The principal food o f roe §£ o f course, grass-; they will eat heather-tops, gram, turnips,
and many roots and plants. T hey are also particularly fond o f rowan berries, and fill their
stomachs entirely with them, standing up on their hind legs to reach the fruit. When the
Roe Deer r 9 3
corn is ripe too, they like spending the night in the fields, and make many beds there, for
they will lie all day in fields close to a wood, i f the farmers give them the chance. They
are also very fond o f certain species o f fungi, which they dig out o f the ground with their
fore-feet. I have seen large spaces all worked up where they had been in search o f these
delicacies. A roebuck that I once kept was a good Scotchman, though he had a beastly
temper, for he liked nothing so much as oatmeal porridge.
One never sees anything about the weights o f roe in books. In Scotland roe are put
From a photograph by Geoffrey Millais, 26th October 1SS9.
on the scales whole, and some years ago when I had the opportunity o f handling a good
many I used occasionally to weigh them. The average buck weighs, about 40 lbs,, in
October, though, of course, many exceed this, whilst does range from 30 to even 40 lbs.
The largest buck I have seen was one I killed at Murthly on 26th October 1889. I had
been after him for a: long time, when one day, out for a beat by myself with the three
keepers, I had the good luck to kill him and two others at the same stand, and from the
same troop. A ll the roe in that part o f the ground seemed to have got together in one
small wood near the Arch, and as they came by in a string I had just time to get in my
three shots. It was such a piece o f luck as only happens once in a lifetime. I weighed the