News Animals

White-tailed deer have their own form of malaria

Long-overlooked parasite turns up in southeastern U.S.

researchers with deer

MISSED IT  Decades of research on white-tailed deer have missed a malaria parasite now confirmed with new evidence. Here, researchers are working with a deer they temporarily trapped during a survey for parasites.    

Lisa H. Ware/Smithsonian Conservation Biology Institute

By Susan Milius

- More than 2 years ago

The white-tailed deer, maybe the best-studied wild animal in North America, turns out to carry a malaria parasite that science has overlooked for decades.