My Morning Encounters with Belmont Wildlife

I think people, at least reasonable ones, view an encounter with wildlife as scary.

Obviously, my wife isn’t a reasonable person.

Recently, I’ve had two early-morning encounters with wildlife in Belmont. Each time, my wife acted as though nothing bad could have ever happened to me.

When I told her how I startled a group of deer, she shrugged her shoulders and said dismissively, “I don’t think of deer as scary.”

Even when I presented her with the following information – that an adult male deer can weigh as much as 300 pounds, is capable of running as fast as 30 miles an hour, can leap 10 feet high, can leap as far as 30 feet in a single bound, and uses antlers and hooves to defend themselves when they are attacked by predators or feel threatened (even by humans) - she rolled her eyes.

“They’re just deer, Vince,” she said in a tone that was designed (at least I believe it was) to make me question my manhood.

On the morning in question, I rounded the corner of our street and came within 8 feet of a deer eating leaves from a shrub. As soon as the deer noticed I was there, it panicked. Its hooves scraped the sidewalk as it tried to dash away. A second deer also went into a panic, slamming into the neighbor’s house as it attempted to flee.

When this happened, I moved into the street and paused, hoping to give the frightened deer a chance to get as far away from me as possible.  That’s when two bucks, about 35 feet away, walked from another neighbor’s yard into the street.

Neither of these bucks seemed to be frightened. In fact, they appeared pissed that I had interrupted their meal. The bigger of the two bucks stopped to look at me for what seemed like forever.

As he eyed me, the only thought going through my head was what I would do if the buck believed I was a threat and charged at me. I thought perhaps shouting that I cried when Bambi’s mother was shot might work, but remembered reading somewhere that deer aren’t into Disney movies.  

Four days before my encounter with deer, I had an encounter with raccoons. I was out walking at 5:30 that morning when I heard a rustling of leaves coming from a hilly area near our street. The rustling of the leaves grew louder and faster until out of the darkness came two big raccoons.

The raccoons were headed directly toward me. I’m not sure what a brave man would have done in that situation (I’m sure my wife does), but I’ll tell you what I did - nothing.

I froze in my tracks. I was unable to run, make myself appear larger (or is that only for mountain lions?), or even scream like a little girl, which I do quite impressively, by the way. The raccoons managed to get within a few feet of me before they turned and went running in another direction.

Two raccoons running wild or four deer disturbed during a meal, none of it mattered to my wife. She reacted the same way I imagine she would if I said I crossed paths with a group of banana slugs.

It’s only a few more weeks before the dark winter mornings give way to spring light. Until then, I’ll be brave and manly if I have any more encounters with animals that could bite me or skewer me with antlers. At least that’s what I tell myself.

And my wife.