiding citizens and would never poach an animal only to return later to claim our prize but it's obvious that these laws exist for some reason so it's a pretty good bet that Simone somewhere sometime ago shot a critter left it and returned later to claim it.
That sucks.

that is exactly why these types of laws exist a guy did exactly that in colorado several years ago, he would go out and shoot muley bucks during the late elk seasons and then hang the heads in the trees until spring go back and get the skulls and claim them as winter kills exactly why laws like this are in place

[boneaddict]

THere are exceptions to this law.  You can notify the WDFW with either phot evidence or give them the GPS and they may give you permission to obtian the skull.  You risk them taking it, but that is one legal way to keep it.  I know a gal who got to keep a sheep skull she found last spring.  I thought no way, but they ok'd it.  She left it in the field like a good citizen.  Of course she risked someone less law abiding taking it, but now its legally hers.

NM operates the same way.

[MtnMuley]

Glad you got the skull bone!  You deserved it.  This law hurts us law obiding hunters, yet prevents the culls from whacking several nice bucks in the winter and picking up their horns in the spring.  It used to be amazing how the same people would keep finding these huge winterkills every year...

[a.lee.hagen]

I frequently hunt for chantrelles in an undisclosed forest and came across a very obviously long dead 5x5 elk skull... the thing is green and nibbled on...  This is before I considered or thought about taking up bow hunting.  I had no second thoughts about bringing my treasure home and it has been posted on my garage ever since.

[carpsniperg2]

that one bone found is cool.

[bankwalker]

i found a 2x5 double droptine (2pt on one side, and 5pt on the other with 2 droptines) blacktail skeleton quite a few years ago. my uncle wouldnt let me take the skull cause it was all smelly and gross (it would have been in the bed of his truck, heaven forbid that). this was well before i knew about the laws regarding taking a skull with antlers.

anyway i left it sitting on the stump next to the pull off, and was gonna have my dad meet up with me so i can take it home. as we pulled away some guy pulled up and grabbed it. my uncle wouldnt stop and let me hide it...he is a jerk.

it was the most heart breaking day to watch someone else take it. and i know i will never ever see anything like that again.

[huntnphool]

Well at least you can sleep well at night knowing you did the right thing and didn't break the law, I bet the guy that grabbed it can't sleep at all.

[alecvg]

Well at least you can sleep well at night knowing you did the right thing and didn't break the law, I bet the guy that grabbed it can't sleep at all.

LOL, I am sure!

[Deep Forks]

  I have found a couple muley skulls with horns attached that had died from unknown causes (they were not connected to the body) and I took them.  They were close to a year old or so and in one case there were some bones around the site.  I know several wardens and under the circumstances of these two finds I don't believe they would give a hoot.  I know one warden who has a trophy bull and buck in his house and he never shot them.  Road kills are a different story, when you have to cut the horns off the skull or head off the spine that's wrong.
But when you find a skull and horns from an animal that has been dead long enough that predator's have separated the body parts and the meat and hair are non-exsistant, that's a lucky find

[littlebuf]

i left a nice 4x4 mule deer skull in the woods this last bear season. i cant break the game laws myself and then bitch about people breaking game laws. i think its called integrity.