Deer Trivia

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Pahoo

New member
Won't be too surprised if the moderator shuts me down but here is a Deer trivia question.

If Elk, Moose and Deer are all members of the deer family. Why then are the yound of Elk and Moose called calves and the young of the deer called fawns? :confused:


Be Safe !!!!
 
My guess would be that the words were in use before the exact breakdown of the species was known, or at least before anyone cared.

Moose and whitetail are members of the same sub-family while elk are a different sub-family so you'd think that technically moose and deer young would have the same name while elk would be different....
 
The closest living relative of the North American Pronghorn Antelope (Antilocapra Americana), is actually a camel.

Why do we refer to them as Bucks and Does?
 
We speak English. And if you know anything about English you know that it is a language that appropriates words from other languages.

Another thing you should know is that what we call English is to a great extent a amalgimation of the Old English sopoke before the Norman conquest and more modern English spoken in the ensuing centuries.

The Normans ended up being the ruling class of England and they kept, at least to some extent, the language of Normandy. This brought about a division in language between the rulers and the ruled.

It also meant that for many things, animals for instance, there were two or more "English" names. Hogs & Swine for example. Lots of other examples out there if you think about it.

Could well be that in one instance the word from one segment of society prevailed in the modern world while in another situation things worked out differently.

Is any of this making sense............?

Isn't to me either..............but I think we're on the right track here. See below......

[Middle English, from Old French foun, faon, feon, young animal, from Vulgar Latin *fētō, *fētōn-, from Latin fētus, offspring; see dhē(i)- in Indo-European roots.]

Origin:
bef. 900; ME; OE cealf, calf; c. OS kalf, ON kalfr, OHG kalb
 
If Elk, Moose and Deer are all members of the deer family. Why then are the yound of Elk and Moose called calves and the young of the deer called fawns?
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Moose and whitetail are members of the same sub-family while elk are a different sub-family so you'd think that technically moose and deer young would have the same name while elk would be different....
Click to expand...

Spurious reasoning. It does not matter that they are in the same Family, Cervidae, or same or different Subfamily. What offspring are called has nothing to do with Linnean taxonomy (developed in the 1700s and current form is from the mid 1800s) as such terms were in place well before Linnean taxonomy was developed.

You might ask why dogs and seals both have pups, but aren't in the same Family (or Order, Carnivora and Pinnipedia), or why pigs and bears are boars and sows, but they aren't in the same Family or Order.

You might ask why a panda bear is called a bear when it is actually a member of the raccoon Family (Procyonidae).

Common vernacular simply isn't a good match for Linnean taxonomic groupings, which in and of themselves are now undergoing changes due to genetics (whereas they used to be based more on morphology).

The closest living relative of the North American Pronghorn Antelope (Antilocapra Americana), is actually a camel.
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No. It is the giraffe. http://jeb.biologists.org/cgi/content/full/210/14/2444
http://www.sciencedirect.com/scienc...serid=10&md5=308da051bfb46b175b600ba27b13ef23
http://wapedia.mobi/en/Antilocapridae
 
Double Naught Spy said:
Spurious reasoning. It does not matter that they are in the same Family, Cervidae, or same or different Subfamily. What offspring are called has nothing to do with Linnean taxonomy (developed in the 1700s and current form is from the mid 1800s) as such terms were in place well before Linnean taxonomy was developed.
Click to expand...

Yeah, I mentioned that...

Peetzakilla said:
My guess would be that the words were in use before the exact breakdown of the species was known, or at least before anyone cared.
Click to expand...


As for "spurious", meaning false, illegitimate or not genuine.... uh, OK, I said "You'd think that...." It makes sense that if two animals are of the same family and sub-family then the young might have the same name. That's not false, illegitimate or disingenuous reasoning. They DON'T have the same name but that doesn't mean that it wouldn't be reasonable to think that they would....:rolleyes:
 
As mentioned Fawn derives from the French faon which means newly born and the early settlers were Spanish, English and French and fawn was easier than el ternero, pantorrilla, or pantorilla.

Just a guess on my part but not many moose in the British isles and they were already using fawn. In northern Europe moose were common and big old bovine type creatures from moose to cows had calves or cælf and from the greek kalb or the goth kalbo
 
Thinking that animals would be called the same thing because they are from the same family would be spurious reasoning. There is no relationship there. If you have different types of animals from different Families that have the same names, then why would you assume members of the same family would have the same names?

As for the definitions of spurious, you left out the key one. See the bold print...

spu·ri·ous / ˈspyoŏrēəs/
• adj. not being what it purports to be; false or fake: separating authentic and spurious claims.
∎ (a line of reasoning) apparently but not actually valid: this spurious reasoning results in nonsense. ∎ archaic (of offspring) illegitimate.

http://www.encyclopedia.com/doc/1O999-spurious.html
 
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