110 PROTECTION AGAINST ANIMALS. 



SECTION IV. KOE-DEER. 

 1. Damage Done. 



Besides herbage, the roe eats beech-mast, acorns, wild fruit, 

 and the cotyledons of beech and oak seedlings, and in winter 

 browses on the buds and shoots of nearly every species of 

 tree, especially young plants, and in summer on fresh young 

 shoots and tender foliage. 



The following species are preferred : Oak, beech, maple, 

 ash, elm, hornbeam, aspen, sallow and silver-fir ; less Scots 

 and Weymouth pines and spruce ; least of all birch and 

 alder. Young plants one or two years old may be entirely 

 devoured. Exotic species and those occurring rarely in a 

 wood are preferred. 



Sunny aspects where the roe stays in winter suffer most, 

 especially on poor soils. The roe rubs its horns in March and 

 April on smooth-barked saplings about a finger's thickness, 

 and strikes its horns on poles in rutting-time at the end of 

 July and August, and before losing them in November. Larch, 

 Weymouth-pine, Douglas-fir, aspen, lime, and mountain-ash 

 are most exposed to these injuries. 



In places where roe-deer crowd together, they trample-down 

 many seedlings. The roe is relatively worse as a forest 

 browser than the red-deer, as it is very dainty and tears the 

 shoots like a goat ; but on account of its small size, and as it 

 abstains from peeling trees, it does a less absolute amount of 

 damage. 



2. Protective Rules. 



Irrespective of the general rules given, the following hold 

 good for roe-deer. 



Suitable fodder are oats, acorns and foliage ; they eat hay 

 only as a last resource, when it is given quite dry and hung 

 up in little bundles under the shelter of trees or thatched 

 coverings and not strewn on the ground. Lopping branches 

 of silver-fir, aspen, sallow, etc., in winter is very useful. 



Fences against roe-deer need only be 5 to 6 feet high. 



Scarecrows are of little good, as the roes soon become 

 accustomed to them. 



