'Very disheartening': White-tailed buck shot, left to waste in Potomac

A white-tailed buck deer was shot and left to waste in Potomac last week, and state game officials are offering a cash reward for tips about the incident.

According to the Montana Department of Fish, Wildlife & Parks, a resident reported the buck on Nov. 13, and it was likely shot the day before. The animal was found dead in a field on private property.

The agency announced Monday evening that Warden Chris Hamilton was seeking information about the killing, and that people who submit tips could be eligible for a reward up to $1,000 cash. Tips can submitted directly to Hamilton at 406-210-7513 or anonymously online at tipmont.mt.gov .

Hamilton said in a phone call Tuesday afternoon that there was a small chance the deer was wounded by a legal hunting shot, moved locations and wasn't recovered, but "it doesn't seem as likely" because of where it was found.

After receiving a Potomac resident's call about the deer around 10:30 a.m. on Nov. 13, he said, he traveled to Potomac and performed a field necropsy on the deer. He also contacted nearby residents and asked what they'd seen and heard in the past 24 hours. But that didn't generate any solid leads, "and that's why we're at where we're at now" soliciting public tips.

"Due to the nature of the wound and no snow" on which to see a blood trail, he said, "it was very difficult to determine or even speculate where the deer had come from."

In a phone call Monday, the resident who reported the deer said that on Nov. 13 he noticed a carcass attracting birds in a field between Slocum and Swanson lanes. The dead animal hadn't been there the day before. He called Hamilton, who he said spent a couple hours on site and "did a fantastic job" investigating the animal.

The resident said the deer was in an open field near roads and would have been easy to find and recover had it been shot during a legitimate hunt.

"It was a nice four-by-four buck in its prime," he said, referring to the four tines, or points, on each side of the deer's antlers. "It was very disheartening to just see the wanton waste, and just somebody blatantly doing it. It's a sad, sad situation."

Joshua Murdock covers the outdoors and natural resources for the Missoulian. He previously served as editor-in-chief of The Boulder Monitor in Jefferson County, Montana, and has worked as a newspaper reporter and photographer in rural towns in Idaho and Utah.

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