Velvet found on antlers of whitetail buck, Oklahoma officials say. What causes it?

A velvet-like substance is often found on deer antlers, but not as late in the year as one an Oklahoma man harvested last week.

The Oklahoma Department of Wildlife Conservation said Caleb Paine “harvested a crazy buck of a lifetime” because of a birth defect it had.

The whitetail buck Paine killed last week had velvet along its antlers, despite deer typically shedding their velvet in late August or early September, the wildlife conservation group said.

As most deer mature, their antlers are covered in velvet, which supplies the antlers with the nutrients needed to build bone mass, GrandViewOutdoors.com reported.

“During the summer, higher levels of the male hormone testosterone slow antler growth, and the veins and arteries around the velvet constrict and cut off the blood and nutrient supply to the antlers,” the website said. This causes the velvet to fall off, which happens each year.

But the buck harvested last week by Paine had a birth defect called cryptorchidism, officials said.

Cryptorchidism causes an extreme drop in testosterone and “is a condition that occurs when the buck’s testicles, for whatever reason, remain in the abdominal cavity and fail to drop into the scrotum at the proper time,” according to BowHunting.com.

The condition will cause velvet to remain on the antlers year-round and the antlers will continue to grow during the deer’s lifespan, the Quality Deer Management Association said.

This story was originally published November 3, 2020 at 11:06 AM with the headline "Velvet found on antlers of whitetail buck, Oklahoma officials say. What causes it?."