Rescued Baby Deer

Me and two others (sister and brother in law) live on a 48 acre farm. No, we don't raise deer for a living.. More like vegetables, pigs, goats, and loving people. We were given a baby deer by a friend.. the baby showed up and stuck around for three days. The baby was abandoned.

We plan to keep her because through a short rehab, she has already bonded with people/dogs/cats and will not survive in the wild. We love her a lot and want the best for her! So I decided to reach out to some raising experts.. That's you.


What do you recommend? She is very young and small.. I believe its late in the season for such a young doe. She is growing wonderfully and is feeding off of goats milk. We are stimulating her to urinate and defecate. She is a happy girl. Are there any other suggestions that you would recommend? Vaccinations? I read about pumpkin.. That is a remedy we have used before for other animals. What signs am I looking for in her poop that would make me want to begin giving her pumpkin? She has been eating dirt outside.

Oh God here we go again...

Do you have any LICENSED wildlife rescue/rehab nearby? That's who should be taking care of this fawn, because if you're not licensed you're breaking the law. The fawn should receive vaccines etc. too. Please try to locate a rescue. Local animal shelter or vet should have some info.

ya'll see if you can play nice......

I'm staying outta this one.....

I should have mentioned that everyone we have contacted has rejected and is full. We are trying our best. That's why I'm reaching out to you.

Every year at this time we deer producers get several inquiries from folks who say they found an abandoned fawn and they want help on how to raise it.

First off very rarely are fawns abandoned. I used to have pens DIRECTLY behind my house and could watch the pens for hours at a time. Often a fawn will appear to have been neglected or abandoned by the mom. It will get up and stretch, move around some and maybe even squeak or cry some. You would swear mom don't give two craps about it. But she does and she is paying attention. Fawns do not eat every two hours like some folks think they need to. Your "friend" who "gave" you that deer stole it from the mother. And stole it from the taxpayers of the state you live in.

Secondly by helping you we possibly open ourselves up to liability. If we know your breaking the law.

Now I don't know what state your in, or even what country. You could be in Mexico or Canada for all I know. Or maybe some state where taking an animal from the wild is legal. I have no idea at all. So for that reason I will say this.

If the fawn poops any sort of pellets be it soft or hard don't change anything. If it is soft but not runny still change nothing. If it is runny you have an issue and should address it similar to say a goat.

Pasteurized goat milk is excellent for fawns. And you almost won't over feed them with it. Eating dirt is normal and good for it. Have fresh water around and a grain of some sort. Another animal such as a goat or dog can teach the fawn to drink water from a dish.

By the way yes she can survive in the wild once you wean her off the bottle. She will brouse around for food just fine. However by having made her tame you have done her a disservice for when she goes back into the wild. She won't fear cars or people now.

Now if your breaking the law disregard everything I have told you and don't tell me so. I don't want to have to report you.

It's a wild animal. We deal with farmed cervids

I will jump in on this since I stayed out of the last one.


 


Jordan, While I know you have compassion in your heart and are trying to do the right thing you simply are not. All of us on here want to help you however lets look at this from a different perspective... Let me know what you think first...


 


I have over 100 animals her at my place. I have a few animals that at one time are valued close to 100K. After spending tens of thousands of dollars on fencing, feed, watering systems etc ( the list goes on for a mile) not to mention my time, a tree falls on the fence and the animals get out. I do my do diligence and report them to our Ag department. 3 days later they come back... I am so happy. So I continue on about my business. 3 months later our state veterinarian comes out to do our inspection checking fences and paperwork to make sure everything is in order...


 


During the inspection he/she finds that the animals that got out are back in the herd. My farm is then quarantined for 5 years. Nothing in and nothing out because our tested healthy animals got out... I can not afford to keep the operation a float and must euthanize the remaining $750,000 worth of animals all because of 3 letters CWD...


 


I would recommend calling your DNR or whatever and getting rid of that fawn. Imagine if these people could destroy your livelihood because you took there animals.


 


 I could write a book on this subject. Best of luck to you. I hope the fawn does well and you don't get fined.

amen no such thing as abandoned I have even seen other mothers in the will give milk to babies that did loose there mothers due to hit by car T&S come on must be a democrat

Thank you very much!

I had an experience when I was younger where a baby fawn was left by its mother after a dog chased off the herd. As a young girl.. I obviously walked her home and called anyone I could ask for help. I ended up returning her to where I found her. Ever since, I have left them alone.

This was interesting.. Because it was my little sisters friend that was home alone for 5 days with a baby deer on her porch. Unfortuneatly she took it in :/ Then dumped it at our farm.. Thank you for your help and we will continue to search for people who will help us out by taking her in.

She is doing great now and hasn't had any problems so we are thankful. Feel free to write any other advice that you may have.

Jordan,


These guys are very touchy on this matter because they can lose their license which is just crap from the government regulation agencies.  We used to find fawns which we swathed up when cutting our hay.  We would fix them up by stitching them up and taking on bottle feeding them.  We would have to keep them till fall when they would just revert back to the wild.  If you allow them to be free and feed them when they want you to they will leave when nature tells them to.  There is no such thing as a domestic whitetail as their instincts will always allow them to revert back to the wild.  As long as it is a small pen and the deer requires food from you much like democrats they will be friends with you.  But as soon as you put them in 50 or more acres with trees and feed or allow them back into the wild they are more than willing to be on their own.


We as game farmers have had our humanity and love of wild animals taken from us by our government agencies that regulate us by fear we will lose our license if we show compassion to wild animals.  Quite frankly none of us would want the wild whitetail in our herds as it would be a big step backwards genetically for us.  We have disease tested deer and wild deer have no testing would be the other reason we don't want wild deer in our herd.  Thanks for taking care of one of the wild ones.  If you have any problems health wise just email me and I will try to help.  I have been in this business 35 years.

Well said Jack. Growing up in the country, every neighbor I know would bottle raise a fawn or two just as you said, got hit by a mower or tractor,etc. during haying season. If you raise them in a big pen or even free in the yard they will go back to the wild just fine, they never loose that flight instinct if something scares them. Jordan, Just keep up with what your doing and after a couple months, open the gate and let the deer go. It will stay around for an occasional feeding and after time it will take off on it's own  or live like any other deer in the neighborhood and most likely be just fine. The last thing I would do now is call a DNR person(or ever for that ,matter ), bullet to the head for sure.You can also private message me if you have any health questions. good luck 

Yup..You want a dead fawn?  Call someone from DNR for help. They will help you by taking it and they will tell you they are helping the fawn...By Killing It.


 


My contact info is at the bottom also!