Casper Realtor and sportsman Dylan Heide got some good karma by saving a baby pronghorn stuck in a cattle guard near Casper on Tuesday morning.
Heide was driving along an unpaved county road "in the middle of nowhere" scouting for pronghorn when he noticed something strange sticking out of a cattle guard he was approaching.
“I noticed something right before I drove over it,” he told Cowboy State Daily. “I thought it looked like an antelope butt, but it was too late for me to mentally recognize what the heck it was. I went over it, stopped, rolled my window down, looked back, and could just see it.”
The weird bump was a pronghorn fawn. Its head and legs were stuck between the grate, and it was desperately kicking and flailing to escape.
“It was probably no more than a month old,” Heide said.
Heide gingerly grabbed the fawn by the torso and gently lifted and twisted it out of the cattle guard. He set it down on the dirt road, and it bolted.
“She obviously didn't want to have anything to do with me, so I tried to be as calm and careful as I could,” he said. “I put her down. It screamed and ran away.”
Heide stayed long enough to watch the rescued fawn join a nearby group of pronghorn. He’s fairly confident his mother was among them.
“I heard a doe chirping as soon as I parked,” he said. “There were three does staying a little close to the cattle guard. She ran right to them, and they took off.”
Unguarded
Heide regularly scouts pronghorn during the summer, so he’s seen and heard plenty of stories about awkward encounters. This one stands out.
“I hear about them getting stuck in fences, and I’ve seen them stuck in a fence before, but they normally get themselves out pretty quick,” he said. “I've never seen one stuck in a cattle guard.”
The probable sequence of events, according to Heide, is that the adult pronghorns went under barbed-wire fence on either side of the cattle guard. The fawn, not knowing any better, took what looked like the path of least resistance.
“It probably didn't even know what a cattle guard really was,” he said. “It was probably taking the easy path, walking down the road until it tried to cross it and accidentally fell in.”
The fawn wasn’t injured. Heide hopes this was a lesson well-learned for the youngster.
“As long as it doesn't go back and find the same cattle guard, we're probably all right,” he said.
Never Too Early Or Too Far
Heide shares his stories and perspectives on hunting and fishing in Wyoming on his FishHuntWyo social media pages. He has a particular outlook on Wyomingites’ relationship with pronghorn.
“I have issues with how many residents take antelope hunting for granted,” he said. “They shoot the first antelope they see, call it a hunt, and then complain that it's too easy. I think if they took it more seriously, they could learn to enjoy it.”
By scouting pronghorn in the summer, Heide can observe the animals he hopes to take when Wyoming’s season opens later in the year. He’s already got a list of several individuals he’s been observing in the same area for years.
Heide also believes Wyomingites don’t see the bounty before them. Pronghorn are plentiful in the Cowboy State, but rarer elsewhere.
“Wyoming is really unique in that aspect,” he said. “We have so many antelope here. Colorado, Montana and Idaho, especially, have very, very, very few antelope, so they're very hard to come by. We take them for granted in Wyoming.
Heide feels the satisfaction of a successful pronghorn hunt comes from spending time with the target. By choosing a particular individual and observing its movements and habits over time, a successful harvest is much more rewarding.
“Every animal is a little different,” he said. “The more you're out there, learning the terrain and scoping out the animals running around, the more success you're going to have in the fall.”
All Creatures Great And Small
Heide said he felt fortunate he was able to save the fawn.
“We're here to take care of God's animals,” he said. “I think God put me there for a reason, in that situation, to help that baby antelope.”
He also hopes that, by posting the video, he can help reduce the stigma around hunting and hunters. It’s something he’s seen more after the actions of Cody Roberts in Daniel and other high-profile incidents of “hunters” showing poor judgment.
“Hunters get a bad rap for wanting to be cruel,” he said. “I think the majority of us really care about wildlife, conservation and putting forth the effort. We want to make sure our wildlife is taken care of for future generations.”
Andrew Rossi can be reached at arossi@cowboystatedaily.com.
