How would one measure how smart a deer is?

[Dirt track]

Ex. My German shepherd is a dummy barely knows how to set. A highly trained shepherd for scent tracking obviously is way smarter than my dog. How can we measure a deer IQ from state to state, county to county, farm to farm, public land to public land?

[john1984]

In WI if they are still alive now they are smart enough

[Dirt track]

Are the Big Bucks in Iowa smarter than the ones in Wisconsin?

[Hawthorne]

I don’t think a deer is smart or dumb. They’re instincts are trained by their environment. Look at the difference between the bucks the hunting public hunts in Iowa and Ohio. The ones in Ohio seemed higher strung because of high hunting pressure

[Dirt track]

I like the deer to deer thought, How many negative learning experiences a deer in Michigan would have in one year? Could you estimate?

[Jdw]

If there is any amount of hunting pressure a mature deer is at least one step ahead of 95% of hunters.
I don’t care if you call it smarts or instinct but most hunters (at least around here) don’t give the bigger older deer enough credit for their ability to adapt and survive.

I try to tell them that the bucks are patterning them and they don’t believe me.

[Dirt track]

So, if a mature buck is pattering a hunter by leaving scent. Is that be considered a learning experience for the deer, Or is it a deer already trained to do his job?

[elk yinzer]

Have you ever walked through a really bad neighborhood at night? Take that emotion times about 1,000 and I would imagine that's about how a deer feels about areas that they associate with humans.

[Edcyclopedia]

It is an inate trait with some learning coming from a wary Doe's and lucky encounters that they survive.

[Crazinamatese]

Age.

[Dirt track]

Learning experience of 1 1/2 year old buck deer

Negative learning experience

close to town Michigan

Shot at 3
bumped in bed 10
Spot light 10
winded hunter 5

Score Card 28 experience/IQ

Managed farm with 600 + acres "IOWA"
Shot at 0
Bumped in bed 0
spot light 0
winded hunter 2

Score Card 2 experience/IQ

Would you say the Michigan deer is a lot smarter than the the managed Iowa farm deer in this hypothetical in the first 1 1/2 years?

[Boogieman1]

Don't believe there is anyway to tell, also don't think smarts and lessons learned is the only key to survival. Feel personality traits often play a huge role as well as the age of the doe who gave birth.

An old doe is smarter than a young one! She has been to the circus and road all the rides. What she teaches her fawn in survival lessons is a far cry diff from a young doe with her first fawn.

Personalities are also very diff from deer to deer. Some bucks are just born paranoid and don't move much in daylight even as a wild teen. These bucks have a good chance to slip into ripe old age. There are also bucks born who prefer doing most there movement in daylight no matter how old they get. The diff between managed property and the stuff we all hunt is bucks with this trait are often the first to get blasted.

[Mossyhorns]

I think most deer are very smart especially it seems when they get to be 2 and up, just when you see average size bucks from the stand stop to raise their nose up into the to smell and make sure there is no danger is amazing to me

[matt1336]

I like to play this game in my head while I’m hunting.

“If, out of all the people I know were deer living in this public marsh, who would get shot first?”
Natural selection. Maybe it’s who raised a particular deer? In my mind of a fawn is raised by a smart old swamp donkey it’s gonna have a better chance than would one raised by a first time mommy. Just like antler and body size...not every deer is created equal.
I’ve seen it plenty times during drives....the young bucks will just blow out of there. I’ve seen some big old mature bucks stand there and look at the drivers. I’m convinced that they are trying to figure out the best way to escape......and in a few instances they did!! Picked the perfect route too.

[ghoasthunter]

my buddy's grandfather raised a fawn buck when i was a kid and that deer would come too his house every day and open the sliding glass door with his nose and eat the cat food. i dont think they are smart but they are not dumb either. i also believe in Darwinism every year we try and kill them and those deer pass on there genetics that helped them survive we are making deer smarter buy hunting them. i just hope they never learn how too fight back