They grow quickly but stay soft and tender until late summer. The antlers are covered with fuzzy skin, called velvet . Then the velvet dries, and the antler gets hard as bone. The male deer scrapes its hard antlers against trees to remove the velvet and expose the sharp points, called tines . Young male deer grow small antlers with two points.
Older deer grow large antlers with six or more tines.
Male deer use their antlers to fight each other during the fall breeding season, called the rut . They try to stab each other s sides. Or, with antlers locked, two males will push each other back and forth until the weaker one runs away. The winner goes off to mate with a female. Male deer also use their antlers to fight off dogs, coyotes, wolves, and other predators.