Hi Mike: I was told that you may be able to help identify the problem with this doe who keeps hanging around our apartment complex. She is very tiny, but there is obviously something wrong with her face - she has large lumps up and down her nose up to her eyes. I've attached a photo. We've named her Crystal as she made it through the harsh winter - we're in the Finger Lakes Region of central New York. She will come right up to us and seems very curious about people. She will sit and stare at us while we are outside. She comes within about two feet of me whenever I head outdoors. The local herd of deer [...]

Mike: One day last fall I swear I saw a doe with a small set of fork-horn antlers, but I didn’t shoot. Have you ever seen a doe with antlers?—Steve from MO Steve, no I have never seen one in the wild, though I’ve posted a few on the blog. According to VA biologists, there are two types of antlered whitetail does. The first is a female deer with velvet-covered antlers like this one.  This animal usually has a normal female reproductive tract and is capable of bearing fawns. The second type is a female deer with polished antlers. This animal is actually a male “pseudo-hermaphrodite.” It has the external genitalia of a female, but has male sex organs internally. [...]

I saw this photo on the Bowhunting.com Facebook and wondered: Is that sucker the biggest cactus buck ever? Although cactus bucks are rare, I’ve seen a good number of them over the years. But nothing approaching the gnarly mass that this one has. I have no idea where this freak was shot. Many people will think this buck had his balls injured or torn off (ouch!), but this explanation from Matt Knox (15th paragraph down), deer project coordinator for Virginia, fits to a tee: A unique male antler anomaly is a “cactus” buck. These bucks suffer from very low testosterone production due to hypogonadism or cryptochidism (i.e., their testicles are the size of a green pea or never descend from [...]