Buck in a truck

Your blog host has been trying to get this photo for months! Annie was visiting the Reserve on Monday. Every March 22 for the past three years, Annie and I have walked and talked to celebrate her birthday. Annie brought her camera, and voila! Buddy in the horse trailer out of the rain while we were, of course, getting wet! Great photo Annie and thanks for sending it to us.

Buddy

Buddy, photos by Jim Linton

Brenda and Jim Linton from Toronto were visitors recently. Here are two of my favourite photos taken by Jim, featuring the one and only Buddy. Buddy is keen to watch people at work and likes all things mechanical from cameras to backhoes.

Open waters

Don Murphy has brought his latest invention to the Reserve as of yesterday and we are happy to report that the deer now have 24 hour access to open, ice-free water despite temperatures overnight as low as -18 degrees Centigrade.

His invention doesn't have a name yet. It's about the size of a wood stove with three stockpots which are heated by a lantern with propane. The lantern is encased a vented, insulated metal box lined with aluminum foil. The single lantern heats all three pots of water thanks to a special spider-like contraption, again invented by Don, that transports the heat from the single lamp to all three pots. Ingenious.

We are 32 hours into the onsite trial and can report that we have observed Buddy and EGee enjoying a long drink and see no signs of ice in any of the pots. Don estimates that a single propane tank should keep the low level heat for up to 7 days. We continue to crack ice in other buckets for those less-courageous deer who have yet to discover the always open water source. Hopefully they will all find it soon helped by a few apples perched next to the bowls.

The same but different

When people visit the Reserve, they always express surprise that we can identify the individual deer. Aside from KoKo who is easy to recognize given his chocolate colour, at first sight the rest of the deer look very alike.

Having worked with the bucks for over 19 months, we know that each one is quite different and unique in both appearance and personality.

Here's how we tell them apart.

Max, the leader, is a large deer with one of the largest sets of antlers and a golden colour especially on his head and back of neck. He often stands in the middle of the herd, but never gets challenged by other bucks. (A challenge is when a deer lowers his head and antlers and moves towards another in a determined way. Sometimes the deer will tilt his head and show one eye to the other deer. )

Dandy, is usually the second in command. He is probably the largest deer in body size but his antlers don't have the wide palmation of the other large deer. He is very calm.

Mike is next in herd hierarchy but sometimes he vies with Dandy to gain status to second. He looks quite a bit like Max and has large antlers. However, his right brow antler is bent over his right eye in an odd way caused by a collision with a barricade when the deer were being moved to Florida from Scotland Road in May last year. Mike is very social towards people. We hope his antlers return to normal this year.

Gulliver is another large deer with the largest palmation of antlers. He seems to be the big brother of Moki (one of our youngest and smallest) who is a constant companion. Gulliver will often let Moki "play fight/challenge" with him but never exerts the full power he could if the fight were for real. Gulliver likes to chase smaller deer at feeding time, doing his best to get all the food for himself, but he never challenges a deer that is larger than himself.

Murph is a large deer with exceptionally long antlers with good palmation and many spellers (or branches). He has a dark coat, but not quite as dark as KoKo. He is very independent and spends time away from the herd on his own. He is not that interested in people...can take or leave 'em.

Bash is a large light-coloured deer with large antlers that have many spellers and very straight brow antlers. He, too, is somewhat independent and will leave the herd to go on his own. He likes to bully Buddy who is also light-coloured. Bash used to be very frightened of people, but he is becoming very social these days.

Ty has a compact body, a muddy brown colour and very wide palmated antlers with many spellers. Like Bash, he was very fearful of people when we first started working with the herd, now he doesn't seem too worried by us. He never challenges large deer for food or water, but bullies all the other deer the same size or smaller than him.

Buddy is a medium-sized light coloured deer. His brow antlers turn inward instead of straight ahead which gives him a slightly cock-eyed, cute appearance. His personality is carefree and he's very curious about people and what they are doing whether it be building a shelter, digging or hauling water. He will run away from food to get a good view of human beings at work.

EGee is a medium-sized deer with shorter palmated antlers, few spellers and long straight brow antlers. He has a dark brown winter coat with a splash of white on his right side where he was injured last winter. He is very social and calm and only occasionally will he bully George or KoKo at feeding time to get in the best position.

George looks like the other medium-sized deer in appearance except for his antlers this year which have little or no palmation. Our theory is that this odd antler formation was caused by the anti-inflammatory medication he was given last winter after suffering a "shoulder" injury. We hope that his antlers return to normal this year. George is definitely the most social of the deer and he can be a nuisance if you are working inside the fence as he has no fear of people and will invade human space quite easily.

KoKo is our most recognizable deer because he is very dark in colour and even in summer he has very faint "spots" on his chocolate-coloured back. He has a compact, you might say round body and he is very social and calm. He is the one most likely to be hanging out in the shelter of the woods rather than the person-made shelter attached to the barn. He seems to like to hang out with Ty or Buddy.

Moki is one of our youngest at 3 years of age. His antlers are palmated but smaller than all the other deer (except for Spike). His right brow antler bends to the right and this winter he lost the top of his left ear as a result of a tussle with Spike towards the end of the rut.

Spike is the other 3 year old with antlers similar to those of Moki. He is the only deer in our herd with a brown tail which makes him a "menil" fallow deer. Spike is social and curious and likes to hang out with George and fight with Moki.

Buddy's Bio

Buddy got his name because back in May he was constantly at George's side and that's how we could identify him. He had then and still has more white than George on his legs and lower body.

Sometime in June as each deer began to grow in size, Buddy became more shy of people and less likely to hang out with us, or with George who took up with EG.

We think he is one of the most handsome looking deer. His antlers are symmetrical and at the inside corner of his expressive eyes, he has white teardrops.

As antlers have hardened and the herd has spread itself out on the reserve, Buddy is getting to know us again and coming in close for photos.

Top photo: Buddy behind George in May 2006.

Bottom photo: Buddy enjoying an apple, September 2006.