Fawn season! The farm will be preparing for the fawns arrival next month. A doe's gestation period is about 200 days and we predict that we will have our first fawns on the ground on May 21st. Of course the gestation period may be altered depending on how many fawns the doe is carrying and the does environment etc. Fawn Season is a bit like Christmas and Easter together. The doe will start pacing non-stop around the fence 12-24 hours before she has the baby. Last year all of the fawns were born at night so we would all wake up in the morning knowing that there was a fawn hiding somewhere in the pasture. A whole lot like an Easter egg hunt! Fawns are about 3/4 the size of a dinner plate when curled up so they are difficult to find. Once they are located we ID them with a plastic ear tag and a microchip. The PA Dep. of Agriculture requires for captive whitetails to have two forms of ID with at least one visible. The fawn receives some probiotic paste orally, 2cc of vitamin B complex under the skin (SQ), and some iodine on it's belly button. We tag all of our doe fawns in their left ear and all of the buck in their right ear, this way we can tell their gender at a glance.
One of our 2012 fawns hidden in the golden rod
After they have their ID's it is all logged in the herd inventory sheet the babies are put back with their mothers. The doe fawns are pulled off of the mother after 6-12 hours. We then take the female fawns and bottle feed them, this makes them easier to handle as they grow up. The buck fawns are rarely bottle fed because when they grow their antlers they become dangerous, especially during the rut (mating season). We never pull the doe fawns form the mother before they are 6 hours old because the mother doe needs time to pass the colostrum through to her fawn. The colostrum is crucial to the fawns survival. I could go on for a long time but I will write more on bottle feeding in a couple weeks.
Here is a video of a fawn being born! This was not on our farm, but it's still really cool!
P.S. The bucks have also started to grow antlers! This picture of Mr. is from last week, since then he has put on a about 2" more growth!
