Long canine teeth sink into a newborn fawn. A short fawn-indistress bleat, a few labored breaths, and then nothing. Another fawn becomes breakfast. Another young deer is dead.
Now, that’s a visceral anecdote, but it’s one that plays out millions of times every spring. Coyotes kill millions of deer fawns each year, and it’s no secret that it’s taking a significant toll on overall deer populations. Coyotes aren’t native east of the Mississippi River. As a result, this newfound threat continues to catch does off-guard, and fawn recruitment rates continue to decline.
For example, according to most data, South Carolina whitetail populations peaked in the 1990s. Furthermore, coyotes arrived in the 20th century and became a newfound problem for deer herds. This posed a new and significant problem for whitetails to overcome.
Clemson University wildlife biologists and Ph.D. candidates Alex Jensen and Mike Muthersbaugh spent months researching several elements within fawn recruitment. Some of these included the relationships between does and fawns, effectiveness of does as mothers, relationships between coyotes and
