This morning we were surprised to see five deer (a four-point buck, two does and two young) grazing in our backyard, which is at the edge of the golf course. The deer are growing their winter coats, and are beautifully colored with dark fur edging their large ears with small tufts of black at the tips.
Tuffy, our 12-year-old Westie, wanted to go outside and investigate. He normally doesn't see anything larger than a rabbit in our yard, although a neighborhood cat often stalks by our front door to tease him. I didn't want Tuffy to scare the deer away, so he had to be content with just watching them through the living room windows with me.
They continued to nibble grass in our yard for several more minutes before wandering off out of view. Upon letting Tuffy out securely hooked to his zip line (we don't have a fence around our yard), I saw the deer unexpectedly reappear and quickly trot back into our yard to check him out coming to within about 15 feet of our patio. His barking didn't seem to faze them at all and they continued to approach us. Not knowing if Tuffy would become impaled on the horns of an unpredictable buck protecting his family, I quickly brought him back into the house. Tuffy seemed relieved to get back inside and out of harm's way!
