Writing about animals at this moment, I catch them in the act of disappearing. Some are gone already: the groundhogs are dreaming their 6-months’ dream in their burrows. With unseasonably warm weather, chipmunks are zipping madly back and forth storing some food and eating the rest: amusingly, half-eaten nuts line the top of the retaining wall. The raccoons are still around, but curiously have ceased to be social and no longer come out to greet me at night as they do in the summer. The deer and squirrels are perpetual. This year I have not had turkeys: who knows where they go? Who knows where any of them go, how they all survive? I worry about it, and put out food, a practice with a shaky legal status here, as feeding the deer is illegal in North Royalton. But of course if I put out food for other animals, and the deer happen to eat it…. Oh, they’ll all survive, I’m told. I’m even told I am harming them by making them dependent on me and thus losing the edge of their survival skills. Oh, they do have the most amazing “animal cunning”: after all, where has that winter mouse, caught in the humane trap in my garage, come from but out in the cold and snow?
When I showed your piece to my mother, who lives in the country, she replied: "The writer does not know my deer who are afraid of all small animals and will scatter if my ducks decide to join them in eating at their pans. I do have a couple of “mean” deer who don’t allow other deer to eat at the same time they do."
Delighted to hear from you, Richard. Ah, yes, it's very situational, isn't it? Animals are as quirky and individual and unpredictable as people. Ducks can be aggressive, so I imagine your mom's deer have rightly learned to be afraid of them, and maybe that has taught them to fear other small animals, who knows? Here, there are only groundhogs and raccoons, which aren't intimidating. There aren't many "mean" deer, but every once in a while..... It's enjoyable and instructive to share animal stories, since we pay so little attention to the common animals all around us.
When I showed your piece to my mother, who lives in the country, she replied: "The writer does not know my deer who are afraid of all small animals and will scatter if my ducks decide to join them in eating at their pans. I do have a couple of “mean” deer who don’t allow other deer to eat at the same time they do."
Delighted to hear from you, Richard. Ah, yes, it's very situational, isn't it? Animals are as quirky and individual and unpredictable as people. Ducks can be aggressive, so I imagine your mom's deer have rightly learned to be afraid of them, and maybe that has taught them to fear other small animals, who knows? Here, there are only groundhogs and raccoons, which aren't intimidating. There aren't many "mean" deer, but every once in a while..... It's enjoyable and instructive to share animal stories, since we pay so little attention to the common animals all around us.