Winter range

Walking to the bus stop in the morning we encounter deer. Sometimes we meet them at the house diagonal to ours, which was unoccupied for awhile. It has a crabapple tree and soft, level grass and a thick juniper hedge separating it from the street. Other times we see them in the yard of the house down the way, which is full of hearty, deciduous bushes and trees that the deer are always eating.

When we walk past they look up at us. We stop to say hello. It's a great joy to see them. We ought to be used to them by now, but we always startle and cry Oh! and coo at them. They're beautiful creatures.

The other morning we met a doe right at the street's edge. Sasha talked to her softly, admiringly. Did you come to see us? Hello, hello, pretty thing... The doe looked wary, but she didn't back away. Sasha talked to her for a few minutes, and the doe stayed. Then when we walked away, the doe backed away, and we realized she had a broken shoulder. Her leg collapsed under her in this strange way. I felt badly then, realizing that she'd stood up to us only because she had to.

I told my sister-in-law this story yesterday. She said Hey, I know that deer! For many years my sister-in-law lived in a house about a half mile from here, and it's entirely likely that the deer I saw also walks past that house – but wait, said my sister-in-law; it couldn't be the same deer; it was too long ago.

How long do deer live? My sister-in-law left that house about seven years ago. Do you think it could've been the same one? She described the way the deer's shoulder collapsed pretty exactly.

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According to the local newspaper, the mule deer have been coming down from the mountains into their winter ranges. That means we have more deer in Bend, since, historically (said the paper), this is their winter range. The deer we see stay here, though, year-round.

Does your local newspaper print stories about deer?