Deer antlers are one of nature’s most remarkable features. If you’ve ever wondered whether deer can feel their antlers or not, you’re not alone.
If you’re short on time, here’s a quick answer: Deer can feel their antlers to some degree while they are still growing, but once the antlers fully harden, deer can no longer feel sensations in their antlers.
The Antler Growth Process
Antler Growth Cycle
The growth of deer antlers is an amazing process that occurs every year. Male deer, called bucks, shed their antlers each winter and regenerate a completely new set the following spring. This antler growth cycle is regulated by changes in testosterone levels and lasts about 4-5 months from spring into summer.
In late March or early April, increased daylight and rising testosterone levels initiate antler growth from the pedicles, which are temporary bony structures that serve as bases for the antlers. At first, the antlers are covered in velvet, a soft, hairy skin filled with blood vessels and nerves that transport oxygen and nutrients to support rapid growth.
By mid-summer, the antlers are fully formed and the velvet is shed, revealing the hard, bony antlers underneath.
Nerves and Blood Vessels in Developing Antlers
While the antlers are growing in the spring and early summer, they are innervated and highly vascularized. This means they contain many blood vessels and nerves. The blood vessels transport oxygen and nutrients, such as calcium and phosphorus, that support swift antler growth.
Meanwhile, the nerves allow bucks to feel sensations in their developing antlers.
Studies show that bucks often rub their antlers against trees and branches during the velvet stage, likely helping to stimulate growth and possibly feeling pleasurable due to innervation. So in the early phases, deer can definitely feel their rapidly growing antlers while covered in velvet.
Hardened Antlers Lose Sensation
In August/September, a rise in testosterone causes the velvet’s blood vessels and nerves to constrict and eventually disappear altogether. This cuts off blood flow and sensation to the antlers. By late September when the velvet sheds, the antler bone hardens into dead material composed largely of calcium and phosphorus.
Deer scrape off the velvet to facilitate the hardening process.
So once the velvet is shed and antlers fully harden, they no longer contain nerves or blood vessels. At this point, deer can no longer feel sensations in their antlers. So during the mating season when bucks use their hardened antlers for sparring and displaying dominance, they do not feel pain from clashing antlers with rivals.
Evidence That Deer Can Feel Developing Antlers
Reactions to Touching Velvet Antlers
There is strong evidence that deer can feel sensations in their antlers while they are growing and covered in velvet. Here are some key observations:
- Deer exhibit pain responses when their velvet antlers are touched or bumped. They may flinch, shake their head, or move away when contact occurs.
- Deer carefully maneuver through brush and wooded areas to avoid snagging and damaging their velvet antlers before they fully harden. This shows an awareness of the antlers and a desire to protect them.
- If the velvet is damaged or torn off prematurely, deer will lick and tend to their antlers to promote healing. This suggests sensation and discomfort in the antler tissue.
- When deer shed their antlers annually, it appears to be a painless process. But when velvet is removed by force, deer show clear signs of pain and distress.
These observable reactions strongly indicate that whitetail deer and other cervids can feel sensations in their developing antlers while covered in velvet. The velvet contains nerve endings and blood vessels that would allow pain signals to be transmitted if the antler is injured or touched.
Careful Movement to Avoid Damage
Deer with velvet antlers will carefully maneuver through their habitat to avoid damaging their sensitive and growing antlers. Here are some examples of this cautious behavior:
- When moving through brush or wooded areas, deer will slowly turn their head from side to side to prevent their antlers getting snagged on branches. They may shake their head to dislodge any sticks or vegetation that gets caught.
- Deer avoid contact between their velvet antlers and hard objects or surfaces that could tear or puncture the velvet. They tend to duck under low hanging limbs rather than risk snagging an antler.
- During sparring matches with other males, deer are very careful to avoid spearing their soft antlers together with force, which could lead to pain and injury.
- Deer minimize head shaking or rapid antler movement that could cause discomfort when antlers are in the velvet stage.
A study by researchers at Michigan State University found that deer modified their behavior for 69 days on average to protect their growing antlers. This slow, methodical movement shows an awareness of the antlers and desire to avoid damage while they are still soft and sensitive.
Lack of Feeling in Hardened Antlers
No Reaction to Antler Damage Once Hardened
Deer antlers are truly remarkable structures. During growth, they are covered in velvet, a highly vascularized skin that supplies oxygen and nutrients to support rapid growth. According to wildlife biologists, a whitetail deer’s antlers can grow up to 2 inches per day, making them the fastest normal growing tissue in mammals.
However, once the antlers are fully grown and hardened, the velvet dries up and deer will rub it off. At this point, the antlers are essentially dead bone, with no nerves or blood flow. Deer show no reaction to antler damage once hardened, even if tines break off or get worn down.
This lack of sensation allows bucks to use their antlers for fighting during the breeding season with no pain response.
Nerves and Blood Vessels Recede
Early on when the antlers begin developing, they are supplied with blood vessels, nerves, and specialized hair follicles that will form into velvet. But by late August, after full maturity, these blood vessels and nerves die off and recede from the antlers.
The velvet will dry off naturally, aided by deer rubbing their antlers on trees and brush.
The velvet makes a clear boundary between living tissue in the deer’s skin forming the growing antlers, and the dead bone that results. So while deer certainly feel pain during antler growth if injured, once the velvet comes off, they lose sensation.
The bone is effectively a weapon used with no harm to the buck beyond normal wear and tear from fighting.
Benefits of Losing Sensation
Prevents Pain During Sparring
Deer antlers are unique structures composed primarily of bone tissue that regenerates each year. As the antlers grow rapidly from spring into summer, they are covered in a highly innervated skin referred to as velvet which contains blood vessels and nerves that service growth (source).
By late summer when the antlers reach maturity, the velvet dries up and deer rub it off, leaving bare bone. This is beneficial because it means mature antlers have minimal pain sensation (source).
Deer frequently use their antlers during rutting season in the fall for sparring matches with other males. These battles establish hierarchy for breeding rights and can be quite aggressive. If deer had full sensation in their antlers, these matches would be very painful.
However, the lack of feeling in the bone material allows deer to strike antlers together forcefully with minimal discomfort. This suggests losing sensation in mature antlers is advantageous from an evolutionary perspective, as it enables them to serve well as weapons.
Allows Antlers to Be Effective Weapons
Beyond simply preventing pain, the lack of nerves or blood supply in fully formed antlers contributes to their effectiveness as weapons. Antler bone is extremely dense and able to withstand incredible impacts of over 700 pounds of force striking against another deer’s antlers (source).
If antlers retained vascularization as the velvet does, internal bleeding and blood loss would result from such collisions, severely injuring the deer.
Additionally, without nerves there is minimal blunt force trauma transmitted to the skull during a collision. This allows deer to sustain impressive blow after blow to their rack. For comparison, injuries in human sports like football and boxing where significant force impacts players’ helmets can still cause concussions and brain trauma even with protective gear.
The deer’s solid, senseless antlers confer great advantage as natural battle weapons.
Conclusion
While deer antlers may appear insensitive once they fully harden, the antler growth process shows the complex biological changes that happen as antlers develop. Through their reactions while antlers are still growing, deer make it clear they can feel sensations in their antlers before they fully calcify.
So the answer is – deer can feel their antlers, but only during the velvet stage when the antlers are still developing. Once the antlers harden, sensations are lost, likely an evolutionary necessity to enable deer to use their antlers for sparring.
