We live in the country, which means we have critters visiting on a daily basis.
We’re animal lovers, which means we love them all.
Raccoons, opossums, woodchucks, chipmunks, pheasants, fox, hawks, the occasional bear, one moose….. and yes, even the skunks.
They come to nosh under our bird feeders, nibble our blueberry bushes and raid our apple trees. We love it. And year after year, we get more deer. At times, we’ve had as many as 24 in the backyard…. which was glorious. They’re such graceful, beautiful creatures.
Of course they’ve also broke every bird feeder I’ve ever hung, which is why we started buying feed a few years ago and putting out a nightly treat.
Now before you pop an environmental cork, we are not subsistence feeding deer. It’s 2 little bowls with a few cups of sweetened grain in each. Not nearly enough to satisfy a single deer, no less a herd. They’re still feeding naturally, we don’t allow hunting on the property and neither do the neighbors, so we’re not luring them to their deaths. Think of it as an Oreo or two. They love it, and we love to watch them.
We have families with young spotted fawns, we have rugged old bucks with impressive racks and even one doe with a bum leg who we worried about the entire winter, but she survived just fine.
The herd tends to disperse in the summer and for the last few months we’ve only had 2 yearlings. But the other night we had 6.
Autumn is coming….
And we love our backyard.
🦌🦌🦌🦌🦌🦌🦌🦌🦌🦌🦌🦌🦌🦌🦌🦌🦌🦌🦌🦌🦌🦌🦌🦌🦌
We have the same here and watching the families evolve is pretty special. We don’t see the bucks often, mostly the does and fawns. The down side is every time anyone around here tries to plant a veggie garden, it gets ravaged by them no matter what deterrents are tried.
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It’s odd, but we have a large organic vegetable farm across the street. You’d think that would be a buffet invitation for the deer but they rarely bother it.
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Awesome!!!
My parent’s house in NJ would attract herds of deer from time to time ~ sometimes they helped themselves to the vegetable garden or fruit, but often they just grazed on grass.
It was always fun to see them.
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We love them. They wander around the yard and through the fields, nibbling and kicking up their heels. Such a joy to watch…
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Deer are such beautiful, graceful animals. I love it when I see one in the wild. We don’t see a lot of them in my suburban neighborhood, but they do go through every once in awhile.
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There are many reasons why I loved moving here… the deer are just one of the best!
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For when you shuffle off this mortal coil, perhaps pride of place among a taxidermy collection.. Looks like you know you’re lucky to live where you are,despite leaks..
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Despite leaks, paper walls and an ever enlarging driveway abomination….. we are truly blessed to live where we do.
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tomorrow that thing will be living in the house. Keep your freezer filled, its hungry
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Oh no. It’s not coming in….. if it tries? We’ll have to move.
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I always love seeing the deer that wander through. I think I can remember when you photographed a fox once. All such lovely creatures.
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Hey you. Welcome to Worpress!
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I haven’t joined, but I missed your blogs and pictures, so Muhammad came to the mountain, so to speak. 🙂
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Oh, you need to join us! There are so many great blogs here…. and no drama filled hate like somewhere else we won’t mention!
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I haven’t joined, but I missed your blogs and pictures, so Muhammad came to the mountain, so to speak. 🙂
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Sorry about the double comment, hopefully you can delete that. If I were a blogging person, I would join in an instant, but I’ve always been one to read and comment. So this works for me. 🙂
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Well, at least go to my page and follow me by email so you don’t miss any of my riveting posts.
😉
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One step ahead of you….I already have! 😀
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Good to hear. Glad to have you back!
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River,
How wonderful! What a glorious backyard to have! We don’t have deer anywhere near where I live (suburbs of Dallas, Texas.) We do have coyotes, though; hence, if we did have deer, it probably wouldn’t be for long. Also, you wrote, “we have rugged old bucks with impressive racks…” and I got this incredibly delightful but naughty visual — and I thought to myself, “Oh, dear!” Heeheehee! Thanks for the stunning photos/video and then the great laugh! Awesome post!
Mona
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We actually have coyotes as well. I hear them howling at night in the distance sometimes, uber creepy. But they’re natural predators and cull the herds as nature intended.
As for the visual… you’re welcome!
😉
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What fun! I think I love your backyard, too.
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Niiice! I feed my critters too! It’s the height of squirrel frenzy right now and I am so pleased 🙂
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We hardly ever have more than 1 or 2 squirrels, but this year? It’s like wrestlemania out there! Fur is flying in territorial battles on a daily basis. Quite entertaining….
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Awesome 😀
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You are very lucky to have this. Lovely post
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We are, thanks. I just wish they would show up a little earlier and in better light for photos!
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