Deer

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

For other uses, see Deer (disambiguation).

"Fawn" redirects here. For other uses, see Fawn (disambiguation).

"Stag" redirects here. For other uses, see Stag (disambiguation).

iDeer Fossil range: Early Oligocene - Recent
Scientific classification
Kingdom: Animalia Phylum: Chordata Class: Mammalia Order: Artiodactyla Suborder: Ruminantia Family: Cervidae Goldfuss, 1820
Subfamilies
Odocoilinae Cervinae Hydropotinae Muntiacinae

A deer is a ruminant mammal belonging to the family Cervidae. A number of broadly similar animals, from related families within the order Artiodactyla, are often also called deer.

[edit] Names

Depending on their species, male deer are called stags, harts, bucks or bulls, and females are called hinds, does or cows. Young deer are called fawns or calves. Hart is an expression for a stag, particularly a Red Deer stag past its fifth year. It is not commonly used, but an example is in Shakespeare's "Romeo and Juliet" when Tybalt refers to the brawling Montagues and Capulets as hartless hinds. "The White Hart" and "The Red Hart" are common English pub names.

[edit] Habitat

Deer are widely distributed, and hunted, with representatives in all continents except Antarctica. There are Red Deer in the Atlas Mountains of Algeria and Tunisia in Northern Africa. Australia has six introduced species of deer that have established sustainable wild populations from Acclimatisation Society releases in the 19th Century. These are Fallow Deer, Red Deer, Sambar Deer, Hog Deer, Rusa deer, and Chital Deer. Red Deer introduced into New Zealand in early 1900s (a gift from United States President Theodore Roosevelt) have been largely domesticated in deer farms since the late 1960s and are common farm animals there now.

Fallow Deer walking

[edit] Physical characteristics

Deer differ from other ruminants in that they have antlers instead of horns. Antlers are bony growths that develop each year (usually in summer) and, in general, it is only male deer that develop them (although there are exceptions). A young buck's first pair of antlers grow from two tiny bumps on their head that they have had from birth. The antlers grow wrapped in a thick layer of velvet and remain that way for several months, until the bone inside is hard; later the velvet is torn away (not shed contrary to popular belief). The one way that many hunters are able to track main paths that the deer travel on is because of their "rubs". A rub is used to desposite scent from glands near the eye and forhead and physically mark territory. During the mating season, bucks use their antlers to fight one another for the opportunity to attract mates in a given herd. The two bucks circle each other, bend back their legs, lower their heads, and charge.

A doe generally has one or two fawns at a time (triplets, while not unknown, are uncommon). The gestation period is anywhere between 160 days (just over 5 months) in the musk deer to ten months for the roe deer. Most fawns are born with their fur covered with white spots, though they lose their spots once they get older (excluding the Fallow Deer who keeps its spots for life). In the first twenty minutes of a fawn's life, the fawn begins to take its first steps. Its mother licks it clean until it is almost free of scent, so predators will not find it. Its mother leaves often, and the fawn does not like to be left behind. Sometimes its mother must gently push it down with her foot. The fawn stays hidden in the grass for one week until it is strong enough to walk with its mother. The fawn and its mother stay together for about one year. A male usually never sees his mother again, but females sometimes come back with their own fawns and form small herds.

Deer generally have lithe, compact bodies and long, powerful legs suited for rugged woodland terrain. Deer are also excellent swimmers. Their lower cheek teeth have crescent ridges of enamel, which enable them to grind a wide variety of vegetation. Snow on a Deer's back can stay for hours. Deer are ruminants or cud-chewers and have a four-chambered stomach. Nearly all deer have a facial gland in front of each eye. The gland contains a strongly scented pheromone, used to mark its home range. Bucks of a wide range of species open these glands wide when angry or excited. All deer have a liver without a gallbladder. The Chinese water deer is the only species that differs from others in that they have no antlers and bear upper canines developed into tusks.

Deer are selective feeders. They feed on leaves. They have small, unspecialised stomachs by herbivore standards, and high nutrition requirements. Rather than attempt to digest vast quantities of low-grade, fibrous food as, for example, sheep and cattle do, deer select easily digestible shoots, young leaves, fresh grasses, soft twigs, fruit, fungi, and lichens.

Fawn

[edit] Taxonomy

There are about 34 species of deer worldwide, divided into two broad groups: the old world group includes the subfamilies Muntiacinae and Cervinae; the new world deer the subfamilies Hydropotinae and Odocoilinae. Note that the terms indicate the origin of the groups, not their modern distribution: the Water Deer, for example, is a New World species but is found only in China and Korea.

It is thought that the new world group evolved about 5 million years ago in the forests of North America and Siberia, the old world deer in Asia.

