The Deer Diet | What Do Deer Eat and Why You Should Know About It

Deer are very skittish creatures. They move to and fro a place very quickly as their own defense mechanism, never staying in one place for too long. So maybe you’ll see a deer in one area for a few seconds, and the next thing, they disappear. This makes hunting them very hard to do.


Nevertheless, a deer hunter must know the diet of a typical deer. Their usual food intake isn’t very hard to predict. Since deer are not hunters and are herbivores, they usually forage for whatever food they can find in the forest. Here are some of the most common foods that deer eat:

What do deer eat

What do deer eat - Infographic

What do deer eat?​


Deer don’t get to eat fruit very often, but they do like to eat fruits that had fallen from trees or are present in bushes. Examples are apples, persimmons, blackberries, and blueberries.


As with fruits, nuts aren’t a usual menu item for deer. Nevertheless, whenever they can find nuts, they eat them. Usual nuts eaten by the deer are pecans, hickory nuts, beechnuts, and acorns.

Grasses and other Fauna

Deer mostly eat grasses, flowers, weeds, and fungi. They can find these foods anywhere in the forest, so they’ll mostly consume what is available. However, this is mostly possible only during the spring and summertime. During the winter days, deer will munch on buds, twigs, and shoots when other plants aren’t available.


Deer eat what is available most of the time. Therefore, if you want to attract deer to your area, provide them with access to safe drinking water and an open area with no hunters nearby. With available food, especially their favorites, deer can voyage into your yard, attracted by the foods you’ve put out.

If you found this infographic and article helpful for your deer hunting needs, why not leave a comment and share with your friends? It’d be much appreciated. Thanks for reading!​

You can find more information ​ about Best hunting backpacks on this article! Hope you like it!

Captain Hunter


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