But maybe not. According to deer researchers, a true albino white-tailed deer will have pink or blue eyes and white hooves. It is my educated guess that this deer would be quite the extreme example of a piebald in that situation. Learn more about deer behavior and biology so you can be become a well-rounded hunter! Just saw a true albino last night which is what brought me to this blog.
It had pink eyes and the skin inside its ears was bright pink. I was driving, but my son got a pic. It was just off the side of the road in Morrisville, NC suburb of Raleigh. There is an all white deer on display in St. Ansgar, IA. I saw it in the wild.
She was just in my backyard again this evening. I love watching her and worry about her every year during hunting season, but most of our area is posted. I do see people stop and take her picture when they see her in the field.
She even ran into the side of my car one year, but no damage to her or my car. Your email address will not be published. This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed. Skip to content. Join the Conversation. I am not sure how many more years she has, but I will enjoy her until the end!
Previous Comments. An albino bred to a normal deer without the recessive gene for albinism would produce all normally colored white-tailed deer.
But, the offspring from this cross would carry the recessive gene for albinism even though it would be normally colored.
When carriers of albinism breed, there is a one-in-four chance that they will produce an albino fawn. The albino deer, other than their color difference, are in every other way the same as regular colored deer In fact, we have videos of four white does fending off a whole herd of brown deer in competition for food.
We also have videos of white does protecting their regular-colored fawns. Is albinism a defective trait? Because pigments are involved in the development of the retina or back of the eye, the eyesight of pure albinos can be affected. However, according to the people who have watched the white deer in the Leland area and in Boulder Junction for years, there is nothing unusual or defective about the deer. They look and act like any other deer, are just as healthy, and live just as long.
Jeff Richter, author of White Deer: Ghosts of the Forest , has seen different albino deer and watched them over years, with thousands of hours of viewing time. Human studies may also show that albinism is primarily a color difference and does not affect overall health or strength:. White deer stand out like a sore thumb…unless they have a backdrop of snow. In winter they have the camouflage advantage. Sometimes albinos are noticed and captured more easily than normal animals. Would you recognize white hamburgers as good to eat?
In studies where animals had many places to hide, predators captured albino and normally colored animals at the same rate. Coat color did not make a difference. Not only because they stand out more due to their white color, but because many hunters see them as a rare trophy. Native American tribes, although they had cultural differences is many other areas, almost without exception considered the white deer special or sacred.
It was considered very bad luck for a hunter to kill a white deer. Although white deer held an exalted status among Native Americans, they have been considerably devalued by those who now view them as merely defective members of the deer herd rather than spiritual messengers. What is the hunting status of white deer in Wisconsin and other states? It is currently illegal to shoot albino and white deer in Wisconsin.
White deer were protected in all of Wisconsin for many years, but an exception was made in CWD chronic wasting disease management zones in the southern part of the state from to This included Leland, which is on the outer edge of the zone. States with legislation to protect white and albino deer and the year the law went into effect: Wisconsin , Illinois , Iowa , and Tennessee The fact that other states prohibit the hunting of white deer shows that they are special enough and valued enough to be given protected status.
The fact that state protection can be removed shows, unfortunately, how precarious any white deer law is. Why are the white deer special?
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