Me hand-feeding a deer named Jill

It must be a nice feeling to have a feral animal FINALLY have trust in you to come over to you.

What was that movie, "Dances With Wolves" ?
 

It's nice but kind of startling. When I met Daisy I was unloading my car in the driveway. I sensed motion behind me. When I turned here was this full grown doe not even four feet away. I've seen them when I used to take Sophie off leash. She would take off like a gazelle, but of course never managed to out run one.

But there was Daisy almost nose to nose with me. No fear at all, she sniffed at me like " Hello and what might you have for my lunch?". We fed her a bunch of potato rolls. You could tell she was nursing, the carbs were probably good for her. I was afraid to pet her, didn't know what kind of teeth they have. But I don't think she would have minded.
 

It is wonderful to have a wild animal trust me that much. tnthomas, guess she was a psychic dear. grin. Yes, nature things don't bring in revenue. So much of our survival depends on a balance in nature, but the funds are usually diverted to other things. People often live in denial...until it clobbers them.

Deer have teeth for munching grass and plants, like cows do. Mostly they would raise their feet at something to defend themselves or push others away.
 
Here in California it will cost you $10,000 if you are caught feeding deer ,so that`s enough to make me not consider it. I`m guessing there must be a good reason why they have a law against feeding them.
 
Yehoot's...$10,000 for feeding a deer? Here the state troopers are so very happy the deer is contained and hasn't caused an auto wreck. Hey feed them all you want. On one paw my dogs could have gotten in trouble last year. They killed a really big groundhog...hurt my boy bad before it died. You can't kill natural wild life...BUT there is no animal control. I had to cart the remains to public disposal. The world has gone mad...
 
Shalimar said:
How did we morph from the simple joy of loving nature into a morality play?
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I always appreciate being educated about things and was only recently educated by the man that I quoted above. I always thought that the reason for not feeding wildlife was that they come to depend on it. But apparently there are other reasons as well. Here in my town,we are on the shores of the largest natural lake in California. Our city park is full of ducks. For many people,going to the park to feed the ducks bread was something they did for generations. Nobody thought anything of it. But a few years ago,they had to stop allowing it as the ducks were dying from having an unbalanced diet. Anyway,I don`t really think of this as being a morality issue-unless someone is feeding wildlife with the intent of killing them,which I highly doubt. I just thought people might want to know that it might not be the healthiest thing for the animals.

By the way,Phoenix. I did ask my Oregon veterinarian friend and she said that we should not be feeding deer unless there is a very extended period of frozen ground that is causing them to starve. That is never the case here in California. And one last article to help people decide if they want to feed the deer or not. http://www.farmanddairy.com/columns/feeding-corn-to-deer-could-be-death-sentence/14324.html
 
In New York it is also illegal to feed Deer. CWD (Chronic Wasting Disease). a relative of Mad Cow. Feeding deer in a concentrated raises the possibility of infection due to the increased contact between animals and their bodily secretions.
Feeding also makes them way more vulnerable during hunting season.
I feed the deer and turkey all year round with my corn,oats and hay. My neighbors feed them with soybeans corn and wheat. No need for concentrated feed piles in these parts,there are thousand of acres just laid out for the feast!
 
Mrs. Robinson said:
Then he continued.....I used to raise goats over a decade. Just changing their supplemental hay or adding some grain for extra nutrition too fast and too much would sometimes cause bloat. Ruminants have a potent GI tract -- loaded with some of the worst bacterial, yeast, and fungal strains....so much so that terrorist bio labs actually use goats as weapons factories. Sheep and deer are similar GI tract. Normally, the acid-alkaline balance helps keep the gut flora in harmony -- giving them tremendous ability to digest just about anything off the landscape. The least disturbance, however -- especially from too much grain-feeding, which is not their natural diet, and usually too loaded with sugar (and molasses) and lacks fiber....will induce bloat. Grain supplement in goats is best at 1/4 to 1 cup gradually introduced per day. You can't just spread it in a trough and let some of the herd overfeed, or at least one case of bloat is maybe 70% certain in a herd of about 40. Of the bloat cases, about 30% of them can be saved by intervention; About 100% lethal where not. Usually best to just put the animal down early, as the end result is about 24 to 36 hours of painful, agonizing, slow death as the stomach and GI tract are overpressurized. They cannot burp it out into relief. Guts just expand like a balloon. The bacteria run rampant fast -- causing more pressure. The bacterial byproducts cause inflammation, burning, rapid ulceration, toxins into the blood, paralysis, overall misery, wailing, and eventual death as the heart is squeezed by the GI tract into failure. So, it may seem like a stupid nazi law, but feeding anything unusual to ruminants other than mildly and individually is highly likely to kill them slowly with great agony and cruelty than any evil hunter or rancher ever does. Over the years, I lost several goats to bloat before knowing how to prevent it. With extensive effort, was only able to save about 30% of those cases, where caught early. In the wild, they have nobody to help them out of that misery. Bottom line: Just 1 to 2 cups of grain consumed by a cute little fawn with a GI tract still developing -- even as commercial deer feed -- is highly probable of causing them an agonizing death. Adults will tend to survive more, but also hog and consume more of the feed. Best to just leave them alone, let them pass, and, if insistent on feeding them anything....at least toss them choice of only yard and garden scraps, not basically grain candy. Grain is lethal. Ranchers get carried away with grain to fatten up livestock, but it is not their natural diet and always leads to more death where poorly managed.
Like · Reply · 2 · 9 May at 07:59
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Everything you've said here makes perfect sense. When I had my two horses, they'd get hay and pellets all winter and when spring started to come, I had to put them on the grass very slowly. The third from last winter, I stretched re-introduction out over a period of three weeks, starting with ten minutes per day and finally getting to about two hours per day. Not gradual enough apparently because one of them foundered even with that and it ruined her feet for the rest of her life with that first summer being the worst. Her pain was excruciating and I really thought I'd have to put her down to end her suffering. And all because the green grass screwed up her gut flora. She was super sensitive forever after and feeding her became a total pain. I'd also included a cup of soaked soybeans with her cup of pellets every day for a year or two prior to that and after the worst of her laminitis and the hoof assess was improving slightly, suddenly the beans became intolerable and she had diarrhea for months even though I quit feeding them.

