There’s a dead deer in the bin. The burial while unceremonious was not without a deep sadness for an animal that didn’t know I exist.
My house is in the shockingly short boundary where city turns into wild. Troops of wild turkeys march through, the jack rabbits scurry away when you walk up the hill, and deer leap across the road heading from the creek on one side to the hills on the other.
I purchased this house from the woman who built it with her husband. Frank passed away about 20 years ago, but he still visits. His wife Marilyn moved to Sacramento and is an avid gardener. She cultivated a rich variety of flowers, bushes, and trees under the towering oaks of the home she built.
I let most of the non-native plants wither, encouraging and those which could survive the wet winters and dry summers. Continuing Marilyn’s garden would have taken too much time and water, neither of which are in abundance these days. Nonetheless I still feel a sense of responsibility to the land, the animals, and the oaks.
Returning from a week of travel, I was shocked to spot a fat doe lounging on the hillside. Deer are common but I have never seen a deer just lying on the ground. A couple days later walking through the backyard the doe, who was given the name “Butterflia” was just as surprised to see me as I was to see her. Later that evening I noticed her again further down the hill, a tiny fawn wobbling between her legs.
Last year a doe was struck and killed by a car on the road that runs alongside my house. The following day I discovered a fawn with a broken hind leg in the backyard. The nice woman from Fawn Rescue of Sonoma County and I cautiously crept through the woods with outstretched beach towels but could not catch the injured fawn and it escaped.
I called them back to see if they could help me relocate this doe and fawn. The same nice woman assured me that they would probably move on in a week or so, and to call back if their situation deteriorated.
Over the weekend I spotted a second fawn. Butterflia had twins! The backyard was off limits to ensure that neither Butterflia nor her fawns would be scared into the road. I am happy to share my space with such relatively benign neighbors.
By the end of the following week there was only one fawn that I regularly saw with Butterflia. During the day when I knew she was out I swept through the backyard to see if I could find a body, but never learned what happened with that fawn.
For whatever reason Butterflia had decided to call the backyard home.
A week later, on a Sunday while carefully walking through the backyard to get something from the shed I discovered the other fawn’s newly deceased body behind a rock near the house. The job of coroner would have to wait until Monday after work, Sunday’s plans did not include a dead fawn.
Butterflia discovered the body Monday morning around 4am. I was awaken by the mournful bellowing of a mother discovering the body of her child. It was absolutely gut-wrenching. I busied myself on the other side of the house, periodically checking back in the bedroom, only to hear Butterflia’s continued sorrow. She painfully wailed for almost three hours and spent the rest of the day near the rock. I would see her revisiting the body, poking her head under the leaves of the bushes as if in disbelief.
She was mourning and I found myself mourning as well.
I let the body rest for a couple days. I wanted to make sure Butterflia had left before I did anything, out of some sense of respect. Using an old spade I scooped up the fawn and gently placed it in the bin, covered it with dirt, and then some leaves and straw.
The week came and went without any additional sightings of Butterflia. Her sadness affected me more deeply than I anticipated. I don’t know if she mourned the first fawn, or even knew it was gone. I imagined her grief was compounded by losing both of her babies, the early morning anguish heavy with the knowledge that they both died.
She must have moved on, hopefully to greener pastures.
I swept through the yard this weekend to see if there were other remnants of deer habitation to be cleaned up. After completing my yard work, I startled Butterflia as she gingerly walked through the yard.
I said hello with a warm smile, pleased to see her, because I’m human.
She turned and looked at me dumbly, because she’s a deer.