On a spring day in April last year, wildlife law enforcement officers in Wyoming made an alarming discovery. While patrolling national forest land in the state’s north-west, they came across an overflowing stack of 40 antlers piled among the trees and concealed with branches.
The antlers, they realised, were part of an illegal poaching cache. Collecting antlers has long been a favorite pastime in Wyoming, where the state’s bull elk spend most of the summer growing massive antlers before shedding them the following spring. There are, however, strict limits on when people are allowed to gather these antlers – which typically fetch high dollars to be used as decorations, dog chews or craft products – from public lands.
