EHD and young deer

[whiteoak]

Since I have been seeing the effects of EHD in my area. The few live deer I have been seeing the majority are this years fawns. I have seen very few adult deer in the last several weeks. Does this desease not hurt young deer as much as the adults? I have talked to many others who have said the same thing/

[rmc]

I have alway heard a human baby can handle a high fever better then an adult. That is one of the things that go with EHD is a high fever.

[bsk]

EHD general hits the youngest deer the hardest because they've never come in contact with the disease before and have little resistance. I think few dead fawns are found because they are so quickly consumed by scavengers.

What deer are seen during daylight is usually a very poor indication of what deer are out there in the wild.

[Deleted]

That is not what is happening here, in Central Ky. We are seeing the oldest does and adult bucks dieing off the most and lots of fawns in the woods alone. My friends in Ga. report the same. The thought is that fawns have some immunity to the Type II EHD for at least 6 month or so. Many reports of fawns surviving and being without the adult doe in this area, too many to believe that fawns go first.

[whiteoak]

timex, that's what I'm seeing also. I went from seeing 30 -40 deer an evening a month and a half ago, to now seeing 5 or 6 young fawns an evening, most still have spots on them. I realize that you do see more deer out feeding in bean fields early in the year, but now I'm only seeing a few fawns, and without their mothers. I'm getting very few pictures on my game cams also and the ones that are taken are of fawns. Out of the 31 dead deer that I have found not one , that I can tell for sure has been a fawn, no spots at least yet, but several were pretty far gone to tell for sure.