Blacktail question

[fishnfur]

OK.  I know you have all seen this while out hunting.   It is always easiest to identify on old gravel logging roads that have become alder stands lining the old road.  I see this pattern all the time in November.  I may be making a big assumtion, but I'm thinking the forest floor disturbance displayed in the alder leaves is caused by Blacktail Deer doing one of the following:
 
1) mating

2) Bucks jousting or "battling" with other bucks

3) putting down scent in a fashion similar to Whitetail scrapes.

It is not the best picture, but I think you'll get the idea and light up a neuron.  Anyone know what is going when this took place?

[Tree Killer]

Lots of deer tracks?  Ruffed grouse and other birds pick through leaves on the old roads foraging for bugs and fresh sprouts, hard to tell from the photo. 

[Axle]

I would guess grouse 

[bobcat]

I would also think grouse if I saw that.

[BOWHUNTER45]

I would say move the leaves and see what you find underneath them ...Tracks ? Scratches ! It will tell the story !

[fishnfur]

Interesting.  I was thinking something on four feet.  Perhaps grouse.  I've never kicked one out of the bushes at that spot, but I'm thinking you might be right.  Then again.... 

[dreamunelk]

Northern Flicker!  That is how they forage.  They work an area looking for bugs and then move to another.  They do this in moss along the road and fool hunters every year.  I have a hunting buddy who will never live it down.

[fishnfur]

OK, I'm buying the bird answer.  I had to Google the Northern Flicker.  Never saw one, never heard of one either.   Of course, I'd never seen a Piliated Woodpecker before just a few years ago.....

[grundy53]

There are a ton of flickers.

[magnumb]

I had just finished taking a leak and started to walk off a ways to investigate a noise without 'holstering' myself properly.......


Actually......ever seen a domestic cat or dog drop to it's shoulder and push itself along the ground with it's rear feet trying to rub some scent or remnants of something on itself (scat or urine of some sort) of whatever struck it's fancy.  Lots of 4-legged critters could have made that design by doing just that (bobcat, cougar, 'yote, etc.).

Nice clear pic, no matter if we figure this out or not.  And yep.......I've seen it a bunch and like you, it's always a puzzler.