[edit] Subfamilies, genera & species

The family Cervidae is organized as follows:

• Subfamily Muntiacinae (Muntjacs)
  • Indian muntjac or Common Muntjac (Muntiacus muntjak)
  • Reeves's muntjac or Chinese Muntjac (Muntiacus reevesi)
  • Hairy-fronted muntjac or Black Muntjac (Muntiacus crinifrons)
  • Fea's muntjac (Muntiacus feae)
  • Bornean Yellow muntjac (Muntiacus atherodes)
  • Roosevelt's muntjac (Muntiacus rooseveltorum)
  • Gongshan muntjac (Muntiacus gongshanensis)
  • Giant muntjac (Muntiacus vuquangensis)
  • Truong Son muntjac (Muntiacus truongsonensis)
  • Leaf muntjac (Muntiacus putaoensis)
  • Tufted Deer (Elaphodus cephalophus)

Fawn

• Subfamily Cervinae (True Deer, Old World Deer):
  • European Red Deer (Cervus elaphus)
  • Central Asian Red Deer (Cervus affinisor Maral)
  • North American Elk (Sometimes called "Wapiti" by American Indians)
  • White-lipped Deer or Thorold's Deer (Cervus albirostris)
  • Sika Deer (Cervus nippon)
  • Barasingha (Cervus duvaucelii)
  • Schomburgk's Deer (Cervus schomburgki) (extinct, 1938)
  • Eld's Deer or Thamin (Cervus eldii)
  • Indian Sambar (Cervus unicolor)
  • Sunda Sambar or Rusa Deer (Cervus timorensis)
  • Philippine Sambar (Cervus mariannus)
  • Philippine Spotted Deer or Visayan Spotted Deer (Cervus alfredi)
  • Chital or Axis deer (Axis axis)
  • Hog Deer (Axis porcinus)
  • Calamian Deer (Axis calamianensis)
  • Bawean Deer (Axis kuhlii)
  • Père David's Deer (Elaphurus davidianus)
  • Fallow Deer (Dama dama)
  • Persian Fallow Deer (Dama mesopotamica)

Pudú, the smallest deer in the world

• Subfamily Hydropotinae (Water Deer)
  • Chinese Water Deer (Hydroptes inermis)
• Subfamily Odocoilinae (New World Deer)
  • White-tailed Deer (Odocoileus virginianus)
  • Mule Deer (Odocoileus hemionus)
  • Marsh Deer (Blastocerus dichotomus)
  • Pampas Deer (Ozotoceros bezoarticus)
  • Red Brocket (Mazama americana)
  • Merioa Brocket (Mazama bricenii)
  • Dwarf Brocket (Mazama chunyi)
  • Grey Brocket (Mazama gouazoubira)
  • Pygmy Brocket (Mazama nana)
  • Yucatan Brown Brocket (Mazama pandora)
  • Little Red Brocket (Mazama rufina)
  • Northern Pudú (Pudu mephistophiles) (smallest deer in the world)
  • Southern Pudú (Pudu pudu)
  • Peruvian Guemul or North Andean Deer (Hippocamelus antisensis)
  • Chilean Huemul or South Andean Deer (Hippocamelus bisulcus)
  • European Roe Deer (Capreolus capreolus)
  • Siberian Roe Deer (Capreolus pygargus)
  • Caribou/Reindeer (Rangifer tarandus)
  • Moose (Alces alces; called "Elk" in England and Scandinavia) (largest deer in the world)

[edit] Hybrid deer

In Origin of Species (1859) Charles Darwin wrote "Although I do not know of any thoroughly well-authenticated cases of perfectly fertile hybrid animals, I have some reason to believe that the hybrids from Cervulus vaginalis and Reevesii [...] are perfectly fertile." These two varieties of muntjac are currently considered the same species.

A number of deer hybrids are bred to improve meat yield in farmed deer. American Elk (or Wapiti) and Red Deer from the Old World can produce fertile offspring in captivity, and were once considered one species. Hybrid offspring, however, must be able to escape and defend themselves against predators, and these hybrid offspring are unable to do so in the wild state. Resent DNA, animal behavior studies, and morphology and antler characteristics have shown there are are not one but three species of Red Deer: European Red Deer, Central Asian Red Deer, and American Elk or Wapiti. (The European Elk is a different species and is known as moose in North America.) The hybrids are about 30% more efficient in producing antler by comparing velvet to body weight. Wapiti have been introduced into some European Red Deer herds to improve the Red Deer type, but not always with the intended improvement.

In New Zealand, where deer are introduced species, there are hybrid zones between Red Deer and North American Wapiti populations and also between Red Deer and Sika Deer populations. In New Zealand Red Deer have been artificially hybridized with Pere David Deer in order to create a farmed deer which gives birth in spring. The initial hybrids were created by artificial insemination and back-crossed to Red Deer. However, such hybrid offspring can only survive in captivity free of predators.

