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Where We Left Off:
An audacious grey squirrel assaulted one of our Winchester-Nabu Detective Agency employees, Gnomez Addams. He’s still being repaired.
Rut-Roe:
Many thanks to WorldDeer.org for having clear information that I’m using as reference for this week’s case file. Oliver, Gus, and I thought we were specifically contending with our native species, White-Tailed Deer, for this mystery. There could be something else going on.
Victimology:
The cats and I were diligently reviewing trailcam footage which takes nearly a full day’s work schedule. On the clips from August 30, 2024, my heart felt like it was harpooned. We watched as a momma Doe walked into frame with one of her spotted baby fawns behind her. We have mothers with one and two babies. As I watched the screen, I thought this was one of the mothers with one fawn.
Twelve seconds later, a smaller spotted fawn limps on three legs into the frame. Its right front leg lifted at the mid joint and the lower half dangling. We weren’t watching in real time, so there was no point running out the door to do anything, nor would I be able to. I’m skilled in lassoing a calf, sheep, or baby fawn. That’s probably what it would have taken for someone to catch it and bring it to a rescue/rehabilitation center for assessment.
Information Take-In:
- Species: White-tailed deer
- Name/Street Name: Dani (daughter of Mąera)
- General Age/Stage in Life: baby
- Residence/Frequently Spotted Locations: Fort Winchester Path
You can see how lively and athletic Dani and her larger twin, Ochekka, typically are in this video from July:
That brought up another problem. I got online and reached out to the closest wildlife rescue (if you’ve been reading our adventures, you’ll know that there aren’t any close by and I’ve driven over an hour in the dark to try and save some small mammals). The closest one operates only during the day and since it was still working hours, I thought I’d get lucky if I sent them an email. I couldn’t say it was “urgent” since I didn’t have custody of the injured animal. The past two times I’ve tried them, it was after hours. This time, it was the wrong species.
They thanked me for being concerned about the wildlife, but said, unfortunately they do not take deer. The closest place that would is in Mercer County. If you don’t know what that means, let me explain. Mercer County is where Trenton and Princeton are located. This area directly borders Philadelphia in Pennsylvania which is not where we live. I decided that since I didn’t have the fawn in my custody, it was just as well to not reach out and contact the Mercer rescue until I could see her again.
Theory #1: White-tail Bucks Rutting Chaos
“Is it rutting season already?” Gus asked from his comfortable penthouse roof of the multi-level cardboard structure that houses part of the detective agency office space.
Mating season behavior could have caused a buck to trample a fawn on its way to the female. I’ve watched the moms start to walk as babies are still suckling. These deer mothers do not take any crap!
“Look that up, human!” Oliver screeched to me. That rotund marmalade and white fellow does not have a soft voice. His human is hard of hearing so I guess Ollie is used to yelling everything.
“I got it. Jeez,” I mumbled even though their super feline senses meant they could hear everything I said. I read from the WorldDeer website:
For most deer, mating season begins when temperatures cool and days begin to shorten in the fall. This seasonal change triggers a surge in testosterone among male deer, and it also stimulates female deer to begin estrus. In some parts of the world (like the tropics, for example), there is no distinct mating season for deer since there is little seasonal change in day-length or temperature.
Regarding white-tailed deer, WorldDeer states:
White Tailed Deer are polyestrous, which means females can be in heat more than once per year. In the most northern reaches of the whitetail range (United States into Canada), females go into heat during November and lasts over 24-hour cycles. However, the whole whitetail mating season is from October to December.
In more southerly climates in South America, whitetails will not be ready to mate until January or February. When a doe is not mated during the first cycle she enters a second estrus period about a month after the first. Whitetail fawns are born in late spring after a near 200-day gestation period.
Theory #2: Jersey Devil-Deer (possibly rutting)
“Guys?” I spun around in my chair and crawled to the floor near their toy basket. “This website, like most, only research mundane world white-tailed deer and other species. They don’t have information on our cryptid hybrid, Jersey devil-deer.”
“If our injured baby fawn and its maternal traits are of the wingless morph of the Jersey devil-deer hybrid, that could completely alter our victimology.” Gus jumped from his penthouse lounge, walked over to me, and sat politely which meant he wanted a treat for coming up with a helpful line of deduction which technically, I had thought of.
The South Jersey division of the Winchester-Nabu Detective Agency is run by our majestic and adventurous canine family member, Rocco. Rocco loves wildlife as much as anyone could. His human man does a little deer hunting. Rocco also loves to hunt and his tastes are not discerning nor does he care about these things called “hunting seasons.” Ollie sent off an email to Rocco asking him to discuss the case on their end and give us any feedback we should consider.
Being from South Jersey, Rocco had some better perspective on the Jersey demons, devils, whatever you may wish to call them.
Oliver tapped the screen on his device to have the reply from Rocco read aloud to us. Ollie concluded that it is possible that the cryptids would trounce on anything getting in their way of mating.
Theory #3: Collision Impact with a Vehicle
This is probably the most easily explained situation. We’re on an extremely busy road on which speed traps by police are only set up when residents (with children) complain. On a random Sunday in April of 2017, a traffic study was being done and it determined that 1,402 vehicles drove over the counting strip. This can be slow-moving excavators, farm vehicles, 18-wheelers with flat beds, trailers, or tankers; fast-moving horrifically dump trucks, loud coupes, sedans, SUVs, and pick-up trucks. There are also miscellaneous vehicles like the mail carrier “jeeps,” Amazon and other delivery vans, and heating oil/propane tankers which are shorter in length than the dairy milk tankers.
Needless to say, people hit a lot of deer with their cars out here. It’s kind of a sick rite of passage. If you’ve made it two years with your driver’s license and haven’t hit one, you must have some sort of blessed juju around your car.
