A neighbouring estate has a few hinds in a certain area which have lost a significant amount of their hair. Any ideas on the cause of this, Morena?
The deer appear healthy otherwise, it is not an area heavily stocked with deer, although sheep are present. The hair loss appears to have happened over the last 4 months or so, and is not just the kind of patches that are commonly seen when deer are moulting/ irritated by warbles, etc-some of the beasts I have seen have lost about 25% of their hair, in one big patch. The deer in question live on the open hill in the north of scotland and have no access to forestry. The overall condition of deer in this area last year was not great, owing to the very dry and cold spring/early summer we had last year which kept the grass growth back.
The deer appear healthy otherwise, it is not an area heavily stocked with deer, although sheep are present. The hair loss appears to have happened over the last 4 months or so, and is not just the kind of patches that are commonly seen when deer are moulting/ irritated by warbles, etc-some of the beasts I have seen have lost about 25% of their hair, in one big patch. The deer in question live on the open hill in the north of scotland and have no access to forestry. The overall condition of deer in this area last year was not great, owing to the very dry and cold spring/early summer we had last year which kept the grass growth back.