Deer eating at gut piles

[John Y Cannuck]

Now that seems disgusting I'm sure to some, maybe even hard to believe.
What I think is happening, is that they are eating the contents of the rumen. I have set trail cams at gut piles a few times, and regularly get deer visiting, often they even beat the Ravens, if it's an evening kill. But so far no clear picture that indicates they are actually eating, or just curious.

He's about six feet from the pile in that pic.

If I have the time, I may try to move the rumen to a different spot and see if they come to it next time.
Gut piles last maybe two nights, but usually only one here.

 

[Smcx]

I read about a study that was a collaboration between le and a university in the US on cadavers (human) decomposing in the forest. They were surprised to find deer munching on the bodies.

 

[Got Juice?]

Deer will eat the rumenants, and find areas of organs containing minerals. Wild animals are much better adapted to the outdoors than we are for sure.

 

[sherlockbonez]

Vegetarian by day, corpse eating zombie by night.

 

[Chuckbuster]

If I remember correctly, they were chewing on bones; possibly for the mineral content.

 

[victor16]

If I remember correctly, they were chewing on bones; possibly for the mineral content.

I wonder if this is the same for gophers. I heard they were cannibals but never saw that occur after so many years of hunting them until I saw it a couple of years ago. We shot five in a row at a hole as one started chewing on the buddy we just shot....one after the next chewing on the previously shot gopher......

 

[Grizzly Adams]

I wonder if this is the same for gophers. I heard they were cannibals but never saw that occur after so many years of hunting them until I saw it a couple of years ago. We shot five in a row at a hole as one started chewing on the buddy we just shot....one after the next chewing on the previously shot gopher......

Watched em dining a lot of times on their late, road killed buddy., and another one bites the dust.

Grizz

 

[45ACPKING]

I have a spot i hunt by treestand and one weekend we dropped bucks in there and went back the following weekend to see about our other tags. Lots of deer pass by the stand and several of them stopped and lingered around the previous weeks kill site,which was 15 yards out from the stand. They didn't appear to be eating anything , just smelling and being real curious about that exact spot on the ground. Not much left of the gut pile a week later but still seemed to attract the deer strolling by.

 

[Butcherbill]

It wouldn’t surprise me if they were eating the rumen or other parts of the gut pile, when we kill and process our roosters the other chickens will mob us for any scraps and blood that they can find. Animals are savage sometimes, chickens especially. They will literally peck and eat each other to death when they are chicks if they see blood on another bird.

 

[Jaaska]

Twice i've seen deer eat mice and a buddy saw a deer eat a little bird .

 

[MIRAMICHIER]

My Wife feeds the moose birds in the winter they will eat anything chicken,ham bologna when the snow gets high enough on our porch the Deer will come and eat everything including old chicken legs and wings probably because they are so hungry in winter with the deep snow.So in a sense they are carnivores.

 

[mbogo3]

In a hard winter rabbits will eat one another out of snares.

 

[Rynnik]

These are all trail cam shots set up over a skinned out coyote corpse. Lots of other critters captured by the camera of course (red tail hawks were first) but I found the deer interest the most surprising personally:

 

[lbo]

It wouldn’t surprise me if they were eating the rumen or other parts of the gut pile, when we kill and process our roosters the other chickens will mob us for any scraps and blood that they can find. Animals are savage sometimes, chickens especially. They will literally peck and eat each other to death when they are chicks if they see blood on another bird.

i have seen this with our birds as well even older ones lbo

 

[45ACPKING]

this might be the most interesting thread on the hunting forum this fall LOL

I found this topic kinda fascinating and google searching found me this.....
https://slate.com/technology/2012/1...nd-carnivores-are-not-so-clearly-divided.html

 

[elimsprint]

And here all I've given them is corn, wish I could afford steak, lol.

 

[Suther]

My Wife feeds the moose birds in the winter they will eat anything chicken,ham bologna when the snow gets high enough on our porch the Deer will come and eat everything including old chicken legs and wings probably because they are so hungry in winter with the deep snow.So in a sense they are carnivores.

Definitely not carnivores, as that would mean they only eat meat.

If you look into it, you'll find that animals are rarely 100% one or the other. This is especially true for carnivores. Very very few animals eat a 100% meat diet with zero plant matter in their diet. Even things we typically think of as carnivores such as wolves will often eat fruit and berries and such at times.

Hell dogs will eat rocks when they are starving... I wouldn't be surprised by much from a really hungry animal.

 

[sherlockbonez]

I think of cats a obligate carnivores but not dogs. Most of dog food in store are plants with some meat mixed in.

 

[TSPIRI]

Deer are sometimes attracted to blood during the rut. Read a study somewhere and it was all about how a hot doe might sometimes bleed a tiny bit when she's ready to breed and the bucks take that as a sign she's good to go.

 

[IronCanadian]

Is it baiting if I drop a corpse in the woods and hunt over it!?