Theory #4: Bobcat – or other Predator
A. It’s not hunting season so the baby’s injury should not have been caused by an intentional attack by a human.
B. Canine – No foxes, coyotes, not loose dogs were seen on the cameras. That doesn’t mean there aren’t any. The neighbors around here do have dogs that love to chase and bark.
C. Feline – specifically, big feline:
While reviewing the footage of the trailcams which gives us various vantage points, there was something worth noting when it came to the timestamps. A beautiful bobcat entered the space between cameras 1 and 4. We’ll use the timestamp from Cam4 which indicates 06:31:35 PM on August 25, 2024. However this bobcat decided to exit, it managed to avoid every single other camera!
The bobcat immediately sensed something in the woods. It stalked through the grass like Gus does. Instead of lying low to the dirt, it wasn’t threatened so sat straight up like a friendly Walmart greeter who could secretly tear out your throat.
Five seconds after the bobcat exits the frame of Cam4, there’s movement in the distance beyond Fort Winchester. A deer came out of the woods. When she comes into clear view of Cam4, it’s easy to see her watching something out of frame on the left—I’m guessing it was the bobcat. She approaches in footsteps like a firm marching cadence. It’s what a doe will do when giving off Don’t F*** With Me vibes to anyone in front of it. Then she looks to her right. The doe ends up following her gaze to see where her possible competitor is heading. After a few seconds, she’s out of frame too.
At 6:42 PM, which is about 20 minutes after the bobcat first appeared, a doe (maybe the same doe) and her two baby fawns arrived with the one fawn badly injured. Did the bobcat do that? If it tried, a mother doe will do all she can to beat the snot out of someone going after her babies.
Theory #5: Familial Rough-Housing Gone Too Far
The Winchester-Nabu Detective Agency also has video evidence of one fawn lightly hooving a smaller fawn. You can practically hear the banter in your head. “Moooommmmmm, she’s in my spot. Get out of here, dorkhoof!“
Deer and other Cervids have powerful legs and have the ability to use them as a gentle warning or to bludgeon someone.
In 2019, one hunter name Thomas Alexander, 66, was killed after he shot a deer and thought it was safe to put down his rifle. I kind of love that the ABC News broadcast ends the segment with, “Wildlife officials are still looking for that deer.”
Did big brother or a cousin go too far in socialized playing or in being a big brother dorkhoof shoving the tiny one out of the way?
Theory #6: Self-Inflicted?
“I think we forgot something.” I know all of us were exhausted by this case. The Grumpy Old Man had even gotten more involved by making sure the wildlife had corn and fresh water twice a day! I had to speak up though because this last weekend of working on this case was yet another time when I kept stumbling over my own feet. My head lowered into my body like a turtle hiding in its shell. “Self-inflicted…I don’t mean on purpose! I just mean an accident, but not caused by anyone else!”
Gus looked up at The Cook specifically, “You’re not the only one who trips over things or nothing, but she does it All The Time.” He just needed to add that extra emphasis and used his shifty eyes to let her know he was talking about me. Plus, I was the only other person who uses she as a preferred pronoun in the room.
“It’s that new wall,” I started to explain, but the mere mention of it hit a nerve with The Grumpy Old Man.
“I’m waiting for the right dirt!” He’s been saying this for quite a while. He wants some kind of specially sifted soil from his friend with the machine, but yadda-yadda-yadda, dirt-this, dirt-that—it’s still not ready nor here.
The wall is looking better. It resembles more of a wall now. But it’s just a facade. Behind it is uneven patchy dirt with incredibly deep crevasses and those holes are getting covered by long billowing weeds. It’s like tiger traps in the jungle or…Predator (one of the greatest movies ever made).
![orange tabby with bright white belly and green eyes, Oliver Winchester, is on the upper balcony looking down and to his right with one ear to the side at the railing like he's annoyed; caption: Ollie doesn't like this situation either because he used to get lovely chauffeured rides all the way up and enjoy [sic] being away from things.](https://www.catdetectivecases.com/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/20240825-Ollie-conducting-gate-investigation-wm-3-300x300.jpg)
No one could stand the old man’s raised voice. I had to cut in and try to rein in this hypothesis. The baby fawn is still only a few months old. She’s got a lot of growing to do. She runs around as she should to build up her muscles and agility. It’s quite easy to imagine that if her family was walking down Bunny Hollow and came to Lord Theodore’s new Iron Gate of Glory that the baby could have tried get around it behind the unfinished wall, stumbled into one of the many deep crevasses, and sprained her own leg. I know what that feels like. Gus is correct. I do fall a lot. I’m generally clumsy. I always have food on my clothes. I fall on my ass at least once a week.
Case Findings:
Oliver and Gus even brought in the other humans to deliberate this investigation. It seemed like no one was agreeing. Two cats, three humans (The Butler, The Cook, The Grumpy Old Man and me) means six differing opinions. In the end, we sat around eating pumpkin muffins with some chocolate hazelnut coffee and came to an agreement. I was right.
The spotted baby fawn must have tripped somewhere—we agreed not to blame with location of the new wall even though I have recent photos of hoof tracks there—and suffered a terrible sprain. She spent a week recovering, but forced to do physical therapy per her mother’s orders so that she would be strong enough to dodge cars, predators, and hunters.
Case Status: Closed
Resources:
The actual Deerstalker Hat for Dogs is a creation of an Etsy seller. I photoshopped it onto Rocco. He’s nearly as intolerant of clothing as Gus. Nonetheless, it is damn friggin’ cute to see a dog in a hat.
Zarrell, M. (2019, October 24). Arkansas hunter dies after being attacked by deer he thought was dead. ABC News. https://abcnews.go.com/US/arkansas-hunter-dies-attacked-deer-thought-dead/story?id=66504417