Hot shot! Pennsylvania game warden shoots antler off buck
BERKS COUNTY, Pa. – A warden with the Pennsylvania Game Commission is being credited for both his quick thinking and great aim after he shot the antler off a deer that was stuck in a net.
In a Facebook post, the Pennsylvania Game Commission said a warden was called to a report of a buck with an antler stuck in a net in Berks County. When the warden, Ryan Zawada, arrived, he felt the safest option was to shoot the antler off, which he successfully did.
Photos included with the post show the antler tangled in the net.
While tranquilizing the deer crossed his mind, Zawada said he didn’t feel it was safe to do so. “It would have been hung while it’s neck while I did it and that could have restricted its airway,” Zawada told The Courier Times. “It would not have been able to lay flat on the ground.”
Zawada told The Courier Times he used his skills as a firearms instructor to fire his 12-gauge shotgun with 00 buckshot from a distance of less than 10 yards.
Zawada said he believed the deer had been stuck for several hours, given the way the dirt around its hooves had been pawed away, and because it was tangled up so far from the nearest road that it wouldn’t easily have been seen, The Courier Times reported.
“It was certainly a unique incident. I’ll probably never have anything like it again, very unique,” Zawada told the paper.
Officials with the game commission told The Centre Daily Times that had Zawada missed and shot the deer, the meat would have been donated to local families in need.
