A fawn being bottle-fed by an older adult male in a grassy outdoor area with trees during spring or summer. 18:42
Kitchen Window Wildlife channel icon Kitchen Window WildlifeOriginal creator 4.5M views Save

Rescued fawn Bambi says no to the new menu

Dinner at this house starts with corn for the herd and ends with a face wipe for one small deer. more

That deer is Bambi, a whitetail fawn who followed an older couple home one day, starving and dehydrated. They helped him get his strength back, then set him free. He keeps coming back anyway, at least twice a day, and since the yard has no fence, he comes and goes as he likes.

A bald man in a plaid shirt bends down to touch a small deer standing on grass near trees. A headline runs in white letters across the lower third.Save
One of Bambi's rescuers bends down to say hello in the yard.

The couple never meant to keep a pet. They like that Bambi gets both worlds, days out with the herd that took him in and dinners in their backyard. They started filming those dinners for their channel, Kitchen Window Wildlife, and some nights Bambi brings the whole herd along.

Tonight the herd is here, and everybody is anxious. Corn and deer nuggets go down on the ground, and a few deer eat right from the man's hand. "You have to be careful feeding," he warns, because the corn crunches and they get a little excited. Of one eager eater he says, "He never bites you on purpose. He's a sweetheart deer."

Bambi's milk has to be warmed. While it heats, the couple run through everyone else who eats here, from raccoons and hummingbirds to a hawk and the crows. "Somebody's always hungry," one of them says. "I'm always feeding somebody."

Then a small crisis. "I forgot to bring the napkins," he admits, and napkins are "a very important part of feeding baby." The rule here is paper towels at all times. Meanwhile the young deer get a once-over. Three fawns in the front row are losing their spots, and a fourth, back in the sunlight, still has plenty.

A young deer with white spots sits in green grass and looks straight at the camera. A headline runs in white letters across the lower third.Save
Some of the young deer at dinner still wear their white spots.

Next comes the new menu. Carrots are out. Graham crackers with peanut butter are in, at least in theory. The answer is nope. "Try one, just one," comes the pitch. "If you don't like it, you have to eat another one. Money back guarantee." Bambi doesn't try one.

Some of the peanut butter does go down, and it turns out to be a little dry. It was meant to add protein, the natural kind without all the nasty oil. Blueberries are tried next, but it takes a little milk to wash the peanut butter down.

What Bambi came for is the milk. He drinks with his tail swishing and gives a few good head-butts, the same bump fawns give their mothers when they nurse. In between, the apples get ignored, "after we slave to cut them up for you." He works his way into the second pint, and one of them says, "Something tells me milk always hits the spot."

A fawn being bottle-fed by an older adult male in a grassy outdoor area with trees during spring or summer. The headline runs in white letters across the lower third.Save
Dinner at this house starts with corn for the herd and ends with a face wipe for one small deer.

Then comes the face wipe. Earlier the man noted his pants had no stains yet. Now he's wearing some of the milk, and he says, "I need a shower." Clean at last, Bambi is ready, as they put it, for another night on the town. "See you tomorrow, baby."

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