Fawning over this baby
A young visitor dropped by my garden yesterday. Actually I think she was here a couple of days ago, although I didn’t see her that day. I was moving around the side of the house and heard a startled rustling in the sedge and thought I might have flushed a fawn from its hiding place.
Yesterday I was dragging trash bins down the driveway and through the back gate, and when I reemerged into the front garden, something caught my eye along the foundation of the house. Curled up behind an ‘Everillo’ sedge, a tiny fawn held still, hoping its camouflaging spots would keep me from seeing it. No luck this time, but I kept a quiet and respectful distance while using my long lens to get these photos.
What a sweet baby, waiting for her mama to come back and collect her. I’ll be on the lookout for her again tomorrow, maybe in a different spot.
In the back garden, another happy sighting: the screech owl that’s been hanging out in the owl box. I don’t really think it’s a nesting female, mainly because it doesn’t sit for long periods in the doorway, like nesting females do as their chicks grow larger and more active. Whenever it sees us, it immediately hides inside the box, making it the shyest owl we’ve ever had. The only photos I’ve been able to get were taken from inside the house, through a window. What a recluse!
What kinds of wildlife are you seeing in your garden this spring?
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Digging Deeper
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Wonderful on both counts! I had a visit (actually 2 visits) by a wandering peacock last week. He was apparently looking farther afield for a peahen as we don’t usually see adult peacocks here, even though they’re all over our peninsula, brought here some 100 years ago. Unlike your fawn, he wasn’t all that camera-shy, although he was irritated by my paparazzi-style stalking.
A peacock! How very glamorous! 😉 We wildlife paparazzi are only tolerated at the best of times, hah.
What great shots, Pam. When we lived on a ranch in Colorado County we had a group of does that had their fawns around the ranch house every year. There was no hunting in our neck of the woods and they felt comfortable being near and raising their fawns. We got plenty of photographs over the years!
Oh, how wonderful! I bet you did get some great photos. It’s ironic how much I enjoy seeing the fawns, but the rest of the year I give the does and bucks plenty of side-eye.
Fabulous photos, Pam! A very sweet fawn. Our wildlife: deer, coyotes, groundhogs, foxes, ducks and — ergh! — Canada geese. Two families of them, one with only two babies, the other family with 10. They may be cousins: the parents are often together.
That’s a lot of fuzzy goslings paddling around, Pat. Makes me think of the delightful movie Fly Away Home. Did you ever see it?
Love Bambi and hope it becomes a fully grown up deer. Never mind eating in your garden.
Oh me too, dammit. 😉
Wow, Pam! I am envious of your fawn and screech owl! There are plenty of deer that wander through my neighborhood at, even in my tiny garden–I’ve seen tracks and sometimes they empty the bird bath in the heat of summer–but I have never seen any fawns. The occasion raccoon passes between my neighbor’s house and mine. But, in my garden, wildlife seems limited to birds, which is great, and lizards, which I also admire.
Debra
I enjoy watching both of those as well. Lizards especially can be surprisingly entertaining!
What a special treat. I had a fawn in our gardens last year but I haven’t seen any yet this year. We do have a family of wood ducks in our creek.
Wood ducks are beautiful. How special to have a family of them to observe.
Mainly rat-type animals, Chipmunks, squirrels and the gardeners greatest nemisis…rabbits! Your fawn is cute as a can be. I shudder when I think of the destruction they can do though.
Funny, I’ve heard that gophers are a gardener’s greatest nemesis. 😉 I don’t have gophers, thank goodness, but I do occasionally see a rabbit in my garden, and I think they’re the culprits who are nibbling the tender center leaves from my yuccas. But it could be the deer!