Pennsylvania Game News - February 2020 - 4

cover for relief. Every calorie a whitetail
saves dodging the elements or remaining
idle helps it through winter's bottleneck.
It's a strategy built into a deer's survival
instinct.
A few winters ago, while checking
out a mortality signal on a GPS-collared
Deer-Forest Study deer after a winter
storm had passed, Wallingford said he and
another researcher couldn't find the dead
deer at the coordinates provided.
The deer later was found alive.
"Apparently it had bedded down to
conserve energy and wait out the storm,"
Wallingford said. "It stayed still long
enough - four hours - to trip the GPS
collar's mortality sensor.
"What's amazing here is that people
cannot remain completely still for four
hours, even when we sleep. But this deer
did it."
Out of the wind, tucked in and blanketed in its winter coat and insulating
snow, the whitetail offered some insight
on how deer conserve energy: It rode out
the storm sitting tight. It's the only way
an animal as large as a deer can conserve
energy under such conditions. It's also a
fine defense against predators.
A deer's coat is comprised of long,
hollow guard hairs that protect a soft,
woolly underfur that is packed more
densely than sheep's wool, added Jeannine Fleegle, agency deer biologist.
"Air is trapped in the underfur, warmed
by the body and held closely to the skin,"
Fleegle noted.
Sitting tight is an approach deer
use whenever travel is impossible and
weather is too demanding. They have the
innate resolve to remain inactive when
conditions require it. But a whitetail's
ability to pull this off is tied to fall foods
being available in quantities that allow it
to store fat.
4

If forest pests or weather cause mastcrop declines, or if drought impacts
agricultural crops, deer might not have
the choice to wait out winter's wickedest
weather. The same result occurs when
an excessive deer herd strips its habitat
of browse. Fortunately, Pennsylvania
hasn't had this problem for some time in
most areas.

MAKING IT WORK

The Commonwealth's extensive slate
of deer-hunting seasons, substantial
antlerless deer license allocations and
DMAP permits have helped to align
deer populations with available habitat.
But these management tools don't work
everywhere in the state, because of hunter
access and other factors that influence
when, where and how often hunters stalk
deer.
Through hunting, many fawns are
orphaned. But they manage, said Christopher Rosenberry, Game Commission
Deer and Elk Section supervisor.
"While there might be some advantage
to learning from their mother, orphaned
fawns soon find other older deer to
follow," Rosenberry explained. "Research
and our deer harvest data have proven
conclusively that they bridge winter."
October deer seasons have the potential to help local deer populations, because
they reduce the consumption of area foods
whenever a deer is taken.
"There are more groceries for those
that survive, but it's always a race among
forest wildlife to exploit acorns," Rosenberry noted. "Every creature, from chipmunks and squirrels to whitetails and
black bears, is either storing or vacuuming
acorns to offset winter's impact on their
bodies."
Every acorn gatherer resolutely collects or consumes whatever it can. But

Pennsylvania Game News - February 2020

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