Hog Deer

[Shyamala Kumar]

Related to the chital and known to interbreed with them the hog deer is an endangered species.Its so called because its movements resemble that of a hog.Canon 60D+100-400mm 1/640s ISO160 FL5.6.Corbett national park April evening 2014.

[Saktipada Panigrahi]

Nice to see Hog deer from Corbett. It starts shedding its horn from early spring, much earlier than others, its hind legs are larger; both are evident in the central image, as I see it. Nice you could locate such a herd relaxing in Corbett.Thanks for sharing.SaktiWild

P.S.: ' Known to interbred with Chital' : Who has recorded this? May kindly enlighten us, as you please.

[Shyamala Kumar]

Saktipadaji, this information is from the book of Indian Animals by S.H.Prater of the Bombay Natural History Society.

[Mrudul Godbole]

Nice to see this shy animal in the open. In Kaziranga, we sighted hog deers but they were very shy, and bolted at the sight of the gypsy. Thanks for sharing the detail information.

[Vipin Sharma]

Loved to see them , a shy and elusive animal. I tried clicking them in my recent trip to Corbett but without success.

[Roopak Gangadharan]

Nice. Didn't know they interbreed with Chital...

TFS
Roopak

[Sabyasachi Patra]

Quoting from The Book of Indian Animals by S. H. Prater (note the previous edition was titled The Wild Animals of The Indian Empire)
"The Hog-Deer is a relative of the chital and interbreeding between the two species is known to take place". (page 292 first paragraph, first sentence)

Frankly speaking I have no idea whether this is true as I haven't read it anywhere else. S. H. Prater used to be the curator in BNHS and this book is based on letters and writings posted in the pages of the journal (BNHS). Will try to find out details of any interbreeding either in zoos or in wild.