A deer with an arrow through its head is walking around 'robust and healthy' in Whitnall Park. How did it happen and what's next?

By all accounts, April 2 was a typical Saturday for Collin Buth.

The Wind Lake man was on a morning bike ride at Whitnall Park, which covers 626 acres in both Franklin and Hales Corners.

Buth spotted some deer and, knowing his 4-year-old daughter likes deer, stopped to take some pictures and video of one of them.

That's when he noticed something strange. The deer had something stuck to its head.

"Luckily, the deer in that park are kind of used to humans, so I was able to get relatively close," Buth said. "When I got pictures and videos I was like, wow, there's an arrow sticking through the back of its head."

Buth, who has a YouTube channel, posted a short video of the encounter on the channel, ACE Bike Media.

This was not the first sighting of the deer

Bev Bryant, interpretive naturalist at Wehr Nature Center, located within Whitnall Park, said they've had reports of people seeing the doe since February.

"To our eyes, and what people have been able to observe, obviously the arrow didn't hit an artery or something immediately vital that it became a lethal shot," Bryant said. "She seems to be able to feed, she seems to be moving around with the other deer, so we're kind of keeping an eye on it."

Buth's images and video show the rear of the arrow protruding from near the back of the doe's head with the sharp end emerging between the deer's nose and left eye.

"When I got home, that's when I realized, when I zoomed in on the picture, that I could see that the arrow actually went all the way through," Buth said.

DNR warden says weapon used was a crossbow

The arrow is technically called a bolt, because it came from a crossbow, said Sam Haferkorn, conservation warden with the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources.

He said the incident is upsetting.

"We as wardens, we stand for the protection of our natural resources, and in this case, what happened to this deer does not really show a good example of that at all," Haferkorn said. "It doesn't represent an ethical or humane principle of our hunters who we know and the hunters that respect the rules and the regulations for the sport."

Haferkorn said the incident is not currently being investigated as a poaching case because officials are still gathering information.

If people have information, he said they can share it via the DNR's confidential tip line, 1-800-TIP-WDNR (1-800-847-9367), and more questions can be answered.

"Was this legally attempted to be harvested on private property, or was this an occurrence of a common complaint, an issue we have in Whitnall Park and other parks across the county, of illegal hunting activity?" Haferkorn said.

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Buth has his own thoughts.

"It had to be illegal poaching, from my perspective, because I've heard of plenty of stories of people illegally poaching in that area and I know there was a problem in Wauwatosa, same thing with deer."

Bryant didn't say that in so many words but struck a similar tone.

"I guess when we see an animal that's been injured in this park, we presume that it came from some sort of illegal activity, because we're pretty surrounded by areas that are not hunted," Bryant said.

The incident shines a light on illegal hunting in Milwaukee County parks

Whether the incident involved illegal activity is not yet known, but Haferkorn said poaching has been the topic of complaints involving Whitnall Park and other parks in Milwaukee County.

He said the parks offer a great resource to deer in the form of food, water and habitat. On top of that, he said people feed deer — which is illegal in Milwaukee County — and that provides another dependence for them.

"They actually become habituated to people and vehicles, and all of those things combined are part of the bigger picture," Haferkorn said. "All of those things create a recipe for these individuals to come through at night and to shoot crossbows and firearms from a roadway and to harvest these deer at night."

The penalty for shining and shooting — illegally hunting deer at night — can involve civil or criminal forfeitures, revocation of hunting privileges, confiscation of equipment used in the crime or jail time, Haferkorn said.

Feeding deer can result in a civil forfeiture.

The deer is in good condition despite its injuries, DNR wildlife biologist says

Nathan Holoubek, a DNR wildlife biologist who's been following the case, said despite its injuries, the doe seems to be in great condition.

"When I first became aware of it, I was anticipating that its body condition would slowly decrease over time, but it hasn't, it's actually remained quite robust and healthy," Holoubek said. "It's obviously survived the initial injury and then appears to have fought off any subsequent infection, and seems to be doing surprisingly well, considering the injury."

That fact is remarkable, he said.

"The likelihood of an animal sustaining this kind of injury and not suffering mortality is very low," he said. "Even if it wasn't initial mortality from the injury, generally animals with this kind of injury succumb to infection or some other factor in the coming weeks."

Officials have no immediate plans to try to remove the arrow

So what's next? Can the bolt be removed, or perhaps trimmed off on the ends?

Not likely, Holoubek said.

"Generally, animal capture is very stressful for the animal," he said. "Logistically, it's extremely challenging in an urban environment, and often ends with fatal injury to the animal when they get scared and run into traffic or get caught in a fence, something of that sort. On top of that, there are no rehab facilities within the state or out of the state that I'm aware of that could legally or even logistically handle an adult deer for surgery."

Bryant agreed.

"It's a lot of stress to try to come in and dart a deer with anesthesia and collect it to actually be able to try to fix whatever their issue is," Bryant said. "So it's kind of that sweet spot to decide is the animal able to, more or less, do what it needs to do to survive, in which case maybe the stress of trying to intervene is worse than letting them continue where they are."

Bryant said another takeaway from the incident is thanking all the park visitors who act as their eyes and ears.

"If you ever see an animal that you think is in distress, or something that looks suspicious … people should not have a bow and arrow ever in this park, unless they're at the archery area, so citizens keeping us aware of what's going on is always a benefit of having lots of people in the park," she said.

Contact Bob Dohr at 262-361-9140 or bob.dohr@jrn.com. Follow him on Twitter at @BobDohr1.

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This article originally appeared on Milwaukee Journal Sentinel: Deer at Milwaukee County's Whitnall Park has arrow stuck through head