And that's the problem. Most people have a High School understanding of genetics. Genetics are so much more complicated than what is taught at that level. In fact, when looking at what is taught at the High School level, the realities are so much more complex that it basically makes that High School level information incorrect. Very few genetic traits follow the simple Mendelian process of single dominant/recessive genes. We were all taught the simple relationship between brown eyes and blue eyes and how the combination of dominant-dominant, dominant-recessive, and recessive-recessive determines a child's eye color. Yet, in reality, eye color is determined by an exceedingly complex combination of at least 17 different genes.

Quite a few expressed genetic traits in one sex are inherited exclusively from the parent of the other sex. The best known example of this is male pattern baldness in humans. This trait is expressed in men, but can only be inherited from a man's mother. Nature is full of these relationships. A buck's genetic antler characteristics could be inherited exclusively from his mother. But the genetics of antler characteristics are not at all understood. We just don't know that much about antler development yet. The few scientific looks at heritable antler traits that have been done (and none of them have been extensive) definitely suggest the majority of single-generation expressed antler traits come from the mother.