**** Info via Hope for Wildlife
Did you know that mother deer leave their fawns alone on purpose?
Many of the calls on deer we receive at Hope for Wildlife are for fawns that are found by themselves without a mother around. This may seem scary for human parents, but in the animal kingdom it is often the norm.
Mother deer will leave their babies alone for 12 to 16 hours a day, usually staying within a 200-yard distance to keep an ear out. Fawns are born with underdeveloped scent glands, so the mother keeps them hidden from predators by taking her own scent away from the babies. While mom is away foraging for food, the babies will remain as still and as quiet as possible so as not to attract attention. She will come by a couple of times a day to feed and care for them.
If you come across a deer sitting quietly underneath a bush or alone in a field, with its head up and alert, and not crying or shivering, this is normal behaviour and the fawn is doing exactly what it should be doing. A fawn in this condition doesn’t need to be helped! Even if she left them in a suburban area during quiet morning hours, returning later to find a busy neighbourhood full of people, pets, and vehicles, she might wait until the area is quiet again and then move the fawn to a better location overnight.
If you see a fawn that is wandering about, crying excessively, is shivering, laying on its side, has flies buzzing about it, or the mother is found dead nearby – contact us or a nearby wildlife rehabilitator.
