LAST EDITED ON Nov-12-13 AT 05:41AM (MST)[p]LAST EDITED ON Nov-12-13 AT 05:37?AM (MST)
The law in NV says that if you find a dead head or shed you are supposed to report it to NDOW before you pick it up. They then will decided if they want to do an investigation, if they do and determine that no foul play was involved (not necessaraly by you but also by anyone earlier). Then you MIGHT get to keep it, or might not. Probably depends on the officer.
I have in the past found 2 great muley bucks locked together and dead. One had been dead for a while, the other probably only a few days. I was in a remote area and a long ways from home or an officer, and probably wasn't going back to that area for a while. I took lots of pics from all angles, cut the skulls from the spines and tried to get ahold of NDOW all the way back home. I probably called the Elko office 6 times trying to catch the officer on my way thru. He was never in so i just told them i was headed home and if they wanted they could come talk to me.
By the time i pulled into town the officer in my town knew all about it. I just happened to run into him about 2 minutes after getting in. He looked them over, looked at the pics, listened to my story, had me write out my story, and wrote me a form to keep them. In that case it was totally obvious what had happened, they got locked together and died.
Also if you plan to take it to a taxi they will want the form from NDOW that says you are leagaly the owner of said dead head or shed. Otherwise i don't think they will want to touch it, I know mine didn't.
The following year i ran across a really really nice buck that was dead only a day. In fact i had that buck in my sights just the night before but he spooked and got away. Next morning i found him dead, no sign of a bullet, no sign of anything wrong. I tried to call the GW (same guy as earlier story), tried all day to get ahold of him, never could. I went back that night cut the horns off, took pics etc. and continued trying to get ahold of him for the next 4 days. when we finally hooked up about 5 days later i took him the horns, took him out to the carcass which by then was only about a foot and half of spine. He looked it over, wrote me out the necessary paper work and i was on my way with a 175" 4x4. I ended up tagging that buck because i never got anything during season and wanted it counted in the harvest, so i guess in a way i got my deer that year and never fired a shot.
As far as crossing state lines...if you have the paperwork from NDOW then i guess it would be up to the state your going to.
Hope he gets to keep it!