Population reduction and, in some cases, habitat management are prescribed to alleviate overpopulation problems. Occasionally during the breeding season, two evenly matched bucks battle for dominance. These serious confrontations are quite different from the gentle sparring typical of younger bucks before the breeding season. Diet Because whitetails are ruminants, they are able to use a wide variety of foods. Their four-part compound stomach enables them to break down woody browse and herbage, but they cannot digest low quality forage, such as grass and woody browse, as efficiently as cattle and goats.
Deer are selective feeders and seek out preferred plant species.
They seem to possess an ability to select those plants that offer the most nutrition during that particular time of year, such as when the plants are flowering, producing fruit or undergoing rapid growth. Deer have been documented eating more than 600 different types of plants. Deer in the Ozark region of Missouri live in chiefly wooded areas and rely on natural forage, such as grape vines, green briar, Virginia creeper, oak leaves, pussy toes, clovers and prickly lettuce. During spring and summer, deer eat perennial plants more than annuals. Most researchers found wild browse, fruits and seeds also are major food items.