Saturday, September 1, 2018

A queer deer?




3 out of 3 helpful at Amazon for this ironic lecture about a Confederate flag spouting a deer in the center... 

It's interesting to note that there are deer that could be considered hermaphroditic, intersex or transgendered. Thus, there is a special kind of white-tail deer, called a velvet-horn because these deer retain the special velvet skin over the antlers that is usually shed after the antlers have aged. Velvet-horn males have small antlers, doe-like body proportions and facial features, and small testes. They are said to be infertile. The frequency of velvet-horns among white-tail deer is said to be 10% in some areas and can reach as high as 40% to 80% in some populations. Female white-tails typically don't have antlers, but there is a type of female deer with hard, bony antlers. It, too, is infertile. Intersex morphs also exist among black-tailed deer ("cactus buck"), elk, swamp deer, sika deer, roe deer, fallow deer and even moose. Given the queering of the deers, I find it richly ironic that this ultra-conservative Confederate flag shows what could be (with between 10% and 80% probability) an exuberant, intersex deer.

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