Face to Face with Bambi

Last night after moving the chicken tractors and making sure they had enough water I decided to go down my shooting lane to check on the little branch and see if it had any water flowing.  I walked around past the old garage and through the small gate that leads down the highline to where I have my DeerCane mineral site and where I just put up a pole to hang up my little deer feeder.  As soon as tromped around the corner I looked up and saw a doe come out of the tree line on the other side of the branch.  Apparently she was off to see if there was any water in branch too.

We both stopped moving and starred at each other.  There was no way the deer could miss me since I was wearing a bright orange shirt and light blue shorts.  I guess I must have stopped first because instead of bolting off into the woods she just starred at me.  Dripping with sweating and itching like crazy from the humidity  I tried to stand as still possible.  After about a minute the doe  shook it head and made a loud WHSSSSSST noise and then went back to staring at me.  Determined to see how long this would play out I kept as still as i could.  After waiting for a few seconds to see what I would do the deer did a combined foot stomp with the WHSSSSSSST.  Like it was trying to say "hey dumbass, move so I know what the hell is going on". I stayed put and the doe did this a couple more times until she finally turned her head and did it in the direction of the opposite tree line where she was answered back by several other deer.  Finally she got tired of this game and bolted back into the woods.

I didn't want to chase them out of the space that I am hopping to find them during hunting season so I headed back into the yard. I started to pull plants out of what had been the kids small garden so that I could mow the whole thing down. I realized that the tomato plants were still alive and decided to give them a little helping hand and see if we get any more tomatoes.  I took all the tomato vines and laid them up on the trellis separated them and gave them some room.  After picking off the few rotten tomatoes that had grown covered by weeds I started to clean out the beds.  First thing to go was the squash plants which stopped producing a while ago.  I had most of them out when I saw a medium sized patty pan squash that had probably been their for a month.

Figuring this thing had to be hard as a rock I picked it up and threw it as far as I could out into the woods.  As soon as the thing went into the woods I hear this really loud WHSSSSSSSST and something bolting through woods.  I have to wonder how close did I come to bouncing this squash off one of Bambi's relatives. I'd feel bad about it if I did, but since I am going to try to put a rifle slug in one these animals I guess my sympathies are ridiculous.