SPENCER — Bret Lee thought it was odd that a female pronghorn antelope was just standing on the side of the road.
It was the end of August, and Lee was driving near the town of Spencer approximately 60 miles north of Idaho Falls when he spotted the female antelope.
“Usually they run off when you get close to them, so I thought something was wrong,” he said.
Eventually, the female antelope jumped a cattle guard and ran off, but the animal’s unusual behavior sparked Lee’s curiosity. He stopped the vehicle and looked around the area.
It was then that he spotted a second antelope, but this one had two of its legs stuck in a barbed wire fence nearby.
“He was flopping around pretty good,” Lee said. “He wouldn’t have made it very long. It was a hot afternoon.”
Luckily, Lee was able to retrieve some wire cutters from his camper. But before he went to free the ensnared antelope, he decided to videotape the animal rescue operation with his cellphone camera.
“I wanted to prove to my family that I did this,” he laughs. “Usually, they don’t believe what I tell them.”
As he struggled to hold his camera with one hand, he cut one of the barbed wire strands with the wire cutter in his other hand.
“I chose a wire, held the camera and did everything I could not to get kicked at the same time,” he laughs.
With one snip of the barbed wire, the antelope was freed. The antelope then jumped back on its hooves and ran off. The video ends with the animal stopping for a few seconds, kicking up one of his hind legs and then continuing toward the horizon.
Born in Colorado, Lee has resided in East Idaho since his youth. Currently, he lives in Lewisville in Jefferson County.
Ironically, this wasn’t the first time he has had to come to the rescue of a wild animal stuck in a fence.
Approximately two years ago, Lee was with his brother when they came across a herd of elk standing on the road. Like with the antelope last month, the elk didn’t seemed to be scared off by the human presence in their immediate vicinity.
Upon closer examination, they spotted a young cow elk off in the distance stuck in a fence.
“She thought she was doomed when we came up on her,” Lee said. “She was screaming and crying.”
However, the ensnared elk stopped crying once Lee and his brother freed her from the fence.
