232 REPORT OF ONTARIO GAME No. 52 



about seven months, the fawns being usually born about May or June. 

 The young does breed when about seventeen months old and have usually 

 but one fawn the first time, but subsequently two fawns are produced 

 in the majority of eases. As instancing the rapid increase of deer may 

 be noted the case of the Otzmachon Rod and Gun Club, Clinton County, 

 Pa., which placed about 90 deer in its 4,000 acre park and in six years 

 had 2,000 head and were expecting an additional 1,000 fawns in the 

 early summer. Deer are easily and cheaply raised, and comparatively 

 hardy, living approximately twenty to twenty-seven years. They will 

 eat wild rye and other soft grasses, buds and leaves of trees, growing 

 wheat, clover, peas, barley, oats, vegetables, corn, bran, chops or fruits, 

 in fact, almost anything except dry hay. The cost of feeding them in 

 suitable localities has been estimated at one-half a cent each per day. 

 They are easily confined by a woven wire or barbed wire fence 61/2 feet 

 in height. In addition to the fact that were deer more readily obtain- 

 able doubtless quite a number would be purchased for small parks and 

 enclosures; the creature is commercially valuable in tliat its flesh is an 

 excellent meat for human consumption, and the horns, hides and even 

 hair are articles of commerce. The dietetic value of venison is enhanced 

 by the fact that it is especially adapted to invalids who require a nour- 

 ishing yet easily digestible food. In a recently published table show- 

 ing the time required to digest foods, grilled vension is given front rank 

 with boiled tripe and boiled rice, as requiring but one hour for complete 

 digestion, whipped raw eggs, boiled barley and boiled trout, as well as 

 asparagus and a few other vegetables are shown to require an hour and 

 a half; while grilled beefsteak and mutton require three hours for diges- 

 tion and grilled or roasted veal or pork five hours or more. 



Deer horns, although deciduous, are solid processes, produced from 

 the frontal bone, and have the physical as well as the chemical proper- 

 ties of true bone. The material produces much gelatin by decoction and 

 the waste pieces of the horns used in the manufacture of knife handles 

 are either made into gelatin or boiled down into size used in cloth 

 manufacture. At one time deer horn was a prominent source of am- 

 monia. Some thirty years ago in Sheffield, England, some 500 tons of 

 deer horn, representing the antlers of fully 350,000 deer, were used an- 

 nually in the manufacture of handles of knives and other instruments. 

 Deer skins, as tanned and dressed by the Indians, are manufactured into 

 moccasins, racquets, toboggans and other articles for sale, while deer hide 

 also makes an excellent leather. Deer hair has a peculiar cellular struc- 

 ture and is used in some parts of the world for stuffing saddles, to which 

 purpose it is especially adapted. 



It will be conceded, therefore, that under suitable conditions deer 

 farming should indeed prove a profitable industry. In this connection 

 it may be observed that it will, in all probability, be found feasible to 

 exploit both moose and caribou by similar methods, and doubtless also 

 to introduce other varieties of deer, should such be deemed desirable. 



