The Miracle Fawn

On Friday, August 5th, about noon, Gabriola was host to a miracle, although only a handful of people would ever know. Undoubtedly miracles are commonplace and go undetected but for those instances when the randomly selected are privileged witnesses. I was such a witness and this is my story.

Merv Sweeney has lived on the island for 32 years and is proud to say he's never hit a deer in all that time. He encourages people to honk their horn as they near wildlife along the roadside, thus preventing a tragic accident waiting to happen. On this day there wouldn't be time to sound the horn, nor to avoid an all too common roadside drama on Gabriola which was about to unfold. Like the fawn, Merv was simply in the wrong place at the wrong time.

Just a few minutes earlier Merv had left the Wild Rose Garden Centre in his dump truck with a load of gravel en route to delivery. About the same time I gave in to the demands of my hungry felines and was on my way to the Village for a bag of cat food. In another ten to fifteen minutes, Gail of G.R.O.W.L.S. would be driving to pick up some items at Twin Beaches. All our converging paths were soon to focus on a very unfortunate fawn whose only crime in its short life was the desire to cross a very busy road.

The dump truck was heading down ferry hill, just past the Agi Hall. I was heading up the hill. In the deep ditch was a young fawn hidden from view in the grass. It happened very quickly, and is a tragic sequence of images that loops repeatedly in my mind. The fawn leapt from the ditch directly into the front wheel of the truck, was slammed to the pavement and pulled under with such force from the rotation of the wheel that if one had blinked they might not have seen it happen at all.

Having barely a moment to react to the horror unfolding before me, our vehicles passed and I was sickened at the sight of the fawn cart-wheeling alongside the dump truck before coming to a sprawling rest on the shoulder, but continuing to writhe in spastic agony.

I stopped my vehicle and made my way across the road. The fawn was on its side, wailing and heaving in obvious pain, its eyes bulging and covered in dust, its nostrils flaring wildly, and all of its legs torn, with a three-inch section of hide on one front leg peeled back exposing its knee bones and ligaments. It's the sort of thing that breaks one's heart, and one which I was painfully familiar with after losing numerous cats to the cruel road while living in Victoria.

I apologize for the graphic description, but it becomes a necessary ingredient for one to fully appreciate the magnitude of the miracle that is yet to unfold.

Merv had stopped his truck and walked his way back up the hill. He had felt the truck roll over the fawn like a bump in the road and we were in mutual agreement to end this fawn's misery as quickly as possible. While Merv went for assistance I stayed with the fawn hoping I could somehow calm it down as it neared the end of its tragically brief life.

I'm an animal lover, especially when it comes to wild creatures, but I don't profess to have a clue about their biology, to be Dr. Doolittle or to possess the mystical talents of a horse whisperer. Yet as I stroked the fawn's neck and forehead it seemed to calm, its breathing became measured and shallow, and its once rapid heartbeat became barely detectable. Its dust-covered eye slowly closed and each time I thought that perhaps it had slipped away it would let out a deep breath as though it were only sleeping peacefully in a forest meadow dreaming of better days.

A dome of tranquility seemed to surround the moment and I barely noticed the steady stream of traffic going by, but soon Merv returned and our voices startled the fawn. It struggled to its feet despite my efforts to keep it from doing so, managed to get up on all fours and had I not constrained it I'm certain it would have bound away into the forest. This of course was seemingly impossible after just being hit and run over by a dump truck but I wasn't giving this much rational thought at the moment. None of its legs appeared to be broken, nor was it losing great amounts of blood from its many wounds, or bleeding from the mouth as is apt to happen if severe internal injuries are involved. Although unarguably battered up, there suddenly didn't appear to be any misery to protect this creature from!

