Wild friends in East Hokkaido #1 Ezo Deer

The eastern Hokkaido is surrounded by dramatic nature,and there are many opportunities to encounter wildlife, rare plants, and bacteria.

Through next few posts, we will introduce some of the wild friends in surrounding environment you can meet in the eastern Hokkaido region.

When you visit Lake Akan, pay close attention to the encounters that occur at Lake Akan, where nature and humans are so close!

This time we will be introducing ezo deer, which are seen so often that it would be no exaggeration to call them local residents or neighbors.

Ezo deer can be seen everywhere around this area, including at the tourist information center, along the back roads of shopping streets, and on forest walking trails, and they are often in group.

Ezo deer is a subspecies of Japanese deer that lives in Hokkaido, and is one of the largest in size among them.

In particular, autumn is physically the biggest time of the year, as deers are saving up for the winter.

The Ezo deer we see are constantly moping, which shows that they are eating a lot and preparing for severe winter.

The pattern of the deer changes with the seasons, turning brown with spots in the summer, and turning dark brown as the pattern disappears in the winter.

A deer with spots may be thought to be a fawn, but this changes depending on the season!

When you think of deer, many people think of magnificent antlers, but these antlers regrow once a year, and each year around spring, the antlers naturally fall off, and new antlers grow in time for summer.

A newly grown horn is called a velvet horn, and its surface is covered with skin and downy hair, and it also has blood flowing through it, so it feels warm when you touch it.

As deer grow, their inner antlers grow, and when the skin that covers the antlers peels off as they rub against trees or push each other with their antlers, white, hard antlers emerge. Deer antlers that live and grow in nature are strong and beautiful.

At Lake Akan, they are often seen grazing along the lakeshore.

It was a beautiful sight to see a deer standing by the lake in the early morning.

When winter comes again, white and cute butt looks even more adorable.

Please look for the fluffy butt moving in the snow during the winter time.