Yep, the grazing animals have such a delicate digestive system. I think we humans have to get over ourselves and look at the species and see what the experts say is the right food for them. If someone with credentials says that corn and stuff isn't good for deer, than maybe those who are feeding it should rethink their decisions. I watched Sierra suffering for months, all because of new spring grass and I learned an awful hard lesson with that. In fact, her symptoms didn't even become evident in the fourth week, it was only into the fifth where I walked out to the barn and saw her standing there in agony. Cost me a $1,000.00 to run tests, and a summer of soaking her hay to get all the sugars out of it just to help her gut stabilize and we also hauled in a load of clean sand to make the footing as soft as possible for her. I had to put cushioned supportive booties on her feet so that the tiniest stones didn't put pressure on her soles and then when the abscess developed from the rot inside her hooves, I had to soak her foot a few times a day in a bucket of hot, epsom salt water.

Listen to the experts when it comes to feeding any animals. That link of yours was pretty good Mrs. Robinson and I see that the guy that wrote it had a Phd in wildlife ecology.
 
Debby-This is exactly why I am so wanting to educate people about this! My donkey Jezebel foundered when she was just a couple of years old. It was due to my lack of knowledge. She and my mule contracted Strangles-apparently from a trainer my husband had brought in to work with them. They were both very,very sick and I was giving them grain to mix the mes in. I didn`t realize that her gut couldn`t take that much grain and she foundered. She is 22 now and her feet are still not normal-never have been. I felt sooo horrible seeing her in such agony. I wishe the vet had warned me but I just don`t think she was that experienced with donkeys either.

Yes,I think that guy really did know what he was talking about. That conversation took place on FB when it was reported on our local scanner page that a woman was being given a $10,000 citation for repeatedly being caught feeding deer. She lives on a hill across from our lake and she has been trying to save the deer from being hit on the highway when they cross the road to drink from the lake. I totally understand her frustration and sadness but according to that second link I posted,feeding may cause them to be even more confused and increase the likelihood of them being hit by cars.
 
She would have been better off working with her local government to build an overpass over that road so they could access the lake safely. Her $10,000 and the government chipping in......

I drove through the Rockies last September and in the province of Alberta, they've done that because of the elk and such that cross the highway. They've actually made them quite beautiful as they're faced with local stone and then wide and deep enough from the bottom to the top edge, that they can put soil back in and then trees and shrubs grow up over top of the roadway! Looks great and non-frightening and safe for the animals.

We have an underpass that we walk our dog through to get to the other side of the highway and after the first time hearing a car go whizzing overhead, I could totally understand why they don't work for wild animals. Even when you know what it is, it makes you jump every time for the first few weeks. Our little dog still cowers close at heel going through there.
 
Yep, we have goats (ruminants, same as deer). I've never feed them carbs at all---only hay, hay pellets, sunflower seeds. Much healthier diet than corn. But that makes them susceptible to changes in diet to carbs. I've found places on our property where the deer hunters have thrown out a whole bag of deer corn over the fence. Lucky the goats didn't find it. Corn is like candy to goats.
 
Debby said:
She would have been better off working with her local government to build an overpass over that road so they could access the lake safely. Her $10,000 and the government chipping in......

I drove through the Rockies last September and in the province of Alberta, they've done that because of the elk and such that cross the highway. They've actually made them quite beautiful as they're faced with local stone and then wide and deep enough from the bottom to the top edge, that they can put soil back in and then trees and shrubs grow up over top of the roadway! Looks great and non-frightening and safe for the animals.

We have an underpass that we walk our dog through to get to the other side of the highway and after the first time hearing a car go whizzing overhead, I could totally understand why they don't work for wild animals. Even when you know what it is, it makes you jump every time for the first few weeks. Our little dog still cowers close at heel going through there.
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I have seen those overpasses-very cool. Would never happen here in this county though. Not enough money. But yes,helping to give them back their habitat is the kindest thing you can do for them.
 

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