Deep dive 3 min read
Vampire Deer: Why Chinese Water Deer Have Fangs
A deer with long fangs instead of antlers? Meet the vampire deer – the Chinese water deer – and find out why it has tusks, and which other deer have fangs.
The photos look edited: a cute, teddy-bear-faced deer with two long white fangs hanging out of its mouth. But the “vampire deer” is real. It’s called the Chinese water deer, and it doesn’t drink blood. It eats grass. So what are the fangs for?
Do deer have fangs?
Most don’t. Male deer usually fight with antlers. But a few deer species never grew antlers, or have very small ones, and kept long upper canine teeth instead. The Chinese water deer is the most famous of them. Its males have curved tusks that can stick out about 2 to 3 in (5 to 8 cm) below the lip.
What are the fangs for?
Fighting. In the mating season, males compete for territory and females, and instead of locking antlers, they slash at each other with their tusks. Old males often carry torn ears and scars from these fights.
The tusks are not fixed in place. A male can use facial muscles to pull them back slightly while eating and swing them forward when he’s ready to fight.
No antlers, no blood, no problem. The vampire deer just eats grass and looks dramatic.
Do female water deer have fangs?
Females have much smaller canine teeth that usually don’t show. If you see a water deer with long fangs, it’s a male.
Other deer with fangs
- Muntjac: small deer from Asia with short antlers and small tusks.
- Tufted deer: a tiny antlered deer from China with fangs and a tuft of black hair on its forehead.
- Musk deer: they have long fangs too, but they belong to a separate family, so they aren’t true deer.
Strange but trueChinese water deer have more babies than any other deer. A mother can have up to six fawns at once, though two or three is more common.
Where do vampire deer live?
They’re native to river valleys and wetlands in eastern China and Korea. The Korean population is often called the Korean water deer. Around 1900, some were brought to parks in England, including Woburn Abbey. A few escaped, and wild water deer now live across the English countryside, especially in the east.
In their native range they’re listed as Vulnerable, mainly because of hunting and lost wetlands. That makes the escaped English deer an important backup population.
How big is a Chinese water deer?
Small. It stands about 18 to 22 in (45 to 55 cm) at the shoulder and weighs around 24 to 40 lb (11 to 18 kg), about the size of a medium dog. In the dark, people sometimes hear it before they see it: alarmed water deer bark and even scream.
Want more animals with big teeth? See our Fangs & Tusks collection.
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