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Limping deer

Buddy took out a buck that had shed his horns and his lower leg was swollen like that, you reckon they stand up and smack like I have seen videos posted of doe's fighting? Maybe break a bone in it?
 
Daughter got a nice 8 pt. with broken brow tines. Processor found infection inside one leg, and ribcage. Didn't eat it.
I was bowhunting ,and a doe came by me with 2 fawns, and a hurt front leg so bad she couldn't put it down. She would hop a couple steps on her good front leg, and stop to rest. I thought she wouldn't survive the winter, but I let her go. Two years later I saw the doe, and she had only a slight limp. A good buck was following her.
 
I watched a 2.5 yr old for about 15 minutes a few weeks ago that was walking funny. Finally decided he was reluctant to put weight on his back right leg. No obvious external injury. I figured he got thrown around and/or landed funny on that back leg. I know dogs can tear their ACL — no reason this doesn't happen to deer too.
 
Biggun4214 said:
Lower leg injuries could also be caused by old fences, vines, etc.
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Honey Locust Thorns are the absolute worst on hooves! If you get poked by one it's got the same sickening feeling as getting finned by a catfish. I've seen deer have a lot of foot problems in areas with high concentrations of those devil trees. I Had one go through my kids rain boot one spring when we were fishing, I felt awful.

There are areas in the delta that are thick with those honey locust and more often than not there are deer limping in those areas! also, Deer love honey locust pods especially in the late season.
 
I've been saying the extra aggression this year in the deer is linked to a lack of scraping activities. 🤷‍♂️

If your seeing deer that can't put weight on their front or rear hooves then watch it. I've been trying to track down an illness I've been seeing the last 7 years; that was not prevalent before. We are seeing deer with swollen ankles at the hoof. They get to where they can't walk at all and we have lost a BUNCH of deer to it. My neighbor had to put one down last week, and I have been trying to get TWRA to perform testing on these deer to figure out what this is. I lost every single shooter I had going into the next deer season for 5 years straight on one farm when I first started seeing it. The only thing we had new in the area around the time it started was a different land manager on an adjacent farm that started feeding the deer huge quantities of corn. Me and another neighbor believe it is foot rot caused by feed sites, but we are not sure and without actual testing by an expert we don't know what it is. But it has been a major issue on one farm I hunt. I have not seen it in other locations.
 
BSK said:
Below is a prime example of what I'm talking about. This is one of our better surviving 3 1/2 year-olds. In the first video, you can clearly see he can hardly put any weight on his front left leg. But in the close-up second video, I can see no injury on his front left leg or shoulder. I probably have 5 older bucks like this now on my place - heavily limping on a front leg but no visible injuries.
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That's not good read my post above. This is what our deer look like before deteriorating fast.
 
UPSman said:
We're down the street now and I passed on a small 8 point last night that was limping badly. He was favoring his left shoulder and he was scrawny as all get out. Ther spike that was with him had to outweigh him by a good 40 pounds or so. Looking at a recent picture of him his foot is noticeably swollen.View attachment 257898
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Yep that's what we are seeing. Swollen lower leg, bad stuff. I'm not sure I've seen a deer survive it.
 
Dickson county
 

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That is troubling Dumluck. Can't say I've seen that in my area, but I've heard you mention it before. The few times we've seen a deer with a foot or hoof problem, upon inspection they had either stepped on something sharp, cutting between their hooves, or it was a deer that had survived EHD and had hoof sluffing.
 
BSK said:
That is troubling Dumluck. Can't say I've seen that in my area, but I've heard you mention it before. The few times we've seen a deer with a foot or hoof problem, upon inspection they had either stepped on something sharp, cutting between their hooves, or it was a deer that had survived EHD and had hoof sluffing.
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I've never found anything between the hoofs. Ive always found some type if cut above the hoof but it's usually very light most of the time, not all the way through the hide in some cases. It looks like typical wounds you'd see from a deer running, jumping fences, ect....

Now I have seen EHD damage to hoofs and this is not the same.

The hoof is usually intact, it's the area directly above the hoof just like Mike posted and the bucks always shed early like his picture. I never see those deer again after they shed. We have even shot a couple to put them down and their racks fall off when they hit the ground.

A thought that comes to mind is other areas may be seeing it now because properties that used to not feed are now feeding because the crazy game warden law, they figure they cant get caught. IDK just a thought if it is some kind of foot rot from infected feed sites.

I really wish someone would test a deer to fugure this out. My neighbor kept parts of the deer he put down the other day and I'm working on trying to get TWRA to test it. I actually texted my game warden following up with him before I saw this post.
 
Dumbluck,

Reading up on it I believe you are correct that the problem is hoof rot. The description of the symptoms and the images you and others have posted is a perfect match for the disease.

Looking at known causes, I wonder do you have cattle operations nearby? Since many ungulates carry the bacterium in their digestive tract, I suspect deer that are congregating at a feed site or cattle feed site would be highly susceptible to the disease. Wet/muddy ground is also a contributing factor. Deer defecating and churning up the ground at a feeder site would be a perfect transmission spot.
 
BSK said:
Wet/muddy ground is also a contributing factor.
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The most likely cause for foot rot, muddy water sources.

I have dealt with it with cows, the pic Mike posted is consistent with what I would expect it to look like in deer. Giving cows antibiotics will clear it up, unfortunately that's not an option in wild deer herds.
 

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