What Every Deer Owner Should Know About Deer Feeding Habits
Deers are fascinating creatures. If you own one or are thinking about purchasing one, you must know that they have a variety of behaviors and habits, which can be difficult to understand if you don’t know how they behave in their natural habitat.
Luckily, this blog post will discuss everything that deer do while feeding so you can make sure to keep your deer healthy and strong.
Basic Deer Diet
Before getting into the different deer feeding times and habits, it is important to know what a deer’s basic diet consists of. In general, deer love to eat:
- Grasses
- Leaves
- Acorns
- Berries
- Twigs/saplings
The availability of these food items will depend on the time of year and location. For example, deer will eat more conifer needles in the wintertime since other food items are not as readily available.
Deer Feeding Times
Now that you know what a deer’s basic diet is let’s discuss when they tend to feed during the day.
- In the morning, deer will usually feed for an hour or two.
- In the afternoon, they will feed again for another hour or two.
- At night, they will typically eat for about four hours.
These times are not set in stone and can vary depending on the individual deer and what is available to them at the time.
Different Deer Feeding Habits
Deers are creatures of habit, and once they find a certain food source, whether it is an apple tree in your back yard or the neighbor’s shrubs that hangover into their property, they will keep coming back to feed on that.
But what happens when deer don’t have any specific food items to eat?
Here are some feeding habits that deer will engage in when there is nothing readily available:
- They will browse for food. This means they will be looking at everything around them and eating whatever they can get their paws on; even plants considered weeds by humans. They do this because it helps clear away dead leaves to grow new ones.
- They will also eat snow for water, especially in the winter months or if there is a drought and their usual sources of drinking water are dried up.
- Deer may even resort to eating bark off trees since it contains tannin, which helps them digest food.
Seasonal Dietary Differences
Deer tend to follow the food sources available in their area. For example, if they live near forested areas with plenty of leaves and acorns, they will eat what they eat most often since it is readily available for them throughout all seasons.
However, if there isn’t much plant life in their area or the available plant life changes with every season, deer will adapt and change what they eat. So in the wintertime, they may eat more conifer needles, while they might consume more grasses in the summer.
Give Your Deer A Complete Nutrition
By understanding the different deer feeding times and habits, you can make sure to keep your deer healthy, and by visiting the Fix & Feed store, you can accomplish full nutrition thanks to our great variety of deer food.
We’ve got only the best brands of deer pellets and deer corn, perfectly balanced to provide your short-tailed buddies with all the necessary nutrients they need to stay strong and live as long as possible.
Visit us and ask for our high-quality deer food products!