Strange season

[Dbender]

Deer are similar to cows in their digestive system in that they are rumimnants, and they are browsers that just eat whatever is present as they move through the area. They don't use stomach acid like humans to digest food and instead have micro-organisms in their stomach that breakdown their food. The microorganisms that work to digest one food source don't work well to digest another, so the "makeup" of microorganisms change depending on what they are eating as the primary food source. They eat a lot of high protein legume in summer, then move on to acorns which have protein and carbohydrates. Corn fits right in in terms of digestion during that time period. In the wintertime, when those more preferred food sources are gone in most places, deer often go to a heavy diet of woody browse, so the "bugs" in their stomach change to that food source being more fiber based. That doesn't mean they won't eat corn or hit a food plot, but the don't have to "bugs" to digest it well if most of what they are eating isn't similar in makeup. They often aren't getting much in terms of energy from corn or small food plots, so they will often just ignore them to continue to eat on stuff they have the "bugs" in their stomach for.cut

Cut open a few deer and you'll realize this isn't true.

 

[B. White]

How Many Stomachs Does a Deer Have?​

Deer have four stomachs, commonly referred to as four chambered stomachs and each stomach chamber serves a very important process in the deer digestive system.

Deer chew cud to maximize their digestive process.

Having a full stomach sounds great, especially if you have four chambers in the stomach, but when that belly is full of plant life that isn’t exactly the easiest to digest, you’d want to find a way to take some pressure off of things.

First Chamber: Rumen​

When deer go to forage on grass and other browse, contrary to popular belief, they don’t chew their food all the way through. deer chew enough so that the food is safe to swallow.

When they first swallow food, the food passes into the first section of the stomach called the rumen. The rumen could basically be considered a waiting room, being the chamber that holds the food when the deer loads up. The rumen portion can hold about two gallons of food for a deer.

After they get to their bedding area, they will lie down and begin to bring the cud back up and start chewing on it before swallowing it and sending it back to pass through the second chamber.

Second Chamber: Reticulum​

Since deer eat plant life that contains cellulose, which is basically the part of plants that isn’t digestible, their stomachs are going to need a way to separate the good stuff from the bad stuff.

And that’s where the second portion, known as the reticulum, comes in.

The reticulum portion of the stomach could basically be considered the strainer of the stomach.

After the food has been through the first cycle, the cud comes through the reticulum, where the reticulum puts a filter on the incoming cud.

The good bits that are digestible go through the fermentation process, which makes it easier for the third portion to step up and pull its weight.

The cellulose?

It's still a stomach, so the cud that can’t be broken down with digestion is going in the waste bin.

Fun fact, deer are known to defecate and urinate almost twelve times a day.

The digestion that takes place within the reticulum can take around sixteen hours by itself.

Third Chamber: Omasum​

There’s still more to chew, and another chamber that the re-regurgitated cud has to pass through.

After the cud has been processed via the second chamber, brought up and chewed on again, it gets swallowed and passes into the third section, the omasum.

The omasum is the water absorber, taking all of the water out of the foods where it is absorbed into the body for the deer's energy.

After this stage, the deer brings it back up one last time into the deer mouth to be ground up even further before reaching the fourth, final stage in the deer digestive system.

Fourth Chamber: Abomasum​

The abomasum is the true stomach and last chamber, full of the gastric juices required to fully digest the food.

This is where the chewed food is sent last, where deer digestion occurs, very much like human digestion.

When the food enters the abomasum, the gastric juices, like hydrochloric acid and enzymes in the deer’s stomach come together to strip the cud of all of its nutrients, leaving the rest of the food to go into the intestines, where it is turned into waste droppings.

 

[Ashmcc455]

Here is what's left of a gut pile from a buck yesterday after buzzards and an overnight rain. Same thing with another from two weeks ago. All I have ever killed later in the year in middle GA was the same. You ought to be hunting them, or near them, if you have them. They are some of the first to fall and continue to fall all season. I'm sure someone has feeders around, but no corn evident in either deer.

I have found white oak trees from late Dec. to the end of the season where a buck would come into and root the last 10 mins of light. He would come down a bottom by hundreds of other trees and never stop at any but this one. He'd have his head buried in leaves and all I could see was the rack sticking up, then after a while he'd wander off. It was pure luck finding that tree and it doesn't happen very often.

View attachment 1199824

I am hunting oak bottoms, fields, food plots, water sources, corn piles, feeders with deer feed, and deep thickets that all have excellent sign. My entire area is private land and only three neighbors hunt and even then they only hunt one to two days a week. My main spot is not worth sitting anymore as they began clearing land adjacent to it to plant a blueberry field. The new spot I set up has only been hunted twice in November and then the 27th and 29th of December. I harvested a doe on the 27th and watched one on the 29th. I’m back there today (1/1) and it is eerie quiet, no squirrels no birds nothing.

 

[across the river]

Cut open a few deer and you'll realize this isn't true.

What isn't true. that deer have stomach like a cow?

 

[Dbender]

What isn't true. that deer have stomach like a cow?

No, just the belief that they primarily choose similar dietary staples.

 

[Stingray23]

We hunted all day yesterday accept for about 2 hours midday set up in the thick stuff that usually holds the deer on out place. All that came from it was my son getting busted by resident nanny doe. They are hitting the feed and the plots. I'm guessing at night. But we do have a good many tracks of all sizes.

Hunted Sunday-Monday a.m, still no deer, most pics are late night and pre-dawn, decided to fish our pond instead Sunday afternoon, wasn't such a bad weekend after all

 

[gma1320]

Hunted Sunday-Monday a.m, still no deer, most pics are late night and pre-dawn, decided to fish our pond instead Sunday afternoon, wasn't such a bad weekend after all

Nice congratulations