Have you ever wondered How Long Are Deer Pregnant? If so, this is the perfect article for you! Especially if you’re a hunter. It’s important that you know your prey and you’ll be able to pick the best time of year to go hunting deer.
Deer are seasonal breeders, this means they only get pregnant during a specific season. There are roughly 100 subspecies of deer worldwide and, and some deer have different breeding seasons.
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Why It’s Important To Know
So why do you need to know How Long Are Deer Pregnant? Well, there are many reasons… Around the time that deer are getting ready for pregnancy (the gestation period), the bucks come into play. This means that there are a lot more of them gathered in one place. The perfect opportunity to hunt. This period of time is known as the ‘breeding season’, also called as the rut season. This is also how we know How Long Are Deer Pregnant. It’s called the rut season because of the type of behaviors and activities that take place in relation to the males e.g. breeding.
It’s better to be schooled than to go at the wrong time and miss out! It also means that you’ll be able to develop your hunting skills for the next time. You can then bag those trophies that everyone has been talking about. Do Female Deer Have Antlers? Read here
It’s also helpful to know How Long Are Deer Pregnant if we want to control the population etc. This would be if the deer caused problems to people such as by eating their crops, gardens, and trees. There are also accidents involving cars which cause harms to humans, so we need to make sure in some places that deer numbers are limited.
In some parts of the world we’re actually not allowed to hunt pregnant deer, so it’s important to know the rules and regulations in your country.
Let’s discuss further the behavior of deer during the mating season.
Deer Behaviour
Before and during the mating season most deer are shy and nervous. This means that if you wanted to hunt them you would have to know how to follow their tracks quietly, without startling them.
Deer can travel up to 30 miles per hour. Way faster than you are able to run! Right? They can also swim and will take any path to avoid being hunted! They even run away from the bucks before the mating season has started. Once the mating season has started they will usually stand in one place and wait for a buck to come, a buck they have chosen.
Below Let’s Talk Further About How Long Deer Are Pregnant.
The Gestation Period: How Long Are Deer Pregnant?
Male deer typically “exhibit ‘rut’ behavior during early fall (October), the same time that the female deer are getting ready for pregnancy. The mating period usually carries on until December and some species even mate until March. But it also depends on the weather, if it’s cold during October, mating may not begin until much later in the year. This gives the young more of a chance to survive.
Most females of reproductive capabilities will breed; therefore, it is better to go hunting if you so wish after the breeding season has ended. You, as a hunter will be able to tell when a female deer is heavily pregnant as it is obvious. But doing the first month or so it may not be easy, so you will have to take care when you go during the breeding season. A better thing to do is just hunt the bucks if you don’t want to hunt pregnant females.
You can now even predict when the best time of year is to go hunting.
The white-tailed deer, which is one of the most common deer species in the USA will mostly be pregnant for around 7 months (200 days), other species up to 9 months. With birth occurring in May or June. This length of time maybe is longer or shorter depending on the amount of food available to the mother.
In the UK, it is common for deer such as the European roe deer to be pregnant for up to 10 months (up to 250 days).
Here’s a video of 2white-tailed pregnant deer, take a look at their behavior and what they look like. This will be something to watch out for.
After the Gestation Period
After the gestation period, female deer are mostly by themselves nursing their young, this occurs 2-3 times per day for a couple of weeks. The female deer will leave their fawns to go and search for food for hours at a time. The fawns will hide to stay safe away from predators.
Once the fawns are strong enough they will start to follow their mother around. This can be between the ages of 4 weeks and 2 months old. Male fawns will go off on their own after about 1 year, whilst the females will stay for periods of up to 2 years. Sometimes the mother will drive the male fawn off.
After the males have mated they will congregate in packs away from their ‘family’, spending most of the year alone or with other males.
What You Can Do With This Information
Now that you know How Long Are Deer Pregnant for, you can finally go and do what you wish with it. Do you want to go hunting or are you just searching for information? If you’d like to calculate a deer due date click here
Here Are Some Further Tips:
- Do your research e.g. YouTube and some of the sources that I’ve cited below.
- Figure out which type of deer is in your part of the world, so you can the work out its gestation period exactly and if there are any rules and regulations about hunting pregnant deer.
Thank you for reading. I hope this article answers your question. Liked this article? Do you have any tips that you could share with us?
Is there anything else you’d like to know about deer? Or any other questions that you may have? Comment below.
