They’re just starting to show up. Maybe you come across a speckled mulch in the grass while walking your dogs, or maybe you just spot a doe with a juvenile couple while you’re heading into town for groceries.
Most of the newest generation of deer live here, and a significant percentage of them will survive to adulthood. The way they do it is impressive, especially considering all the dangers that are waiting for the deer to make a mistake.
Below is a roundup of facts about fawns that illustrate how well they survive their first month of life and show just how impressive the country’s No. 1 game animal truly is – even if they’re just babies.
Remain hidden
Deer that are approaching their first birthday are spot-free. This is because they operate their heightened senses to detect predators as early as possible and then operate their speed to escape them.
Newborn fawns have no such weapons at their disposal, so they must remain hidden. They do this by going to bed up to 90% of the time in the first few weeks.
A minimum amount of exercise is crucial to their survival, as are delicate spots on their fur. Fawns have an average of 300 spots, and although these spots fade with age, they are exceptionally good at breaking up the contours of newborns’ bodies.
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This works when the child is standing, but is most effective when the child lies in bed and does not move. It is effective in murky weather, but works exceptionally well when the sun is overhead and the forest floor is a mixture of delicate and shade.
Odorless deer?
There is a myth about fawns that do not die. The idea is that they are born scent-free, so predators ranging from lynxes to coyotes to bears won’t be able to smell them.
Fawns actually have a scent, and this is one of the ways their mothers identify them. The only thing they don’t do is move around a lot in the first few weeks of life. This means that they do not leave numerous scent trails in the forest for predators to focus on.
They also weigh on average 6 to 8 pounds at birth, which is petite. Their compact size, combined with dense litter and little movement, reduces the risk of being detected by predators (but they are by no means scentless).
Miniature movements
Fawns can stand and nurse within about 30 minutes of birth. Three hours after birth they can walk. After three to four weeks, they can run speedy enough to outrun most predators in the low term.
Once fawns reach the age where they can run speedy enough to avoid the teeth of most predators, their chances of survival boost dramatically. Not only do they have (and operate) the ability to remain still when danger passes, but they can also simply outrun danger if detected.
This ability to run coincides with a change in their diet, in which fawns switch from nursing to feeding and feeding on leaves just like their mothers.
Deer encounters
Another myth about the fawn that has been with us for a long time is that if you care for a newborn fawn, its mother will abandon it. That’s not true, but it’s best not to deal with them, same way.
It also ties into something that happens every year as May gives way to June. People find fawns and assume their mothers have abandoned them because the fawns seem to be left to their own devices.
A much more likely explanation is that the fawns were hidden in a unthreatening place, one of the ways they lend a hand their offspring avoid predators. They do this with singletons, but also keep twins and triplets in separate places to ensure greater survival.
