Dawn or Don?

This post will be about the deer in my life. As you may or may not know, we live on 6 acres outside of Duluth, and so deer are a regular occurrence in our life. It's a love/hate relationship.

When I arrived in July, it was quite apparent that deer had been having their ways with the hostas in the front of the house. I never saw one leaf on those plants all summer. I hope they can come back in the spring without being able to store energy. In the attempts to keep the deer out of the garden to the north of our house, I even used something called Liquid Fence (Who Let the Skunks Out) to keep the animals away. Although it didn't work with the skunk, it seemed to keep the deer out of the north garden. This is part of the hate relationship with deer.

Did I mention that Bates loves deer poop? Oh yes, he does. It tastes excellent. Give him the chance and he will expertly rub his body all over it. So gross and provides Bates with an immediate "Go Directly to the Bathtub" pass. Definitely a part of the hate relationship with deer.

Spotting the deer is quite fun, and they are amusing to watch. The fawns are so awkward and carefree. They love to skip around, being silly when they can. One day, I was sitting on the porch while it was pouring and a little fawn came dancing out into the clearing. Bates quickly barked at the intruder, and the fawn hid in a stand of trees waiting for its mom. On another day, Clay and I were inspecting the pond, when we heard a loud crashing sound..and it was coming closer. I thought it was going to be my chance to finally see a bear. Clay and I stood motionless in strange poses (remember the freeze-bell in elementary school) while we waited for a monster to come out of the woods. And then we saw it. Another little fawn, stuck his head out of a bush. We stayed in our now painful positions holding our breath. Knowing something was definitely up, but not quite sure, the fawn sniffed the air and stomped its feet for a minute or so. Then without warning, and finally realizing we were to be avoided, the fawn spun around and ran off. This is the love relationship with deer.

We have been referring to a mom and her twin fawns as Dawnie and the Fawns. Of course, I could never pick out Dawnie and the Fawns from a line-up, but it's nice to have a connection. I have seen them on the way to work eating in someone's yard, or bounding across the road. Now that I have given these deer name, I am worried that they may find themselves at the wrong end of an arrow. This year, Duluth has allowed bowhunting in the city limits. This is quite a rare event, but there are so many deer, the city needed to do something about it. Although I agree there is a deer problem, this doesn't prevent me from sighing with relief when I see Dawnie and the Fawns. Knowing they are safe for one more day gives me comfort. At least they didn't meet the fate of the poor ornamental deer that some people have in their yards ;)

This morning, we saw the Fawns (we think) with a buck. So did he steal the fawns from Dawn? Or was Dawn really a Don. The antlers were small, but still impressive. He was right, I mean right, under the kitchen window. I took a picture with the digi, but the low batteries meant it didn't write to the disk. But I have added a picture to show you how close the deer get. You might need to make the picture larger, because taking the picture through the screens of the porch distorted the image.

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