14 DAY TRIAL // In the list of nature's freak things another one is added. A seven-legged intersex deer has been found in Wisconsin, US.
A bow hunter, Rick Lisko, got his most unusual trophy not while hunting, but while driving. The deer was accidentally run over as Lisko drove his truck down his mile-long woodland driveway, near the town of Osceola, on November 22. The young buck had both male and female reproductive organs, small nubs for antlers, and seven legs! "It was definitely a freak of nature,'' Lisko said. "I guess it's a real rarity.''
Four of the legs were just regular legs. But three of these legs - two hind, one fore - had second legs growing out of them. The appendages were three or four inches (8-10 cm) long, and according to Lisko they were moving by themselves. 'They were actually functional,' he told.
He slowed down as the buck and two does ran across the driveway, but the buck ran under the truck and got hit. "It's a pretty weird deer,'' he said, describing the extra legs as resembling "crab pinchers.''
"It kind of gives you the creeps when you look at it,'' he said.
Warden Doug Bilgo of the state Department of Natural Resources came to Lisko's property to tag the deer. "I have never seen anything like that in all the years that I've been working as a game warden and being a hunter myself,'' Bilgo said. "It wasn't anything grotesque or ugly or anything. It was just unusual that it would have those little appendages growing out like that.''
Bilgo took photos and sent information on the animal to DNR wildlife managers. John Hoffman of Eden Meat Market skinned the deer for Lisko, who wasn't going to waste the venison from the animal. "And by the way, I did eat it,'' Lisko said. "It was tasty.''