From Velvet to Bone: The Whitetail’s Fall Transformation

Every fall, whitetail bucks go through one of the most dramatic changes in the deer woods—shedding the velvet from their antlers. It can be a bloody-looking process, but just how much blood does a buck actually lose? And does shedding velvet make him more vulnerable to predators?

If you've ever seen a buck immediately after shedding his velvet, the sight can be startling. His antlers may be streaked with red, dried velvet may hang from the beams, and blood can occasionally run down the antlers and onto his forehead.

Considering how vascular velvet is while antlers are growing, it's reasonable to wonder: How can a buck lose all that velvet without losing a dangerous amount of blood?

The answer lies in what happens to the antler before the velvet comes off.

Velvet Is Living Tissue

During spring and summer, a buck's antlers are among the fastest-growing tissues in the animal world.

While growing, antlers are covered by velvet—a soft layer of skin containing blood vessels and nerves. Those blood vessels supply the developing antlers with the nutrients and minerals necessary for their remarkable growth.

At this stage, damaging an antler can be serious. An antler broken or badly injured while actively growing can bleed considerably because blood is still circulating through the velvet and developing antler.

Normal velvet shedding is different.

The Blood Supply Shuts Down First

As late summer approaches and testosterone levels increase, antler growth comes to an end. The antlers mineralize and harden into bone.

At approximately the same time, circulation to the velvet decreases dramatically. Without its former blood supply, the velvet begins to dry, die and loosen from the hardened antler underneath.

That's an important distinction.

A buck isn't simply tearing healthy, fully vascular skin from his antlers. Much of the blood supply has already been reduced before the velvet is removed.

The buck then accelerates the process by rubbing his antlers against trees, shrubs and other vegetation.

That's when things can get messy.

How Much Blood Does a Buck Actually Lose?

There doesn't appear to be a well-established scientific measurement telling us that the average whitetail buck loses a specific number of ounces of blood while shedding velvet.

What we do know is that the dramatic appearance can make the blood loss look much greater than it actually is.

Blood spreads easily across the surface of an antler. Mix it with strips of velvet and moisture and a relatively small amount can create an impressive-looking scene.

Some bucks shed velvet very cleanly. Others may temporarily have bloody antlers, dangling strips of velvet or blood staining their forehead.

Under normal circumstances, however, velvet shedding is not a major blood-loss event for a healthy whitetail.

Within a relatively short period, the antlers clean up and the familiar polished bone of a fall whitetail buck emerges.

Does the Blood Attract Predators?

This leads to another interesting question: Could the smell of blood make a buck more vulnerable to wolves, coyotes or other predators?

Predators possess an impressive sense of smell, so it's certainly possible that they could detect blood or recently shed velvet. However, there isn't good evidence showing that predators routinely target healthy adult bucks specifically because they're shedding velvet.

More importantly, normal velvet shedding shouldn't cause enough blood loss to significantly weaken a healthy buck.

Adult whitetails are formidable animals. Coyotes are much more significant predators of deer fawns than healthy adult deer, while wolves are certainly capable of killing adult whitetails. In either case, a buck's physical condition, age, snow conditions, injuries and other factors are likely much more important than whether he recently shed his velvet.

If anything, the buck is entering fall with a new defensive tool.

Those once-soft antlers are now hardened bone.

When Antler Bleeding CAN Be Serious

There is an important difference between normal velvet shedding and an antler injury during the growing season.

A developing antler in June or July is still supplied with blood and covered with sensitive velvet. If that antler is broken, cut or severely damaged, the resulting bleeding can be much more substantial.

Injuries during antler development can also produce some of the unusual antlers hunters occasionally encounter in the fall—bent beams, abnormal points or other deformities.

Once antler growth is complete and blood flow to the velvet has largely ceased, the situation changes considerably.

One of the Signs That Fall Is Coming

For Minnesota deer hunters, velvet shedding is also one of those annual milestones that tells us hunting season is getting close.

Throughout summer, bucks can often be observed traveling together in bachelor groups with velvet-covered antlers. As daylight decreases and fall approaches, testosterone increases, antlers harden and velvet disappears.

Soon those bachelor groups begin breaking apart, rubbing activity increases and bucks gradually transition toward their fall behavior.

The bloody antlers might look alarming, but for the buck it's simply another step in an extraordinary biological cycle that happens every year.

Within months, those same antlers will be cast onto the forest floor.

Then, come spring, the entire process begins again.