Wildlife Wednesday Hike

When the little man and I are on our hikes, one of the things we are always on the look out for is the various wildlife that we have in our area. This time was no different but we got a pretty good sight of it!

We recently were looking for a place to go hike on one of the nicer days that we had recently and we ran into a neighbor of ours. He suggested that we visit this place that is fairly close to us since he used to go hiking there all the time when he was younger so off we went! We had written about the other part of the hike in a previous post, you might remember it if you read it because it was the little man's first owl experience! Mine as well, at least from hearing them, but that was remarkable.

This hike didn't disappoint when it came to the wildlife that's for sure! When we were hiking down the hill and towards the water, we saw the waters edge so we figured we would go over and take a look since we've never been here, and see what the view was like.

The view was pretty awesome that's for sure! What we weren't really expecting though was the wonderful family of deer that was nearby! This being the middle of the autumn, it's no surprise that there were deer roaming out and about since the mating season was over and the bucks are trying to protect their ladies. Across the water here was some structures and plenty of beachfront and water for them to be walking on. The thing with deer is they often hear or smell you long before you hear or see them and this was absolutely the case here lol

The buck, not really well seen here because he was more interested in keeping guard and being pissed off, was making all kinds of a racket and I figured that was because he saw and heard us or smelled us on the other side of the lake here. When we are out hiking we try to make as much noise as we can, naturally of course, by talking often, using our walking sticks and crunching all kinds of leaves and stuff. The hope for that is so that we make enough sound to scare away any of the larger animals like bears that would happen to be roaming around the area. This also includes deer because as much as they are cool to look at, you don't want to get in a fight with a buck with those antlers! Lol.

The buck saw us and started to make all kinds of crazy amounts of sound and getting his ladies all worked up. The ladies were just foraging trying to keep their little ones in their stomach growing nicely while the buck keeps watch out. He was running up and down the hill, agitated that we were there and he couldn't scare us off or get to us easily. This made it pretty easy to see him and the does that were with him. I think there were 2 does if I can recall correctly. One was the friendlier one that was at the waters edge getting a drink and roaming around towards the water trying to find things to nibble on. The other one was more in the woods.

Apologies for the highlighting of the pictures but I didn't specifically remember where the fella was in the woods but I think those were the spots that it was. You can't see them easily which is for good reason, otherwise it would be a lot easier for hunters to get them. This particular area is off limits for hunting I believe but still, the deer, white-tailed to be specific, blend in quite well with the surroundings! I saw the buck flapping his tale around quite a bit during this whole ordeal lol

The doe was just hanging out, walking around and doing what she needed to do but it put on a good show for the little man and I to be able to see them the way we did!

It made it quite an eventful hike and I knew that I wanted to add it as a Wednesday Walk (hike) post!

Have you ever seen a deer before? I haven't seen them too often but I've seen quite a few over the past few years now that I've been out and paying attention more with the little man!