Reggie's Story

Reggie found his way to us on June 4.  He is a male whitetail deer and was about a week old when he arrived.  Friends of ours have a guardian dog with puppies and they live in the bush totally surrounded by trees.  Their  dog brought this fawn home into their yard and gave it to her puppies to eat.  Fortunately they were in the yard when this happened and were able to rescue the fawn.  He had several puncture marks on his back end and the skin was peeled back on both back legs.  Because the fawn was injured and there was no way to know where he had come from, I got the phone call to take the fawn because I am milking goats and this would be perfect food for him.

Reggie came in a box; he was incredibly small.  I used crazy glue and stuck the skin on his legs back together and treated him with antibiotics.

Here he is with the cat so you can see how small he actually is.  The next thing to do was get some food in him although he still had milk in his tummy from his mother.  He refused to nurse a bottle.

With persistence Zac was able to get him eating.  In the beginning Reggie ate every 2-3 hours and now he nurses about 5 times a day, on demand.  I haven't noticed him eating green stuff yet but he does eat dirt.

Reggie is now over a month old and thriving.  He spends most of the day outside but we bring him in at night.  That is no easy task because he hides on us in the trees and sometimes takes quite a while to locate him hiding in some hole. 

We plan to move him out with the sheep this fall where he will have access to good feed for his first winter but will be able to have some independence from us. We know he's a wild animal and are conscious about  not making a pet out of him.  I do feel honored though to be able to have a relationship with him.  Very few people have the opportunity we have had.

I will post more on Reggie during the summer, hopefully some video.