Photographer spots rare 3-antlered buck in Michigan's Upper Peninsula

Frank Witsil | Detroit Free Press

A former state representative from the Upper Peninsula, Steve Lindberg, spied a three-antlered deer this weekend and posted photos to his Facebook page.

"Five days before rifle season for Whitetail Deer and look who I get to see, along with his girlfriend," the retiree wrote. "A three antlered, nine or twelve point buck (depending if you want to count the two little tines on the right antler, and the small tine on the left antler)."

It was a rare sighting.

An amateur photographer who lives in Marquette, Lindberg said he decided after a lifetime of hunting, he'd rather shoot deer with a camera than a gun. The 75-year-old posts a photo a day to social media, and it's usually something from nature because it's a lot like hunting.

[In west Michigan, two deer became entangled with their antlers ... until a hunter jumped in to help. The whole thing was caught on camera.]

Birds, he said, are his favorite subjects, although, he added, they are difficult to photograph.

"I'd always been interested in photography and cameras," said Lindberg, who retired from the state Legislature in 2012. "I made a New Year's resolution in 2013. I said, 'I'm going to put a picture a day on Facebook.' "

He did it for a year — and has been doing it ever since.

After he posted the deer photo, commenters offered a string of bad puns, jokes, praise and skepticism:

"Nice rack man!"

"A tricorn!"

"Probably a victim of antler shaming."

Many commenters gushed over the photo — "Impressive stag," "One of a kind for sure," "Beautiful buck!" — and Lindberg's photography skills: "You are a true hunter, doing it for the intrinsic joy, rather than for the kill thrill."

One person, however, wanted to know whether it was real or just photo manipulation.

Lindberg said the photos are authentic.

He watched the deer for many hours on Saturday, he added. The buck was with a small doe and seemed to not want him to get too close to her. But by Sunday, the buck had vanished from the area.

A large-animal veterinarian who examined the images also believes that they are authentic.

"This buck looks totally healthy, and the buck is normal," said Dr. Steve Edwards of Lakeview Animal Clinic in Lakeview. "A normal, healthy, good-looking buck. But, yes, there are two antlers coming out one side. Of course, these are antlers — not horns."

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What probably happened, he said, is either as an embryo, before the deer was born, the bud that leads to an antler's growth, separated into two; or the bud was damaged somehow later in life causing it to split.

Either way, he said, it's a rare animal and the antlers will grow back this way.

Randi Meyerson, the deputy chief life sciences officer with the Detroit Zoo, added that the deer is an oddity, but there's likely no harm in hunting it.

Edwards agreed, adding that the meat would be safe to eat, and it would make a good trophy.

"I've never seen one. I've never heard of one," Edwards, who had been a vet for 30 years and is a committee chairman of the Michigan Veterinary Medical Association, added. "I'd say it's probably a one-in-a-million thing."

Contact Frank Witsil: 313-222-5022 or fwitsil@freepress.com.