What's Up With Deer Droppings

Many hunters mistakenly think they can distinguish buck droppings from doe droppings.  They incorrectly assume that bucks make the clump of compressed droppings while does leave the single pellet droppings. This theory is absolutely false. Both bucks and does leave both types of droppings.

The clumped droppings indicate that the deer has been bedded down and ruminating, which, in cattleman’s terms, means chewing its cud. Deer, like cattle, have four-compartment stomachs. They feed and then bed and regurgitate the coarse vegetation they have eaten and chew it up into finer bits and swallow it again. Then, when they emerge from their beds, their first droppings are compressed in clumps. After that, as they feed and move about, their droppings are formed as single pellets.

So when trying to determine buck sign from doe sign, don’t be fooled by the false theory about droppings. Deer droppings may vary in size in accordance with the animal’s body size, but not according to its sex.