Fauna of Saskatchewan 4

White-tailed deer
Odocoileus virginianus

Location: northeast of Craven




Interesting facts:

-White-tailed deer can leap as high as 10 feet and as far as 30 feet in a single bound.
- Deer are territorial and will starve themselves rather than leave their territory to search for food.
- These deer are very good swimmers.
- In optimal conditions deer populations can double annually.

Fauna of Saskatchewan 3

Cabbage White Butterfly
Pieris rapae


Location: Wascana March








Interesting facts:

- Among the first butterfly to appear in the spring.
- White butterflies are not eaten by predators because of their bad taste.
- White butterflies prefer mustards as their food plants. They find plants in the mustard family with the help of chemicals and colours.
- These butterflies bask in the sun in a unique position. They orient their wings toward the sun at an angle so that rays are reflected off their white wings and onto their darker bodies.

Fauna of Saskatchewan 2

Western Painted Turtle
Chrysemys picta bellii

Location: Wascana Marsh




Interesting facts:

- Painted turtles can only swallow their food in the water.
- Have an extreme tolerance for cold temperatures - they can survive without oxygen for up to five months at 3 degrees Celsius.
- Can live up to forty years in the wild
- The probability of a painted turtle surviving from egg to one year is at most nineteen percent.

Fauna of Saskatchewan

Mourning Dove
Zenaida macroura

Location: My parents' garden.




Interesting facts:

- Up to 70 million doves shot a year as gamebirds in the United States (for sport and meat)
- Capable of flying 88 kilometres an hour
- Range of over 11 million square kilometres
- Closest relative of the extinct passenger pigeon
- North American fossils trace the mourning dove back 1.8 million years; very flexible to change