Dance of the River Deer

It all started with just one doe, whom I accidentally spooked as I made my way north along the river trail from the southern end. At first, she bolted inland, but when I didn’t pursue, she came back, crossed the trail, and continued down to the river.

I continued a bit north along the trail and then hiked down to the river myself to see if I could get a better shot of her.

That’s when I noticed that there were two of them.

As I tried to line up a decent shot of those two, a buck strode out of the brush to join them. Now things are getting interesting.

But wait, there’s more! Soon a second buck came along to fill out the foursome.

The does headed right on over to check out the new guy.

They were soon followed by the first buck, and the does gave the guys some room.

Things looked tense for a moment.

But it never came to blows, thank goodness, and they took a little walk together.

Then they all hiked back up on shore and left me to pack up my camera.

I did hike up to the north end and took some more pictures before I went back home, but let’s save those for tomorrow.