While determining what to do next, Gail happened to drive by with perfect timing and we bundled the fawn up in a quilt, after quite a struggle that was surprising for a creature in this condition, and loaded it into her vehicle. It didn't take well to this method of transport and by the time we reached Twin Cedars Veterinary Clinic it was nearly choking on its own saliva and its tongue was slipping out of its mouth. What tragic irony if this attempt to save its life might cause the final trauma that would end it.

Under the professional care of Thomas and Trish, the fawn would be sedated and undergo 11/2 hours of medical attention, which included treating and disinfecting the wounds, at least 50 stitches to the gashes on its spindly legs and sewing up its exposed knee.

Deer that are hit by vehicles have an extremely low probability of survival, and when I came by to visit a few hours later Trish was cautiously optimistic yet realistically candid with her assessment. No broken bones, no obvious internal injuries, time will tell if it can survive the trauma and potential infection. Of the countless number of injured deer that have been brought to the clinic, none have ever survived their injuries, even after treatment, and many have had to be euthanized because nothing could be done to save them.

By evening, Liz (also of G.R.O.W.L.S.) had been advised of the situation and consulted as to the course of action should the fawn make it through the night. It's ideal to return a fawn to the area it was found within 24 hours for the best chance of reunion with its mother, but would it need more care and was it old enough to survive without its mother if such a situation occurred? Sending it off-island to a wildlife reserve was another bittersweet option. Gail and Liz did plenty of research and consulting on Saturday and since fawns of a similar age (3 months) have been foraging on their own at this time of year the decision was made to release it behind the Agi Hall if determined that it was healthy enough.

At 6:00 pm on Saturday evening four of us moved the fawn outside into an enclosed area at the clinic. How absurd it seemed that a fawn could be healthy enough for release after being run over by a dump truck 30 hours earlier, but here we were watching it prance around the pen as dainty as could be and hurling itself against the wire fence looking for, or trying to create, an opening to freedom. No doubt about it, this fawn was ready for release before it did more injury to itself in the process.

We coaxed it into a large dog carrier, covered the carrier with a blanket and transported it back to its home. Upon arrival at the Agi Hall we hauled the carrier into the forest and opened the door. The fawn seemed content to remain curled up on the padded blanket inside and so we let it discover its freedom in its own time. Eventually it stood up, turned around once, eased its way out the open door and made its way into the forest.

Gail has named the fawn "Thomasina", a tribute to the successful efforts of Dr. Thomas Uhlig at Twin Cedars. I am thankful that we have veterinarians like Trish and Thomas on this island that care as much for our wildlife as they do for our domestic pets, and who offer their services to these wild creatures at their own expense of time and supplies, especially when the success rate is so low it hardly seems practical at times.

This was also my first experience with G.R.O.W.L.S. and the service this group of volunteers provide on our island. I have since become a volunteer myself and I urge anyone who has a desire to harmoniously cohabitate on this island with our wildlife to contribute time or donations to this very worthwhile organization.

The last glimpse I saw of Thomasina was running through the forest and leaping over branches and logs before disappearing from sight. Young Maya, who lives nearby, is going to try to spot this fawn over the next few weeks and report back to us. If anybody happens to be in the area and sees a fawn with a shaved wounded right shoulder flank and the very obvious stitching of shaved hide on the right foreleg, I'm sure that G.R.O.W.L.S. (Liz at 247-8805) would love to hear from you with an update report.

Please take care to watch out for our wildlife when driving around the island, and especially in the busy area near the Agi Hall and the Post Office so that Gabriola's miracle fawn gets a well-deserved second chance.

I know what I witnessed that Friday driving up ferry hill, although I doubt I'll ever be able to fully understand the natural miracle of survival. As way of a rational explanation, my friend Eli has suggested the following: "perhaps the supposition of a fawn's fragile nature is a biological mistake that might lead the unwary to posit divine intervention where youthful vigor and an exceptional amount of good luck is all that was required. If anything, the medical caregivers, let alone evolution's survival of the fittest, gets a little short changed here, in that young animals sometimes have extreme recuperative abilities."