A Photo Essay
Spring 2025
By Susan Lindsley
Many people think of humans as wildlife’s best friend. Town folks or others who are not familiar with a deer’s life behaviors and discover a newborn fawn curled up in a thicket sometimes grab the poor “abandoned” baby and haul it to a rescue facility.
Meanwhile, the mother comes searching for her baby. She finds its scent amid human scent, but no baby. And her udder is full. It strains to hold the milk she continues to produce without the relief of the nursing baby.
People are not a deer’s best friend. Neither is the yard dog, even if it does keep coyotes away. The yard dog is also a predator and when roaming dogs pack, they chase deer and cattle and other farm livestock. A deer’s best friend is feathered, dines on flies and gnats and often perches on the feeder to watch for the next potential meal. That is the willow Flycatcher.
The willow flycatcher
The only possible time to catch this bird for a picture is when it perches. It flits too fast to catch with a normal camera when it chases an insect. These pictures were pure luck; I often kept a finger poised on the shutter button to catch some action, and was fortunate when the “shot” included the bird.
The flycatcher is fearless; it darts beneath the deer’sbelly where a failing hoof might catch it as the deer tries to swipe off a fly.
It darts between antlers to grab a meal from the deer’s head, and a shaking head moves fast enough to crash the bird.
It competes with the deer, to catch the fly befor the deer flushes it off.
Sometimes the bird simply takes a rest and goes wherever the deer takes it. As the buck strolled the bird worked its way up the deer’s spine and checked for snacks. This “rest” lasted only a fraction of a minute.
A member of the Georgia Outdoor Writers Association, Susan Lindsley of Decatur has authored numerous books about deer and wildlife, as well as novels, short fiction and nonfiction. For more details visit her website. She can be reached at yesterplace@earthlink.net.