This deer thought she was a high jumping Olympian… I mean, deer can jump pretty high, just not THAT high.
Whitetail deer are actually quite athletic, with highly-tuned senses to evade predators across North, Central, and South America. When alarmed, deer can reach top sprinting speeds of 35 to 40 mph to escape predators like coyotes, mountain lions, and wolves.
They possess massive hindquarter strength, allowing them to jump up to 8 feet vertically from a near standstill… which is why they can hop fences pretty easily, without much of a running start. While sprinting, they can cover horizontal distances of up to 30 feet in a single bound. Remember that viral video of one nearly clearing 3 cars in a driveway? Yeah… they got hops.
Of course, their athleticism is really their only defense, and when you’re that low on the food chain with no real offensive skills, you have to always be on guard. Between predators, hunters, cars, disease, food scarcity, and weather, it’s not easy being a deer.
But deer are adapted for that perpetual state of awareness necessary to survive. They have independently moving ears that can pick up sounds in different directions, and an exceptional sense of smell. Their dichromatic vision excels at detecting subtle motion in low light, though they struggle to process colors in the red and orange spectrum (which is why hunters can safely wear blaze orange).
But at times, that frantic sense of survival can be their own worst enemy. We’ve seen them make some questionable choices from jumping off bridges, getting stuck in fences, or just making their way into neighborhoods and homes. These choices are made in the name of survival but that doesn’t always mean their desired result comes to fruition.
This particular deer right here panicked when the car got too close. It immediately sensed danger and tried to create some distance between itself and the people. Never mind the fact that there was no actual danger from the vehicle. But it took off on a full tear hoping to make the leap of its life over a high fence on the roadside.
The deer makes a mighty fine leap that just isn’t good enough… only about… two whole feet short.
The deer strikes the fence about ¾ of the way up and gets cartwheeled back as it comes to a dead stop mid-air. The deer gets catapulted back down to the ground and takes off in the opposite direction. Not this fence, not on this day…
Fence 1, Deer 0.
Mule Deer Takes A Tumble
A swing and a miss.
I guess, it’s a jump and a miss, either way this is just too funny. I hate to laugh at any wildlife that is injured but this ol’ boy seems just fine after that tumble. Mule deer are some of the most sought-after large game in the country. Their picture-perfect antlers are a hunter’s dream, mixed with some pretty great tasting meat.
Muleys live in the Western half of the United States, stretching into the edges of the Midwest all the way to the west coast from the south down into Mexico, clear to the north up into Canada. They are a fair sized deer weighing up 300 pounds for large males. This makes them a very desirable species in any area they reside.
Seeing an animal you spend countless hours chasing is always great. Seeing something very out of the norm and hilarious just makes it all that much better.
This muley is spotted absolutely given’er. The deer is full speed ahead running through a farm field as a car travels right beside it. The buck decides its time to make it over the fence and across the road. It takes the last leap and tries to get over the fence but… no dice.
The deer clips the fence and takes a big tumble. It gathers itself up off the ground and easily hops back over it running off.
That is hilarious, a big misjudgment on the deer’s part mixed with too much speed.