In Canada, the farming of European Red Deer and Red Deer hybrids is considered a threat to native Wapiti. In Britain, the introduced Sika Deer is considered a threat to native Red Deer. Initial Sika Deer/Red Deer hybrids occur when young Sika stags expand their range into established red deer areas and have no Sika hinds to mate with. They mate instead with young Red hinds and produce fertile hybrids. These hybrids mate with either Sika or Red Deer (depending which species is prevalent in the area), resulting in mongrelization. Many of the Sika Deer which escaped from British parks were probably already hybrids for this reason. These hybrids do not properly inherit survival strategies and can only survive in either a captive state or when there are no predators.

In captivity, Mule Deer have been mated to White-tail Deer. Both male Mule Deer/female White-tailed Deer and male White-tailed Deer/female Mule Deer matings have produced hybrids. Less than 50% of the hybrid fawns survived their first few months. Hybrids have been reported in the wild but are disadvantaged because they don't properly inherit survival strategies. Mule Deer move with bounding leaps (all 4 hooves hit the ground at once, also called "stotting") to escape predators. Stotting is so specialized that only 100% genetically pure Mule Deer seem able to do it. In captive hybrids, even a one-eighth White-tail/seven-eighths Mule Deer hybrid has an erratic escape behaviour and would be unlikely to survive to breeding age. Hybrids do survive on game ranches where both species are kept and where predators are controlled by man.

[edit] Antlers

White-tailed deer

All male deer have antlers that are shed and regrown each year from a structure called a pedicle. Sometimes a female will have a small stub. The only female deer with antlers are Caribou and their cousins, the Reindeer. Antlers grow as highly vascular spongy tissue covered in a skin called velvet. Before the beginning of a species' mating season, the antlers calcify under the velvet and become hard. The velvet is then shed leaving hard bone antlers. After the mating season, the pedicle and the antler base are separated by a layer of tissue, and the antler falls off. Each species has a general antler growth pattern, e.g. White-tailed Deer tend to grow antlers out and forward with points arising from the top of the main beam of the antler. Mule deer, a species within the same genus as White-tailed deer, have similar antler growth except that the second point is usually forked.

For Wapiti and Red Deer, a stag having 14 points is an "imperial", and a stag having 12 points is a "royal". If the antlers deviate from the pattern of the species, the deer is considered a non-typical deer.

[edit] Economic significance

Deer have long had economic significance to humans. Deer meat, for which they are hunted and farmed, is called venison.

Musk, which comes from the gland on the abdomen of musk deer, is used in medicines and perfumes. Deerskin is used for shoes, boots, and gloves, and antlers are made into buttons and knife handles. The Saami of Scandinavia and the Kola Peninsula of Russia and other nomadic peoples of northern Asia used reindeer for food, clothing, and transport. The caribou is not domesticated or herded as is the case in Europe but is important to the Inuit. Most commercial venison in the United States is imported from New Zealand. Deer were originally brought to New Zealand by European settlers, and the deer population rose rapidly. This caused great environmental damage and was controlled by hunting and poisoning until the concept of deer farming in the 1960s. Deer farms in New Zealand number more than 3,500, with more than 400,000 deer in all.

[edit] Trivia

Several Norwegian municipalities have a deer in their coat-of-arms: Gjemnes, Hitra, Hjartdal and Voss.

[edit] Literature

Deer running

"Nature and Appearance of Deer, and how they can be hunted with Dogs," taken from "Livre du Roy Modus," created in the 14th century

• For the role of deer in mythology, see deer in mythology.
• In Christmas lore (such as in the narrative poem "A Visit from St. Nicholas"), reindeer are often depicted pulling the sleigh of Santa Claus.
• One famous fictional deer is Bambi. In the Disney film Bambi, he is a white-tailed deer, while in Felix Salten's original book Bambi, A Life in the Woods, he is a roe deer.
• Saint Hubertus saw a stag with a crucifix between its antlers while hunting on Good Friday and was converted to Christianity by the vision.
• In Harry Potter and the Prisoner of Azkaban, the Patronus Charm that Harry Potter conjures up to scare away the Dementors is a silver stag. James Potter, Harry's father, had an Animagus form as a stag.
• On the television series Angel, one episode depicts the hart as the last of three animals symbolically representing the evil law firm of Wolfram & Hart.
• In one of the stories of Baron Munchhausen, the baron encounters a stag while eating cherries and without ammunition. He fires the cherry-pits at the stag with his musket, but it escapes. The next year, the baron encounters a stag with a cherry tree growing from its head; presumably this is the animal he had shot at the previous year.
• A Samurai warrior named Honda Tadakatsu famously adorned deer antlers on his helmet.
• Deer have been a subject in Chinese paintings numerous times as a tranquility symbol.
• In The Animals of Farthing Wood, a deer called The Great White Stag is the leader of all the animal residents of the nature reserve White Deer Park.

[edit] See also

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Cervidae

Wikispecies has information related to:

Cervidae

• Hunting