If you shed hunt strictly to find antlers, you'll come home disappointed a lot of days. Even the best shed hunters get skunked. Shed hunting is a great way to beat back cabin fever, get some exercise, learn about deer bedding and feeding areas and if you're lucky, maybe bring home some antlers. But sometimes you get more than you bargained for.

My passion for shed hunting has led me all over the place, from across the Midwest, down to Texas, out in the Rockies, Canada and even Alaska. And let me tell you, over the years, I've found some odd things! Sometimes it's just weird antlers. I found a mule deer shed in Montana that was recessed inward about 3 inches, instead of bulged out at the base like normal. I found an elk antler in Saskatchewan with a broken pedicle, where the pedicle had a 90-degree bend, although the guy I was with had seen the bull before and despite the odd pedicle, told me the antler sat normally on the head. And then there was the time I found a wild whitetail skull in Minnesota with extreme palmation. The third mass measurement was over 10 inches! I showed a picture of the skull to a buddy and his wife. He was impressed. She wasn't so much. "It's cool," she said, "but it's not that big for a moose."

"It's not a moose!" I replied.

And you never know what kind of trouble deer will get into. Shed hunters sometimes find dead bucks (or moose) that locked antlers during combat and then died a slow, painful death of starvation, forever entwined together. Occasionally bucks get tangled up in baling twine or plastic snowfence. It must be a relief to finally shed an antler that's been entangled. Plus, finding such a shed is a true trophy for the finder. One guy I know even found a shed with a broadhead embedded in it!

Skulls are common finds while shed hunting, whether they're from deer or other species. I always pick up old cow skulls on western ranches, which I sell. It's always women who buy them. They paint them or make crafts. I've found skulls from deer, moose, beavers, raccoons and even a crane. I'm still waiting to find a bear skull. Someday.

One of my most memorable finds was a moose collar I discovered several years ago. The bright yellow collar stood out starkly from the snow it rested on. I called the DNR and reported it and learned the collar was designed to release after 5 years. The biologists were glad I'd found it because the collar had stopped transmitting data a few years earlier and they were able to get some more data off the collar. After extracting the additional data, they gave me the collar to keep. And I personally know four other people who have found moose collars in Minnesota.

Those finds are all cool, but sometimes it starts to get weird.

The location you shed hunt has great bearing on the things you find. For example, river bottoms often have lots of weird items that float away during spring floods and are deposited in the middle of nowhere as water levels recede. River bottoms are always great places for nautical items like fishing tackle and boat bumpers, but you never know what kind of trash you'll find along them. I've found old shoes, plenty of lumber, a portable toilet and even a stroller!

Searching below hills along roads usually yields lots of trash dumped off the cliff. I've found old tires, car batteries, computers, dead pets and golf balls -- lots and lots of golf balls. In fact, no matter how far in the woods you walk, you'll probably never get away from golf balls. I've found balls miles from anywhere. All I can figure is animals must carry them.

Shed hunting in urban or suburban areas yields things not often found in more rural areas. These days, there are some pretty nice bucks holed up in town, where they have to worry about dodging cars instead of wolves. But hiking in town leads to some odd discoveries. It's not unusual to run across homeless camps, where people live in tents or makeshift shelters. It's sad to see and you often find clothes, cooking utensils and other belongings strewn around the area. I've also encountered an empty purse, a random pair of pants, a dollar bill, a neon sign and even a plunger in wooded areas in town and had to scratch my head on how these items got there.

These days signs of drug use are often prevalent in both urban and rural areas. I've personally found needles lying out in urban areas and instruments like a propane heater that was likely used to cook meth. Some people uncover marijuana "grows" tucked away in the woods. Finding drug-related items can be dangerous because dealers will go to great lengths to protect their investments, so get out of there if you find grows or drug paraphernalia. 

Sometimes trash just falls out of the sky, only to be discovered miles from anywhere by shed hunters. Nowadays, people sometimes find drones. And I know a couple people who have found weather balloons. And you know those mylar balloons filled with helium you get at birthday parties? Do you know where they go? They always seem to end up in the woods in remote locations. I can't tell you how many of those I've found. In fact, Dan Infalt of The Hunting Beast once mentioned that if you find mylar balloons, you may find a mature buck's lair. What he meant by this when I asked him is that thermals carry these balloons, and mature bucks bed to keep tabs on prevailing thermals.

It's really cool when you discover something that could be hundreds or thousands of years old. I know one guy who has found not one, but two elk antlers in Minnesota far outside the current elk range. These antlers have to be decades old. Shed hunters cruising creek bottoms or recently plowed agricultural fields sometimes find arrowheads and in fact, there are plenty of artifact collectors out there who are as serious about arrowheads as shed hunters are about antlers.

I found an old house foundation one time in the middle of the woods on what is now public land. I have no idea how old that foundation must be or how long the land has been in public ownership, but the house itself is long gone. Someday I'd like to poke around it with a metal detector and see what kind of stories it might tell. I've also found a truck that must have been parked in a forest via an old logging road. Since the vehicle was left, the trees have grown up around it, and it's never coming out of there, unless the area is logged again. A few years ago, I went back to look for it again, bent on taking the tailgate for a bench, but it had been 15 years since I'd seen it and I didn't find it. I guess I just need to look harder. I’m sure it’s still there.

A friend of mine was mushroom hunting, not shed hunting, in the Superior National Forest a couple years ago when he found a rusted rifle. The stock was long since rotted away and only the metal parts remained. I know some people who have found old logging equipment as well. And of course, sometimes you stumble on old glass bottles or conetop cans that are decades old. I'm constantly amazed how some of these bottles remain unbroken after so many freeze-thaw cycles.

My frequent shed hunting companion, Dan, found a spent rifle cartridge in the Badlands from an obsolete caliber, miles from any road. I'd love to know the story of how it got there. Maybe the round killed a buffalo? Maybe it was fired in a battle over a land dispute between Native Americans and early white settlers? Dan had also got tipped off to an inscription in a rock on a Montana ranch. It was far from any buildings, but an outfitter had stumbled upon it. It was hard to read, but we believe the inscription said, "H.W. 1871 US7C." We assume that means it was from the 7th Calvary. The inscription was a little easier to read after we poured water on it. That same ranch has the ruins of an ancient cabin from the pioneer days. It could easily be 100 years old or more.

I was so intrigued by the topic of unusual finds while shed hunting that I turned to social media, where I asked fellow shed hunters about some of their unusual finds. I received an outpouring of responses, that ranged from interesting to odd to downright disturbing. One hunter found a deer stand on public land that bore a sign saying, "Please leave for November 1985 deer season." He found the stand in 2016. Other oddities included a hunting knife stuck blade-first in the ground, a bowling ball, dolls, adult toys, old cars, various bones and skulls, rattling antlers and even a wedding veil in the middle of nowhere. But I was quite shocked to hear about more than one person who had found human remains in the woods! One person even found a body from a person who appeared on America's Most Wanted! Another found human remains and the local newspaper covered the disturbing find.

It stands to reason that shed hunters find some odd things. We get back in the thick stuff, staring at the ground all day. If you do that long enough, you're bound to turn up some usual discoveries. Although we want antlers, you just never know what you'll find!