researcher reviewing footage at a Texas forensic research facility were startled to see an unfamiliar face hovering over a decomposing human consistence . They described their discovery in theJournal of Forensic Sciences .
Texas State University’sForensic Anthropology Research Facility(FARF ) is what ’s known colloquially as abody farm : a large region of indoor and outdoor space where scientists canstudy the consequence of various influenceson decaying human remains . The research conducted at FARF andother forensic facilitieshelps us read what hap after we croak , and itinformslaw enforcement as they investigate crimes .
The folks at FARF are used to seeing strange and unpleasant things . television camera traps place near bodies throughout the landscape allow them to watch as scavengers like slyboots and birds move in . But until they pulled the footage from January 2015 , nobody there — or anywhere else — had ever seen a human - eating deer .
( Warning : the image below are , well , on the dot what you think they ’re going to be . go forward gingerly . )
Ungulates like deer , sheep , and even giraffes have been known to eat at bones in the wild from time to time ; the hypothesis is that they ’re after some nutrients that they have n’t been able to get elsewhere . Still , human bones are something different altogether .
This was not just some weird cervid have a weird Clarence Day . The camera maw captured a deer ( perchance the same deer , possibly not ) on two freestanding social occasion that calendar month hold a human costa osseous tissue in its mouth “ like a cigar , ” as the researchers compose . The body had lain in that spot for six calendar month .
The findings have implications beyond merely creeping us out . If chowing down on human corpse is something that cervid do , even occasionally , it ’s a component that forensic law enforcement will need to consider in succeeding investigations .
[ h / tPopular Science ]
