This is something that happened in May of 1993. At the time my herd of Angora goats numbered about 15. They spent their days confined in the barnyard when I was away at work. After I biked home from work, I used to walk the goats down to the pasture on the other side of the house, where they could find fresh grass to eat. After I herded them down there, I would just hang around to keep them out of mischief. As they grazed, I didn’t really have anything to do, but it was a relaxing way to clear my mind after being in the office at work all day.
One day I herded the goats over to a patch of tall grass along the fence. As I stood there with nothing to do, I happened to glance down and noticed something brown with some white, hidden in the tall grass. At first I thought that it was a big grouse, (a chicken-like bird with brown and white coloring) hiding under the weeds, but then I carefully parted the grass and discovered it was a fawn.
It lay still, completely inert, and I wondered if it was dead, so I bent down and touched it with my finger to see if it was alive. Its skin twitched, so I knew it was okay. I went up to the house to get my wife, so she could see it. As we watched it, the mother deer appeared, slowly walking across the lower end of the pasture. I think it was trying to distract our attention away from the fawn.
Not wanting to cause the mother deer any grief, I herded the goats back up to the barn, leaving the fawn hiding in the tall grass. From the house we kept watch and eventually the mother deer returned to the fawn and led it away.
What a treat.
View my paintings at: davidmarchant2.ca
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