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| Whitetail Buck Lip-Curls As Pre-rut Begins |
Most
whitetail bucks shed there velvet in a period ranging from late August
through mid-September. This buck still had velvet on September 2nd, but a
close look revealed that the velvet was dried and cracked looking. By
September 7th, small bloody areas and bare spots were visible.
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| Shedding Is About To Occur |
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He still had velvet at dawn on September 9th, but I
have no still photos at that point as I was filming the deer with the
Panasonic GH4 as he alternated between feeding and grooming. Suddenly
the time was at hand and he walked to a group of nearby hay bales and
attacked them violently. Again all of this was filmed, but no stills
were taken. The video is not the best quality as it was still too early
for good light, but I hope to post a short clip in the near future. I
took a still photo of the bales after the action was over.
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| Hay Bales After Buck Attacked Them |
I did get some still photos after the action was
over. Unfortunately as a result of using the bale instead of a a tree
or brush to loosen the velvet, the buck ended up with a tangle of vines
and baler twine caught in his antlers.
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| Vines And Baler Twine Tangled In Antlers |
At this point there was still a lot of velvet on the
antlers and for some time he ran about the meadows trailing a stream of
vines behind him as he went. I have not seen anything like this in over
forty years of whitetail deer photography.
I saw the buck again that evening and the velvet and vines were gone, but a tangle of baler twine remained.
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| A Tangle Of Twine |
I was a bit concerned at this point as the tangle
seemed so severe that I was afraid he could not dislodge the
twine.Luckily he was able to free it from his antlers eventually.
With
the shedding completed pre-rut activity such as sparring and
lip-curling becomes more common and will continue throughout the fall
with activity growing more intense until things explode as the
full-blown rut begins and bucks are more visible than at any other time
of year as they frantically chase does and compete with other bucks for
dominance.
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| Bucks Spar As Pre-rut Begins |
Originally published at
Pennsylvania Wildlife Photographer by Willard Hill.
