Fauna Report

Joe Ertle
Ms. Overly
Science Period 5
May 16, 2008
Mule Deer

The Mule deer also known in the scientific world as the Odocoileus hemionus is part of the Cervidae family. The mule deer is the biggest in its family standing from 40 to 42 inches up to its shoulders. Its length is about 80 inches or so from the nose to the tail. An adult buck will weigh from 150 to 300 pounds, so they are generally very large, but don’t weigh as much as they look. The mule deer gets its name from its mule like ears, its closest relative is the white tailed deer. The mule deer's tail has a black spot on it and the antlers don’t come from a single beam spread throughout and branch. The mating season is normally in the fall for about a month long period. During the mating season males start getting more aggressive for mates. The male bucks sometimes mate with more than one female and can go back into estrus mode if they do not mate for a month. The gestation period ranges from 190-200 days, and then the fawns are born in the spring. The mule deer has a very fine diet and stay fit and healthy. They have different eating habits during different seasons. In the summer they eat various berries such as the blackberry, huckleberry, and thimbleberry. In winter the mule deer eat twigs of Douglas fir, cedar, taxus yews, aspen, willow, dogwood, serviceberry, juniper, and sage. All year-round, the mule deer feast on acorns and apples. The deer like nice habitats where it has many different kind of diversity. They like to live on grass where the trees meet it so they can hide if need be. They very rarely travel far away from a water supply so that they can always stay hydrated so they have mad hops to jump away from predators or escape hunters with the speed of the mach 5. The mule deer do not really play a big role in their environment besides getting owned by cars or bears. They are herbivores so they don’t really need much of any other organism. They don’t have to consume that much besides grass, which there is in abundance. The mule deer are spectacular animals and are amazing to see in the wild. They make it a fun sport for hunters, even though I don’t officially agree with that game. They make Jackson Hole, Wyoming an even nicer place to be just with them around to gaze at.