William E. Armstrong

We compared antler characteristics and body mass at 4.5 years of age (adult) of 140 white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus) reared in a captive herd at the Kerr Wildlife Management Area (Hunt, Texas) from 1973 to 1990. Each yearling (1.5 years old) was classified as spike- (N = 43) or fork-antlered (N = 97), and its live body mass recorded. Fork-antlered yearlings were further partitioned into 3-5 points (N = 33) and ≥6 points (N = 64) subclasses based on the number of antler points ≥2.54 cm in length. All deer were reared in 1.62-ha enclosures and maintained on a 16% crude protein diet...

Fawning dates of penned, known-age, Texas white-tailed deer (Odocoileus virginianus texanus) were recorded over a 3-year period. The peak 14-day fawning period for 27 3-year-old-plus females was 10 June-23 June with a mean fawning date (MFD) of 19 June. Peak fawning period for 26 2-year-old females was 24 June-7 July with aM FD of 8 July. The fawning peak for 36 I-year-olds included 2 14-day periods between 8 July-4 August with a MFD of 3 August. The MFD was significantly different (P <0.01) between all age-classes and between individual age-classes (P < 0.05).