102 



Life-histories of Northern Animals 



the sexes free to seek or shun each other at their will, these 

 turn their unantlered heads from the social herd, and wander off, 

 usually two together, as with most of our horned ruminants. 



Bare ground, with its sprouting grass and shoots, now 

 supplies bountiful food. The surplus energies of the does go 

 to the unborn young; that of the bucks to their budding 

 antlers. These make 

 their appearance from 

 two to six weeks after 

 the old ones are dropped. 



Their growth goes 

 on with the marvellous 

 rapidity already noted. 

 During the early stages 

 they are so soft as to be 

 almost plastic, and every 

 accident to them is re- 

 corded in their shape. 

 By August they are com- 

 plete, though still in vel- 

 vet. By the middle of 

 September the buck has 

 scraped them clean and 

 polished them. Until 

 the last two or three 

 weeks the antlers have 

 blood-vessels throbbing with blood; they have nerves and are 

 sensitive, and they are integral parts of the animal's body. 



The antlers are, of course, doomed to die and drop off 

 within three months of reaching maturity. Death begins at 

 the points and follows downward and inward till the whole 

 structure is killed; and it is during the progress of this slow 

 dying that the antlers fill the office for which they were created. 

 This is well known, but Judge Caton, our great Deer authority, 

 gives some surprising additional information.^ 



**The evidence," says he, "derived from a very great 



" Antelope and Deer of America, 1877, p. 172. 



Fig. 36 — The Bonnechere head 

 From a Topley Studio photog^raph supplied by Norman H. H. Lett. 

 This is the finest Whitetail set of which 1 have knowledge. 

 Beam. 26]^ inches. 

 Spread, 24 inches. 

 Growth above burr, 5% inches. 

 Points, 24. 

 It was taken on Bonnechere River, Ont., about 1890, by J. Beckett. 



