Ok I know there are certain wildlife that are attracted to sheds....Coyotes, mice, and even Porcupines ( as I recently learned earlier). How quickly do animals generally hone in on a recently dropped shed and consume or remove it from an area? Heading up to my place this weekend and hoping to find a shed from a young 4 pt or 6 pt that I would not mind parting with and set it up over a game camera to see how long it takes before it disappears. Anybody ever try something like this or know how quickly this takes place after they drop?

Never tried that but interested in what you get on cam

Thanks yeah hoping it works out and find one to test this. I'm of the belief that this happens very quickly as I generally have pretty good luck finding them in mid to late March but if I don't go up until the end of April or early May I hardly find any. Will keep you guys posted

I've found, where I have hunted sheds before, that the lack of finding them later has more to do with the grass getting high enough to hide them. I don't think most critters carry them off, though I'm sure some do. I think most chew on them where they lay.

I've seen cows chewing on them many times, old bones also.

I used to find a couple in my food plot all the time until 3 years ago, not anymore?
Still see plenty of bucks during the hunting season so I attribute it to the bachelor herds moving into another area during that period.

Yep our cows chew them up fast. I have also seen deer chewing on them several times.
Coyotes love them too.

Funny you should mention this because I have often thought of the same. Near our middle feeder, there are some very old cow bones (10+ years old) that always end up in the road. I have moved them and thrown them in the brush for years to avoid a flat. Some of them always end up back in the road. I have seen deer chew on them often, carrying them around like a dog would a bone in their mouth.

Unless its severe doubt by time our sheds drop we are contending with 2+ foot tall new growth on top of what old growth grass is left from last year. If they don't drop in a feed pen or on a road we will likely never find many.

No sheds found = Either high grass or lack of antlered deer

We gots antlered deer

That's a mighty fine buck deer. You must have a high fence place

I spent 4 hours on Ft Hood today looking for sheds and all I found was an old bleached and chewed up set.

That one looks angry. You should get some feed and it'll let you pet its antlers.

I bet we wont find any sheds now, deer probably still have horns.

got a few on camera that don't and know multiple people already finding them. I've found them as early as first week of march

I walked up to my feeder a few weeks ago and found a nice set laying right next to it. went through the pics and about 10 days earlier have the buck on cam with antlers intact and the next pic is them on the ground and him jumping backwards. based off of the pics it looks like a raccoon chewed on one of them a little.

we still have bucks with antlers as of 2 days ago.

We are pretty far south, things run a few months behind.

Gotcha I'm right in the middle

Update- Hunted hard for em this past weekend but no luck. It's pretty much been my experience down there...Some years you find several but some years none. Very few deer on camera. Every thing is very green. Did see three without antlers about two weeks ago but with such a small sample size it's tough to tell if all of em have dropped. Headed back up in two weeks to Turkey hunt. Hopefully will have better luck then

If you are hunting them where you found them in the past there should still be sheds there again this year.
You have to hunt them where the deer are hanging out this time of year, and it doesn't usually change from year to year unless something has drastically changed to change the deers movement.

We are going on our 3rd season just north of Brady and have yet to find a shed with a lot of looking. I haven't seen a squirrel yet but are over run with some type of large mice? Have pics with 15-20 at a time at the feeders at night. I was thinking that's where ours are going.