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Roes 



British Isles wild roe are found in Scotland and some of the northern English 

 counties, although they have long since been killed off from the south of 

 England. Their remains are, however, abundant in the fens of Cambridge- 

 shire and Lincolnshire, and have also been discovered in several English 

 bone-caverns, as well as in the older " forest-bed " of the Norfolk coast, 

 which belongs to the early part of the Plistocene period. In the early 

 part of the century they were reintroduced into Dorsetshire, where they 

 now flourish in the woods of the south side of the Blackmoor Vale ; and 

 some have been turned loose into Epping Forest and other districts in the 

 home counties. Dr. Satunin states that the roe of the Caucasus is C. 

 pygargus, but a small herd from that district at Woburn Abbey belong to 

 the European form. 



The roe is doubtless the animal known to Aristotle as prox, although in 

 scientific literature that name has been applied to the muntjacs. 



Habits. — The " bounding roe," as this deer is often termed, describes 

 one of its most characteristic habits, as, at least when first starting, it 

 always progresses by a series of long bounding leaps, with the head carried 

 high in the air. Roe are generally found in pairs or small family portions, 

 but never in herds. In Argyllshire Messrs. Harvie-Brown, and Buckley 1 

 state that a birch-clad glen of three or four miles in length rarely contains 

 more than from two to four at any one time. Large woods with plenty of 

 under-covert adjacent to grass or arable land are the haunts where they are 

 most generally found. From these they sally forth to feed as evening 

 approaches with great punctuality, usually making regular tracks to and 

 from their feeding-grounds. In Scotland they are more abundant in 

 plantations than in natural copses. They take readily to the water, both of 

 their own accord and when pursued. After the bounding gallop in which 

 they start off, roe generally settle down to a kind of trot, and at no time is 

 their pace very great. Their leaping powers are, however, almost un- 

 rivalled for their size. The cry has been described as a kind of harsh bleat. 

 Like most of the deer tribe, roe will both graze and browse, and they are 

 also stated to eat fungi in autumn. The antlers of the old bucks are shed 

 about the end of the year, and the new pair generally free from the velvet 

 towards the latter part of February. The pairing-season does not, however, 

 take place till July or August, the fawns being born about the following 



1 Vertebrate Fauna of Argyll and the Hebrides, p. 33 (1892). 



