Baby deer, known as fawns, are delicate creatures with spotted coats. Their early survival depends entirely on their mother’s care and a very specific diet. Understanding a fawn’s natural feeding habits is important for their development and welfare. This knowledge also highlights why human interference with their diet can be harmful.
Early Fawn Diet
Newborn fawns rely exclusively on their mother’s milk for the first few weeks of their lives. This initial milk, called colostrum, is rich in antibodies that provide passive immunity, protecting the fawn from diseases. Deer milk is highly concentrated, containing a higher fat and protein content compared to cow’s milk. This nutrient-dense composition allows fawns, typically weighing 4 to 8 pounds at birth, to double their weight within two weeks. Does nurse their fawns several times a day, often leaving them in secluded areas between feedings to avoid predators.
Transition to Solid Foods
As fawns mature, a gradual transition from an all-milk diet to solid foods begins. Around two weeks of age, fawns start to nibble on tender vegetation, though milk remains their primary nutritional source for several more weeks. This early browsing is more about exploration and learning, as their digestive system, particularly the rumen, continues to develop. By observing their mothers, fawns learn which plants are palatable and nutritious.
The types of vegetation fawns incorporate into their diet include tender leaves, shoots, forbs (broad-leaved plants), and eventually grasses. Full weaning typically occurs between 10 to 16 weeks of age (roughly 2.5 to 4 months), by which time their digestive system is capable of efficiently processing plant matter. This slow progression ensures the fawn’s rumen fully develops, allowing it to digest the fibrous plant material that constitutes an adult deer’s diet.
Foods to Avoid Feeding Fawns
Human intervention, especially feeding fawns, almost always causes more harm than good. Fawns have specialized digestive systems adapted to their natural diet, and introducing human foods can lead to severe health problems. Cow’s milk, for instance, has a different composition of proteins and sugars than deer milk, which can cause severe diarrhea, dehydration, and even death. The inability to properly digest cow’s milk disrupts their delicate gut flora and can lead to refeeding syndrome, a metabolic disturbance that can be fatal days after consumption.
Other human foods like bread, corn, and pet food are also detrimental. These items are often high in carbohydrates and can lead to rumen acidosis, a condition where the pH in the fawn’s specialized stomach drops, killing beneficial bacteria. This can result in malnutrition, illness, and even death.
Feeding fawns can also cause them to lose their natural fear of humans, leading to habituation that makes them vulnerable to dangers like traffic or puts them at risk of being euthanized if they become aggressive as adults. If a fawn appears to be in distress or orphaned, contact local wildlife authorities or licensed rehabilitators, rather than attempting to feed or care for it yourself.