It happened again. A deer in the surf and a dozen people crowding the shore. The last time, the deer drowned. This morning it’s an outgoing tide and I was repeatedly called a “b—” (and other things) for shouting “Back off!” at the top of my voice. I am so mean.

[Have no fear reading on. No one dies in this story.]

We see footprints of deer and even elk on the shore.They generally are gone before we go out at dawn, though we’ve seen them once in a great while. If you stand between the deer and where it needs to go, they will wait and wait until you move. So that line of well-intentioned and “concerned” people stood like an electric fence at the edge of the water. No way the doe was moving onshore. Why is this not obvious? It cannot come ashore with people lined up there.

It is amazing to me how otherwise polite people, nice affluent white people on vacation, will tell me how it was unnecessary for me “to be so rude” for yelling “Get back!” Then they tell me to “F-off” and tell me I’m a bitch. Maybe I am. I did eventually become rude, but I stayed back myself. The guy with a child on the handlebars of his bike took it upon himself to tell me to get off the beach, returning twice to tell me how he hoped I was happy now that I’d “upset everyone.”

Because their peace of mind is worth so much more than the life of that deer.

A male neighbor once warned someone that their dog was harassing a seal and he didn’t get yelled back to. Interfering with or even allowing interference (such as allowing your dog to harass a seal) with a marine mammal violates federal law.

The Animal Control black pickup arrived. What are they going to do? Going out after a deer in the surf will only drive it further out into the water. If it loses its feet, it will drown. It’s happened before exactly this way. The tide is going out.

And while I typed the last paragraph the deer vanished.

With binoculars, I can see the deer swimming south just inside the last line of breakers. Gary has read that a deer can swim up to ten miles. I’ve seen that in rivers. It just might make the 0.3 miles south to Arch Cape Creek, if the person at that end of the beach might stand off and the deer head up the creek bed?

But no, it turned back north, got almost onshore and the return of the Animal Control truck has turned it back into the water. One person, on foot, approached the deer but then moved back again. Approached and retreated. The crowd is returning.

I wish I could believe in a happy ending here. And maybe, just maybe…

This is where I remind everyone: DO NOT APPROACH WILD ANIMALS. Even if you want to help (especially then), BACK OFF. Back off well beyond what feels to you like a long distance, a hundred yards is too close in an open area. Wild animals are frightened by humans—the sight of us, the sound, the smell. We are deeply frightening. (And with good reason. We should frighten them.)

When we used to rescue birds, the most stressful thing we did to them was the rescue. We put them in a quiet place and sometimes they lived. The unfledged crow (“Elvis” who we retured to the wild ourselves and who came by for years to say hello to Gary) and a rhinoseros auklet were our greatest accomplishments. Unfledged, we found the auklet storm-battered and helpless. We kept it for three weeks and did what the local bird sanctuary told us. Our house smelled like a seafood outlet from the wading pool in our living room. Once it began preening, the sanctuary took over.

Intentions are fine. Gary knows birds. We talked to Animal Control, the nearby bird sanctuary, and veterinary friends who rehabilitate birds. Mostly we leave injured birds alone. (On top of everything else, birds usually conceal their weakness, and by the time they look to us like they might die, that is what they are doing.) Calling for help is great. Unless you know the job—really know—stay back.

Every summer young eagles are brought down to the shore by their parents (perhaps to learn how to take off from the flat?) and someone want to “help” them. Talons and a beak intended to cut through flesh can cut through human flesh. Aside from the danger to that person, there is a very real danger to the eagle, who will eventually figure out how to take off without human interference. Eagles’ bones are fragile and human contact can terrify. If you have not handled a large bird, it’s easy to underestimate what they are capable of. Too easy to injure them, even if intentions are good.

Baby seals are never “abandoned” by their mothers. “Rescuing” an “abandoned” baby seal means in a best case scenario? The baby loses its mother, is raised by people and released somewhere else. Worst case? It dies.

Leave, Wild. Animals. Wild.

In today’s story, success! The Animal Control guy was eventually able to tie on to neck and right foreleg, and gently and slowly coax her out of the water and across the sand to a safer place. She had a bit of fight left in her—also good.

Yeah, that’s the doe at the top of this page. Maybe, just maybe a happy ending to today’s story.

But I am still a f— b—!