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Home » Plants & Animals » Shade Gardening » Battling Bambi - Page 3 Articles in this Topic    Discussions in this Topic Battling Bambi - Page 3 © Marge Talt Page 3 Feb 5, 2004 A few days later, near dawn, I looked out a window to see two fawns prancing in unison across the east part of the garden. I hated to disrupt their enjoyment of the summer morning, but I zoomed outside after them (in my nightgown). They led me a merry chase around the property, eventually escaping through the remaining gap in the fencing. Then the great day of the arrival of the gates for the drive sealed the enclosure...I thought. Not so. Somehow, a doe and half grown fawn kept getting in to the garden. I'd chase them out and back they'd come. I couldn't imagine how they were getting in...I patrolled the entire nine hundred plus feet of fence over and over again without seeing any breaks or gaps. Finally, I caught them in the act. I had left a gap about a foot wide where the fence began, between the deer fence and the old section of board fence along the road. This was a spot where a tree was growing and the brambles were so thick I couldn't maneuver the heavy roll of chicken wire in to reach it. I'd thought I'd managed to secure it with plastic fencing. Oh, no! Bambi and child were squeezing in through that gap under the plastic fencing! Now that the last gap is sealed, my herd patrols the perimeter, always hopeful; always looking for a breech in the fence, wistfully wishing they could once again enjoy gourmet dining in my garden.

Bambi is a synonym for the whitetail deer, Odocoileus virginianus. There are thirty-eight subspecies, varying by location, found in most of southern Canada, all of the mainland United States except Alaska (only in small parts of Utah, Nevada and California) and on south through Central America to Bolivia.

On the verge of extinction in the late 1800s, due to over hunting, their populations have rebounded. I have read estimates of anywhere from eighteen to twenty-five or thirty million in the U.S.

This population explosion is due to the reduction of climax forests, replaced by the preferred edge habitats offered by clear cutting and suburban gardens; the elimination of their primary predators (wolves and cougars) and the fact that hunting is not practical in most suburban areas.

Today, automobiles, starvation and disease are the primary predators. Considering that deer continue to multiply as though there were still large carnivores waiting around every corner, these are insufficient population controls.

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