Pronghorn have an interesting relationship with fences. Call it a quirk of evolutionary history, but they don’t do them. Why pronghorn won’t jump fences has never been settled for sure, but it’s almost certainly a function of the ungulate’s adaptation of the billiard-table flat Great Plains of the North American continent.
Other ungulates have no problem with fences. Deer leap over them. Elk do the same, but usually make sure they jump just high enough to break, rather than clear, the top wire of a four-strand fence. At least that’s what folks who are in the fence repair business tell me. You may know these folks by their more common name: ranchers.
Bison, of course, just walk through the dang things. That’s a big reason why folks in the fence repair business aren’t thrilled with the prospects of these great beasts being restored to the plains of eastern Montana.
Pronghorn are baffled by these vertical obstructions. While they don’t jump fences, they do scurry underneath them just fine, especially if the bottom wire is lifted at least 18 inches off the ground. Even better, replace the barbed bottom strand with smooth wire, or pull the bottom two strands of wire together and run them through PVC pipe. This fix is called a goat bar. I’ve seen pronghorn running full tilt duck under goat bars while barely breaking stride.
So we saw a curious thing the other day out on a sagebrush flat favored by pronghorn. We came upon a herd of 30 or so animals, and they allowed us to drive up remarkably close. It turned out the herd was transfixed by a battle we hadn’t immediately noticed. There, right along a fence, a pair of bucks had squared off. Their horns were locked in a battle to determine who gets to pick his favorite baby mamas from that audience of does.
This time of year, that’s not all that curious. It’s fall, after all. That pair of bucks may be fast friends the rest of the year, but for a few weeks they lose all perspective. What really made this unusual was that the bucks were on either side of the barbed wire, perpendicular to the fence line, and their horns tangled right at the level of that lowest, and in this case barbed, strand of wire.
The bucks fought with a furious intensity, but neither seemed to be making any headway. In fact, they seemed fixed in place. Then I heard the squeak of wire pulling through the metal staples that held it to the posts.
For a moment we were convinced the bucks weren’t just tangling with one another, but were tangled in the fence as well.
We leaned on the horn.
That got the attention of the does and a few smaller bucks who may have been trying to pick up jousting tips for that fall someday when they’ll get a shot at being the boss. The rest of the herd began to move off, but the dueling pronghorn remained intent on beating one another.
Just as we became sure we were going to have to cut the fence to free the pair of pronghorn, somewhat surprisingly the smaller of the two began to get the upper hand and pushed the larger buck backward, free of the fence.
Maybe the horn messed with the bigger buck’s Mojo? He shook himself off, caught a glimpse of us out of the corner of his eye, and then bounded away, as did his rival.
I’ve killed elk and deer, but never pronghorn. I’m disappointed as they are my favorite big game animal. I’m a sucker for iconoclasts, those quirky critters that simply refuse to consent to modernity, in this case represented by four strands of barbed wire.
Pronghorn have uncompromising rules about the way the world is supposed to be. They respond to our changes with contempt.