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Sunday, June 10, 2012

Don't Mess with the Deer When They Are Feeling Protective

MATT SAYS:


This is my first fawn sighting of the season.  The picture was captured, such as it is, with my iPhone.  You can see the tiny fawn, standing behind its mother, on the left, and a large deer, which I surmise is a stag, on the right.  As I snapped the picture the stag started walking right at me, slowly, but keeping his gaze on me the entire time.  I pocketed my iPhone and backed off -- I was at least 50 yards away when I was taking the picture -- and he lost interest.  I have never had a deer behave that directly and aggressively with me before.  I can only guess the stag interpreted me as a threat to the fawn and decided to confront me.

6 comments:

  1. Deer seem so vulnerable to me. Perhaps that's part of their beauty. I hope this family stays healthy and strong.

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  2. Thanks, Susan.

    Matt says: I hope they stay healthy too. They don't seem quite so vulnerable when a 250 pound stag is facing you down.

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  3. Holy Cow. They do always seem vulnerable, yet when you look at their size, you definitely get the feeling you don't want to mess with them. They seem to be good fathers. :) Happy Fathers Day, Mr. Stag...

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  4. This is Matt: Thanks, Adele, both for me and the other stag. I am, BTW, a graduate of Sierra Madre Elementary School.

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  5. Hi Matt, Such a beautiful school. I would have loved to have gone there. Have you seen it lately? Lots of nice changes (refurbishments - nothing to change the character). I'm planning a post about your alma mater one of these days soon.

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  6. Matt, here, again: I saw Sierra Madre Elementary School from the outside a few years ago. It looked more-or-less the same as I remember it from 1963, except that the air is now so much cleaner. We had approximately 30 "smog alert" days in 1962-63, when we had to stay indoors the entire day. The teachers and students were generally quite good. Sierra Madre had yet to achieve the cache that it has today. The same, of course, was true of old town Pasadena, and much of the rest of the area. Cleaner air helps a lot.

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