Facts about Deer
A female deer generally has one or two young (fawns) at a time (triplets, while not unusual, are much more infrequent).
Most fawns are born with their fur covered with white spots, though they lose their spots once they get older (excluding the fallow deer, which keeps its spots for life).
A characteristic of deer is that almost all species have antlers, a biological structure that is unique to deer.
Many people enjoy the beauty of deer and consider them to be an important part of the natural scene.
Predators of deer include wolves, bears, and cats such as tigers, jaguars, and pumas.
The Chinese water deer has no antlers and bears upper canines developed into tusks.
Most species of deer live in forested or partly wooded areas, although some live in grasslands, marshlands, and tundra.
The Red Deer, one of the largest species of deer in the world, is found in the Atlas Mountains region of northwestern Africa, being the only species of deer to inhabit Africa.
The similar musk deer of the Moschidae family and the mouse deer of the Tragulidae family do not have antlers.
The Irish Elk (Megaloceros giganteus or Megaceros) is a huge extinct deer and the largest known species of deer to have ever lived.
Red Deer (Cervus elaphus) is one of the largest species of deer in the world, after Alces alces and Cervus canadensis(Elk or Wapiti) of North America and East Asia.
The white-tailed deer especially has done well and is now found from northern South America to the southern tip of Hudson Bay in Canada.
Deer meat, called venison, although not as popular as in earlier times, is still eaten by many.
At one point, the white-tailed deer in North America was driven almost to extinction in certain areas.
The moose and the red deer have also been tamed, with the moose even used as a riding animal, but have never been fully domesticated (Clutten-Brook 1999).
Deer have very well developed senses of sight, smell, and hearing and are almost always on the alert for danger.
Note that the theory of punctuated equilibrium merely addresses the pattern of evolution and is not tied to any one mode of speciation.
Deer (plural and singular) are the members of the Cervidae family of the order Artiodactyla, or even-toed hoofed mammals, with two large and two small hooves on each foot.
Deer generally have lithe, compact bodies and long, powerful legs suited for rugged woodland terrain.
Rather than attempt to digest vast quantities of low-grade, fibrous food as sheep and cattle do, deer tend to select easily digestible shoots, young leaves, fresh grasses, soft twigs, fruit, fungi, and lichens.
The deer family, Cervidae, includes elk, moose, caribou or reindeer, muntjac, red deer, and white-tailed deer, among others.
The red deer, or elk, is listed as one of the world's 100 worst invasive species by the Invasive Species Specialist Group (ISSG 2006).
Two million white-tailed deer are shot by hunters every year in North America, as well as many mule deer, moose, and elk (Forsyth 1999).
Sometime after the mating season, the antlers drop off and the deer is antlerless until the next summer.
Such is the case of the Irish Elk, the largest known species of deer, which disappeared about 11,000 years ago, largely from natural rather than anthropogenic factors.
The Saami of Scandinavia and the Kola Peninsula of Russia and other nomadic peoples of northern Asia domesticated, or at least semi-domesticated, reindeer and used them for food, clothing, and transport.
Deer differ from other hoofed mammals in that they have antlers; other ruminants have horns.
Most species of deer live in forested or partly wooded areas, although some live in grasslands, marshlands, and tundra.
Other species are sometimes called deer, but are not true deer in that they do not belong to the Cervidae family.
Most commercial venison in the United States is imported from New Zealand, where deer farms number more than 3,500 with more than 400,000 deer in all.
There are about 100 types of deer, including the whitetail deer, reindeer, elk, moose, mule deer, blacktail deer and caribou. Male deer are called bucks, bulls, stags or harts. Female deer are called does, cows or hinds. Young deer are called fawns or calfs.
Deer are a group of even-toed ungulate mammals. They form the family Cervidae. A male deer is called stag or buck, a female deer is called doe, and a young deer is called fawn. There are about 60 species of deer.
These animals are more active at night than they are during the day, even though the day is generally warmer -- in winter, deer sleep in direct sunlight to stay warm. At night, deer move frequently and walk into the wind, so that they can respectively avoid and detect predators in the area.
Deer live in a variety of biomes, ranging from tundra to the tropical rainforest. While often associated with forests, many deer are ecotone species that live in transitional areas between forests and thickets (for cover) and prairie and savanna (open space).
What they look like: White-tailed deer are the smallest members of the North American deer family. Adult white-tail deer have reddish-brown coats in summer. The color fades to a duller grayish-brown in winter. Male deer, called bucks, are easily distinguished in the summer and fall by their large set of antlers.
White-tailed deer are highly adaptable species and thrive in a variety of habitats. The areas that provide the most suitable environment include a mixture of hardwoods, croplands, brushlands and pasturelands. They prefer an interspersed habitat including meadows, forested woodlots, brushy areas and croplands.
White-tailed deer have good eyesight and acute hearing, but depend mainly on their sense of smell to detect danger and their ability to run and bound quickly through dense vegetation to escape danger. White-tailed deer are preyed on by large predators such as humans, wolves, mountain lions, bears, jaguars, and coyotes.
Feed deer the right foods if you cannot find formulated deer mixture.A wide variety of fruits and vegetables – including apples, grapes, cherries, pears, carrots, and snap peas – are eaten in nature by deer. Therefore, it is safe to feed deer these fruits.Acorns are another safe food source.
Plants that typically attract deer include red clover, chicory, and orchard grass. Certain high-protein crops, such as peas, soybeans, turnips, alfalfa, sorghum, kale, or corn, are also attractants that the animals enjoy feeding on. Deer like the nutritious nuts that come from chestnuts and acorns as well.Oct 23, 2014
My deer on my hunting lease will eat anything during the winter months. Apples, sugar beats, horse feed, sweet potatoes, white potatoes, corn, donuts, dinner rolls, butternut squash, lettuce, vegetables and fruit. ... The deer love it. They even eat the banana skins.Nov 26, 2012