Last week it was Ridgewood Ave. in Glen Ridge. This week it’s Anderson Park in Montclair. Fran Liscio took this picture last night of two fawns wandering around the park.
A reader who saw the deer this morning was concerned enough to call the Montclair Police.
I was walking in Anderson park this morning and saw two baby deer (they still have their spots) walking around casually eating grass. I saw these deer on Sunday night near the train tracks close to the park. I called the non emergency number of the Montclair police and was told that animal control would probably not come unless the animal was injured and that the park was their “natural environment!” Maybe a hundred years ago, but now I think being this close to humans and vehicles is just an accident waiting to happen. I was wondering if anyone knows of an agency that relocates wild animals or even better, rehabilitates animals and then releases them back into the wild? The reason I ask about the rehabilitation, is because it looks as though these two babies lost their mother (I’ve noticed quite a few dead deer on Upper Mountain Road lately) and don’t seem to know how to take care of themselves. Thank you so much for any help you can offer on this situation. I would hate to see an article on Baristanet about baby deer hit by a car or train or some tragedy like that!
Looks like deer are becoming almost as ubiquitous in Baristaville as squirrels or geese. Well, maybe not quite — but their populations are certainly on the rise.
Reminder: With deer come ticks. If you’re playing in Anderson park, you might want to do a tick check.
Those baby deer need rehabilitating!
What was the name of that Cary Grant movie where, oh, was it Katherine Hepburn says, “Deer are very fond of aspen leaves.”?
Don’t name the baby deer Spot and Speck. It’ll just make it harder when the time comes.
My bf actually saw a pair of baby deer not too far from Anderson the other day. I’m assuming it’s the same pair. I was wondering where there mother was too.
Good, I am so glad that the police told this person that. I don’t know if he or she noticed, but Anderson park is, in fact, outdoors.
With animals come ticks. Once you leave your house, you’re outside. This isn’t a shopping mall or a cruise ship. Your yard, the schoolyard, the park – they’re not just a big hallway with skylights, they’re outside. So it goes without saying that you should exercise all due caution against the less desirable, tiny denizens of the great outdoors even in your own backyard.
Oh, and bugs? They can get into your house too! In many parts of this very country, you have to be careful of poisonous spiders and other dangerous vermin in your own bedroom! Even if you’ve mountain lion-proofed the place!
PS, Deer populations were kept in check by Coyotes, Wolves and Puma. People made it impossible for them to live anywhere in this part of the country quite a while ago. They’re less adaptable than Deer. Now we have more Deer than there probably even ever were in the wild before. You get what you wish for.
No complaints here. Just giving people some perspective. Carry on.
NJ Wildlife Rehabbers – by species
http://www.state.nj.us/dep/fgw/pdf/rehab_species.pdf
In situations like these, you may want to think twice before taking matters into your own hands.
I saw a deer on Aubrey Road early this morning.
I live on Broad St in Bloomfield, between Bay Ave and Glen Ridge Parkway. Several weeks ago I was surprised to see two deer traipsing through my little backyard.
Then, last Friday, I was utterly astonished when I looked out my front door in the early afternoon to see a wild turkey (a female, I think) walking up my front lawn. I mean, this is Broad Street in Bloomfield, after all. It poked around for a few moments before sauntering over to my neighbor’s property, and I lost sight of it after that.
What’s next, bear sightings in Baristaville?
Pork Roll–well, there have been bear sightings in Newark, Irvington, SO, etc. etc., so I guess it’s not inconceivable.
The turkey would throw me for a loop too. Although nature does often seem to find a way to survive; I’ve seen a red fox a block from my house on the GR/Bloomfield border.
Stories like this make me feel incredibly sad and helpless. The intrusion of human society into wild places just marches on, and I’m a part of that as much as anyone else is.
Oh, I meant to link to this article about a bear shot and killed in Irvington a couple of years ago.
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/11/nyregion/11bears.html
Called the police because there was a dear ? LOL, LOL What are they possibly going to do and why did your reader feel as though they could do something? They are there to serve and protect and believe me with some of these reports coming out of Montclair these days, protection is needed. I’m hopeful the police were professional and refrained from laughing in the phone. Please stop wasting their time.
Last year Amandala and I were driving down Bloomfield Ave into Montclair and saw a herd (or is it flock?) of turkeys in a parking lot near the sports field on the edge of town.
There were at least 20 of them and a woman told us that they’d chased her whenever she tried to get out of her car (she told us from her half-opened car window).
After seeing some of them run, it’s very easy for me to believe that they were what dinosaurs evolved into after so many millions of years.
My office gets an annual warning to avoid the wild turkeys and, if they stop your car, not to get out to scare them away. It won’t scare them but it will make them angry.
I love the picture of the deer but it also makes me sad. I agree Katie – “The intrusion of human society into wild places just marches on, and I’m a part of that as much as anyone else is.”
