Oh, deer!
Posted on January 5, 2004 @ 1:27 pm
Not everyone can welcome a possum into his or her life, but I had an up-close-and-personal wildlife encounter of my own over the holidays. While visiting my parents in Southwest Virginia, we took a day trip to Breaks Interstate Park, the “Grand Canyon of the South” (really–it says so on their website). While we were checking out the view from a scenic overlook, we heard something rustling in the brush a little ways up the trail. We went to investigate and found two young deer foraging for food. By the point, we were within ten feet of the animals and, while one seemed a bit wary of us and kept its distance, the other actually began to approach my family. Here’s a photo of the friendlier deer (click the thumbnail for a larger view):
After making sure that we weren’t going to make any sudden moves, the deer walked right up to us. We cautiously petted her, and she seemed to enjoy it. Then, she began nosing around to see if we might have any food with us. All we had was a starlight mint or two, but Kourtney assured us that they were perfectly safe for deer consumption (apparently, they go over that kind of thing in vet school). So, we unwrapped a mint or two and offered them to our woodland friend, who gladly gobbled them up and continued to let us pet her.
It was then, however, that the deer attacked.
Well, she didn’t so much attack as walk right up and lick the lens of our digital camera as we were trying to take a picture of her. After we finally got all the smudges off the lens (the instruction manual was surprisingly vague in terms of offering tips on how to deal with deer saliva), we got this final shot of our friend sticking her tongue out at us before she returned to the woods.
What did I learn from this experience? First, deer–even in the wild–have much softer fur than you might imagine. Second, they seem to really enjoy starlight mints. And, finally, they aren’t particularly ashamed to mug for the camera if the opportunity presents itself.
Posted by Jess | Filed Under Photo Ops |
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You might have also learned about wood ticks and fleas! (Just in case you were wondering about those weird black lumps under your skin) Round our ways you might just learn about Anthrax as well.
Well, not every learning experience can be a walk in the park.