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On May 1, a Serious Hunt for Antlers Begins

Inside the world of 'shed hunters' and the antlers they sell
By Mike L. Ford,  Newser Staff
Posted Mar 19, 2022 4:05 PM CDT
On May 1, a Serious Hunt for Antlers Begins
In this Wednesday, May 15, 2019 photo, Savanah Swanson holds a set of shed elk antlers at the Sun River Wildlife Management Area in Montana.   (Thom Bridge/Independent Record via AP)

"Shed influencers” are a thing on YouTube, and some of them pull in six figures from ads and sponsorship. They are an offshoot of a multimillion-dollar market for elk antlers—the ones that are shed by the animals each spring. Writing in the Atlantic, Abe Streep explains how the "confluence of the dog-chew phenomenon and social media has created a uniquely American boom." The article begins with a description of the annual "shed hunt" near Jackson Hole, Wyoming, where hobbyists and antler traders gather in droves on May 1 each year to comb the rugged terrain of the 25,000-acre National Elk Refuge. It's serious stuff: Streep recounts one 27-year-old boasting that he had logged 700 miles of running over the last nine months to ready himself for shed hunting.

No elk are harmed in the process, at least not directly, but widespread interest in the activity (a hobby for some, big business for others) has motivated state and tribal governments to regulate shed hunting in order to protect existing herds and their habitats. Once upon a time, elk ranged by the millions across North America, as far east as Pennsylvania and Virginia. Overhunting and development nearly wiped out the population by the early 1900s, when the federal government stepped in to create the refuge. Soon after, the lands around Jackson Hole were littered with shed antlers. Streep digs into how much the antlers go for (commonly $16 a pound, with a nice rack weighing 10 pounds), how the Chinese medicinal market factors in, and how the dog chew-toy antler business came to be. (Read the full piece here.)

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