This past weekend I got to chase a frog off the driveway, water plants while a snake slithered around me, saw the dogs chase a moose off the property and had a bear crash a bbq. Thankfully I was not NJ but VT where all of that is normal.
Sorry, not a fan of Bambi and her pals. My husband found a tick on his leg last night and we’re bringing it in to have it tested.
royal-jelly, I hope that tick turns out to be nothing.
I usually give these Bambi posts a straight forward:
KILL. THEM. ALL.
And your post is exactly why.
Ol’ Dorothy from complainerpuss’ link has the right idea.
Kill ‘em young. Kill ‘em often.
MKA has all of its bathrooms on the western side of the school that is almost built into a sloping hill. They all had large windows and upon entering the bathroom (about 5 years ago when I was still in school) I was stunned to see 20-25 turkeys standing within 5 feet of the window. I nearly crapped my pants and I was only about a foot away from a toilet…
Echoing Amandala, many of our pest problems stem from disrupting nature’s cyclical nature. Without predators to cull the deer population, it will only grow. Same goes for smaller rodents, as tree destruction hurts nesting possibilities for birds of prey and such.
OMG, JUST LEAVE THE DEER ALONE!!!!
I just can’t believe this article…
I hope someone can find a way to help the deer who lost their mother…And at the same time, leave the rest of the deer alone.
Damn, doesn’t anyone remember the deer that got killed smashing through the glass window of a store a block from Anderson Park last year? The call to the police was not out of line. Yes, it would have been nice if animal control could have moved the deer back to the reservation where it would be less likely to get hurt or dart out in front of someone’s car. I saw a huge one dead on the side of the road the other day.
As for us encroaching on their space, aren’t they encroaching on ours? Maybe there needs to be more grass planted in the reservations on the mountain. I am seeing these things on our lawn more and more and I’m on the South end of the mountain nearer to Eagle Rock Reservation.
greypoupon, we can make a choice not to encroach on the wildlife by not overdeveloping. Deer, and other animals, aren’t able to reason and make a decision in the same way. I’m sure, given the choice, they wouldn’t want to be on ourlawns but they sadly have lost their open spaces and have nowhere else to go.
Given a choice, the deer prefer to be on our lawns. It’s not so much that the deer “have nowhere else to go”, but rather that deer populations have exploded in the absence of any other natural predators (other than man), and the proliferation of human-developed habitat that deer actually find quite attractive.
The reason we see so many deer and geese, and see bears, foxes, and turkeys in our suburban neighborhoods, is that their populations have rebounded due to a combination of conservation efforts, lack of predators, and adaption to human-altered habitat.
To some extent, yes, they are encroaching upon us now!
For the last week or so, a mother deer and her two babies have been showing up in my backyard almost every day (I live in Cedar Grove close to the reservation). Most recently they appeared at 6:30 yesterday morning. The babies were darting around and playing like puppies–while their mom watched over them. Unfortunately, because the babies are a bit more playful, they are at great risk for getting hit by a car. Last Sunday, another baby deer was killed by a car at the botton of my street (the intersection of Cedar and Ridge). But deer are nothing new in my neighborhood–its not unusual to see a cluster of 10 or more hanging out on someone’s front lawn. Now that deer are moving farther out into the community, I would encourage eveyone to be more aware when driving; even though I recognize that many times an accident is unavoidable.
A few points:
the tipster called the NON-emergency number, which seems appropriate
field mice are the primary vector for so-called “deer” ticks
we should shoo the deer away with leaf blowers
No perspective here, just complaints. Buzz off.
FINALLY a sane post….I can’t believe this discussion! First of all mothers leave there babies all day and return with food in the evenings. This is normal behavior! What is NOT normal are the looney “friends of the earth” types that have taken over montclair and don’t know the first thing about animals except what they see on tv since they probably grew up in an apt in nyc!!
I caught a glimpse of a ground hog in the back yard yesterday. Not as cool as some of the other sightings, but I think it’s nice that Baristaville is still a little wild…
“in our suburban neighborhoods”
Like the settlers saw when they landed here, blocks and blocks of suburbia.
First of all mothers leave there babies all day and return with food in the evenings. This is normal behavior! What is NOT normal are the looney “friends of the earth” types that have taken over montclair and don’t know the first thing about animals except what they see on tv since they probably grew up in an apt in nyc!!
While lambasting people for not knowing “the first thing about animals,” you seem to think that mother deer bring food back to their young? That doesn’t happen other than on a baby deer’s birthday, when the doe brings cupcakes to class.
HAAAAAAAA oh tony tony tony…that is hysterical. You are correct about the mom’s not bringing food back (and the cupcakes) but they DO leave their young during the day. The over-population of deer due to lack of natural predators is a serious and increasing problem up and down the east coast costing thousands of taxpayer dollars in accidents and clean up (not to mention destruction of landscaping). I read the other day that a town not too far from us hired a sniper to take out as many deer as possible to ease this problem. Now there’s an idea!!