White-tailed Deer
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The White-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus), also known as the Virginia deer, is a medium-sized deer found throughout most of the continental United States, southern Canada, Mexico, Central America and northern portions of South America as far south as Peru. The species is most common east of the American cordillera, and is absent from much of the western United States, including Nevada, Utah and California. It does, however, survive in the Northern and Canadian Rocky Mountain regions of United States and Canada, and in the Willamette Valley and Columbia River delta of Oregon and Southwestern Washington (endangered). There are also populations of white-tailed deer that inhabit the mountain forests of Arizona, New Mexico, and West Texas extending into Mexico. As a result of introductions, white-tailed deer are found also in localised areas of northern Europe. White-tailed deer are generalists and can adapt to a wide variety of habitats. Although most often thought of as forest animals depending on relatively small openings and edges, white-tailed deer can equally adapt themselves to life in more open savanna and even sage communities as in Texas and in the Venezuelan llanos region.
Description
The deer can be recognised by the characteristic white underside to its tail, which it shows as a signal of alarm by raising the tail during escape. The male (also known as a buck) usually weighs from 60 to 100 kg (130 to 220 pounds) but, in rare cases, animals in excess of 160 kg (350 pounds) have been recorded. The female (doe) usually weighs from 40 to 60 kg (90 to 130 pounds), but some can weigh as much as 75 or 80 kg (165 to 175 pounds). The deer's coat is a reddish-brown in the spring and summer, and turns to a grey-brown throughout the fall and winter. Only the mature males have antlers. Antlers begin to grow in early spring, covered with a highly vascularised tissue known as velvet. Bucks shed their antlers when all females have been bred, usually in late December or January. Females enter oestrus, colloquially called the rut, in the fall, normally in late October or early November, triggered mainly by declining photoperiod. Sexual maturation of females depends on population density. Females can mature in their first year, although this is unusual and would occur only at very low population levels. Most females mature at one or, sometimes, two years of age. Males compete for the opportunity of breeding females. Sparring among males determines a dominance hierarchy. Bucks will attempt to copulate with as many females as possible, losing physical condition since they barely eat or rest during the rut. The general geographical trend is for the rut to be shorter in duration at increased latitude. Females give birth to one or two spotted young, known as fawns in mid to late spring, generally in May or June. Fawns lose their spots during the first summer and will weigh from 20 to 35 kg by the first winter. Male fawns tend to be slightly larger and heavier than females.Range and population
Historically, market gunning, unregulated hunting and poor land-use practices, including deforestation severely depressed deer populations in much of their range. For example, by about 1930, the U.S. population was thought to number about 300 000. After an outcry by hunters and other conservation ecologists, commercial exploitation of deer became illegal and conservation programs and regulated hunting were introduced. Recent estimates put the deer population in the United States at around 30 million. These changes were so successful that, in some areas, deer populations are very high and the animal is considered a nuisance. Motor vehicle collisions with deer are a serious problem in many parts of the animals's range, especially at night and during rutting season, causing injuries and fatalities among both deer and humans. At high population densities, farmers can suffer economic damage by deer depredation of cash crops, especially in maize and orchards.
The species is the state animal of Arkansas, Illinois, New Hampshire, Ohio, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, and Wisconsin, as well as the provincial animal of Saskatchewan. Texas is home to more white-tailed deer than any other U.S. state or Canadian province, with an estimated population over four million.
White-tailed deer were introduced to Finland during the 1950s. The introduction was successful, and the deer have recently begun spreading through northern Scandinavia and southern Karelia, competing with, and sometimes displacing, native fauna.
In many states in the U.S. and in several Canadian provinces, hunting for white-tailed deer is deeply ingrained in local cultures and is central to the economy of many rural areas.
A sub-race of the white-tailed deer is white - not albino - in colour. The former Seneca Army Depot in Romulus, New York has the largest known concentration of white deer. Strong conservation efforts have allowed this race to thrive within the confines of the depot.
In the western portions of the United States and Canada, the white-tailed deer range overlaps with those of the black-tailed deer and mule deer. In the extreme north of the range, their habitat is also exploited by moose in some areas. In other areas, mainly in higher elevation coniferous forests, mountain meadows, and open grasslands, white-tails may occur in areas also exploited by elk (wapiti).
Classification
Until recently, some taxonomists have attempted to separate white-tailed deer into a host of subspecies, based largely on morphological differences. Genetic studies, however, suggest that there are, at most, three subspecies within the animal's range as compared to the 30 to 40 subspecies that some scientists described in the last century. The Florida Key deer, O. virginianus clavium, and the Columbian white-tailed deer, O. virginianus leucurus are both listed as endangered under the U.S. Endangered Species Act. The dominant subspecies across the deer's range is the Virginia white-tail, O. virginianus virginianus which is also the type species for the Odocoileus genus.
- Family Cervidae
- *Subfamily Capreolinae
- **Genus Odocoileus
- ***Species O. virginianus (nearctic and neotropical species)
- ****Odocoileus virginianus clavium (Key deer)
- ****Odocoileus virginianus leucurus (Columbian white-tailed deer)
- ****Odocoileus virginianus virginianus (Virginia white-tailed deer)
References
- Deer Specialist Group (1996). [Odocoileus virginianus]. 2006 IUCN Red List of Threatened Species. IUCN 2006. Retrieved on 12 May 2006.
- [Odocoileus virginianus (TSN 180699)]. Integrated Taxonomic Information System. Accessed on 18 March 2006.
- Deer of the World: Their Evolution, Behavior, and Ecology, by Dr. Valerius Geist
External links
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