Difference between revisions of "Category:Deer"

"Rustic is not the opposite of culture" —Northrop Frye.

White Tail Deer Mounts, or Portrait Busts in the Main Street Museum Collection:

Portraits, or Self-Portraits of Odocoileus virginianus

• 5 Point White Tail Deer in Good Condition fa.57228.00.po
• 8 Point White Tail Deer Portrait Bust fa.828.009.po
• 9 Point Whitetail Deer Portrait Bust
• Common, or White Tail, Deer fa.1989.33.po
• Only Somewhat Damaged Whitetail Deer from Nebraska fa.1989.32.po
• Wilfred, a Whitetail Deer Mount fa.2001.01.du
• White Tail Deer Mount with Wood Support Fully Exposed fa.1989.31.po — Original catalog #18
• White Tail Deer Portrait Bust fa.1989.31.po

"Lovin' too, is on his mind..."

Two Dimensional Representations Odocoileus virginianus

• Photo-litho of a Diorama of White-tail Deer

Free-Standing Specimens

• Stunning Nine-Pointer Going Through a Barbed-Wire Fence

Antlers and Skulls

Moose

Moose (North America) or Elk (Europe), Alces alces, is the largest extant species in the deer family. Moose are distinguished by the palmate antlers of the males; other members of the family have antlers with a "twig-like" configuration.

The animal bearing the scientific name Alces alces is known in Europe as elk and in North America as moose. Confusingly, the word "elk" in North America refers to the second largest deer species, Cervus canadensis, also known as the wapiti. Early European explorers in North America, who were familiar with the closely related but smaller red deer of Central and Western Europe, believed that the much larger North American animal looked more like the European elk (i.e. moose), so they named it elk. The word moose is derived from the Algonquian Eastern Abnaki name moz, which loosely translates to "twig eater".

Caribou

Overview

Deer are the ruminant mammals forming the family Cervidae . A number of broadly similar animals from related families within the order Artiodactyla (even-toed ungulates) are often also called deer. Male deer of all species (except the Chinese water deer) grow and shed new antlers each year – in this they differ from permanently horned animals such as antelope – these are in the same order as deer and may bear a superficial resemblance. The Musk deer of Asia and Water Chevrotain (or Mouse Deer) of tropical African and Asian forests are not true deer and form their own families, Moschidae and Tragulidae, respectively. All other animals in Africa resembling deer are antelope.

Deer are widely distributed, and hunted, with indigenous representatives in all continents except Antarctica and Australia, though Africa has only one native species, the Red Deer, confined to the Atlas Mountains in the northwest of the continent.

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). Clearing open areas within forests to some extent may actually benefit deer populations by exposing the understory and allowing the types of grasses, weeds, and herbs to grow that deer like to eat.

The highest concentration of large deer species in temperate North America lies in the Canadian Rocky Mountain and Columbia Mountain Regions between Alberta and British Columbia where all five North American deer species (White-tailed deer, Mule deer, Caribou, Elk, and Moose) can be found. Mountain slope habitats vary from moist coniferous/mixed forested habitats to dry pine forests with alpine meadows higher up. The rare woodland caribou have the most restricted range living at higher altitudes in the subalpine meadows and alpine tundra areas of some of the mountain ranges.

The White-tailed deer have recently expanded their range within the foothills and river valley bottoms of the Canadian Rockies owing to conversion of land to cropland and the clearing of coniferous forests allowing more deciduous vegetation to grow up the mountain slopes. They also live in the aspen parklands north of Calgary and Edmonton, where they share habitat with the moose. The adjacent Great Plains grassland habitats are left to herds of Elk, American Bison, and pronghorn antelope.

For most deer the male is called a buck and the female is a doe, but terminology varies according to the size of the species. For many medium-sized deer the male is a stag and the female a hind, while for many larger deer the same words are used as for cattle: bull and cow. Terms for young deer vary similarly, with that of most being called a fawn and that of the larger species calf; young of the smallest kinds may be a kid. A group of deer of any kind is a herd. Usage of all these terms may also vary according to dialect. The adjective of relation pertaining to deer is cervine; like the family name "Cervidae" this is from Latin cervus, "deer".

Deer Hunting

Historic Appraisal

Upon its flesh were the first settlers of the State, to a very considerable extent, dependent for food. Indeed so eagerly was it hunted, and still so anxious were the people for its preservation, that a law for its protection...was one of the earliest acts of our legislature. But notwithstanding all that has been done for their preservation, their numbers have been constantly diminishing within the state, till they have become exceedingly scarce, except in a few of the most unsettled and woody sections.” —Thompson, 1848