I Observed Something Unusual

 

 

 

I went over on the neighboring property this morning to pick wild blackberries (they are just beginning to ripen).  I was in the middle of a patch of blackberry plants when I heard something coming through the brush and weeds from the woods to my right.  I looked up to see a coyote come running into the grass of the pasture where I was.  It was headed across to the woods on the other side of the field, off to my left.  Immediately behind the coyote, about 30-40 feet came a deer.   The coyote ran on across the field, a distance of only a few hundred feet, with the deer right behind it.  The coyote went through the fence and on into the woods, the deer jumped over the fence, and it was obvious neither saw me standing to their side, maybe 40-50 feet away.  I was amazed to see a deer quite obviously chasing a coyote.

Some time later, as I had worked my way around the field picking berries, I was startled to have a small fawn jump up from a few feet in front of me.  It ran into the woods which was only a few feet from where it had been laying.  This spot was probably only 75-100 feet from where the coyote and deer had come out of the woods.  The picture became clear to me, the mother deer was chasing the coyote which was a danger to her baby.