# Deer with two livers?



## knutson24

Well, I was able to harvest my deer tonight, After gutting him I went to remove the liver as I always do and found what I thought was a secong one. So I took them but them in a pot and let them soak for a couple hours to drain the blood out of them. Ithen came back and was going to cut them in half to further facilitate getting all of the blood out. The first on was normal like every other liver I had kept. the second one not so much, this one was very soft in the middle and almost more like a giant blood clot smelled bad like a deer smells like when they are gut shot. Now I not sure if it was indeed a liver or not, by outward appearance they both looked the same other than the one was a little darker is all. Any ideas what other organ it might be or sny other suggestion would be greatly appreciated.

Knutson


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## HUNTNFISHND

Maybe a blood filled lung?


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## knutson24

No chance it was a lung. Both lungs were totally destroyed and the (2nd) liver was connected to the base of the other liver.


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## north1

Might sound crazy but could it be a tumor or growth?


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## XFIRE800

I was thinking the same thing


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## knutson24

Thats what I was thinking like he had liver cirrhosis or something and a new one grew as an adaptation or something. I was going to bring it in and get it checked out. Im not squeamish by any means but it smelled so gawd awful I about lost my lunch.


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## blhunter3

That's why you don't mess with the liver(s). uke: uke:


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## Norm70

there were times in my college days i wish i had 2 livers :beer:


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## coloradomarshrat

Actually, that would be the spleen. It looks a lot like the liver, but is softer and it does smell bad because of what it does.


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## knutson24

nope not the spleen. Every deer I have ever harvested I'v eaten the liver I know what the anatomy a deer is suppose to look like and this was like nothing I had every seen before.


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## Fallguy

Gall bladder? I guess I have never looked for a deer's gall bladder but that organ is attached to the liver and stores the bile that the liver makes. My students find them in their pig and frog dissections. Just throwing that out there even though you probably already ruled it out.


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## Fallguy

Well I learned something new today. Did a search and found that deer do not have a gall bladder. Never looked that hard, but I will have to look at that this weekend when I fill my doe tag. Rule out gallbladder!


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## HUNTNFISHND

knutson24 said:


> I was going to bring it in and get it checked out.


So did you or did you just pitch it?

You didn't get a pic of it by chance did you?


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## knutson24

HUNTNFISHND said:


> knutson24 said:
> 
> 
> 
> I was going to bring it in and get it checked out.
> 
> 
> 
> So did you or did you just pitch it?
> 
> You didn't get a pic of it by chance did you?
Click to expand...

I never did bring it in I ended up throwing both out. I'm sure the coyotes appreciated the hand out.


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## swift

I would bet it to be a large fibrous hematoma from the gunshot. Blood can pool and if there was an injury to the diaphragm likely the chest blood settled between the lobes of the liver. When the clot hardens it appears as a dark colored liver.


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## spitfire_er

sounds like a spleen to me.


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## CU Tacoma

Resurrect an old thread here. This weekend I shot a deer that had exactly what you are describing. It had what looked like two livers one on each side of the body, and they were about the same size. One had some faint white spots on it and it didn't appear to be connected to anything. When I cut it open it looked like a massive blood clot. Did you ever figure out what it was?


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## Habitat Hugger

Dunno the anatomy of a deer liver but in humans the various lobes of the liver are variable from person to person. A big caudate lobe on a deer ( if there is such a thing) could sure look like two livers. A huge echinococcal cyst or other parasitic infection in a deer could look like a second liver and those small like heck in humans when puncured, though never had the pleasure of doing so personally!
I suppose a liver tumor, a primary or secondary could look like a second liver. I shot a wild turkey one time filled with avian tuberculosis that for all the world looked like hi,an ovarian cancer spread everywhere, with a huge modular liver. Disgusting sight!
I give up! Could be a whole list of,things, and glad you didn't eat it!


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## marcel9

How long does the whole digestive system for a whitetail deer take? :sniper:


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