Joe Kahlo
This is the astonishing moment a mother deer browses a gift show before returning to gate crash with her children
Shopping is probably at the top of everyone’s to-do list with the holidays fast approaching, and this mother deer is certainly no exception.
It all happened at the Horsetooth Inn and RV Park in Fort Collins Colorado, and the staff member at the time was Lori Jones.
As this location is nestled by the foot of the Rocky Mountains, local wildlife sightings are pretty common, but this was far from ordinary.
It all started when Lori looked up and spotted the wild deer by the door, and to her disbelief, it began to walk inside, just like a customer browsing the shelves.
“It was hilarious, she was looking at the sunglasses and the chips. I was laughing so hard,” she said while talking to The Dodo.
Lori actually recognized this particular deer, she is the strong mother figure to a known family of deers from the area.
She often spots them heading to a nearby field to graze but never before had any of the deer entered the building, let alone browsing the shelves.
So Lori assumed the deer was lost, and therefore she got out from behind the counter and escorted the deer outside, enticing her with a peanut bar.
Little did she know, this was certainly not the end of it.
“About 30 minutes later, here comes the deer again with her whole family. I’m in the office doing inventory, and I come out to find her there. This time she brought back her twins and this one young buck that she adopted.”
The mother came back into the shop, and the kids waited at the door.
“They were just looking in the doorway like, ‘Can we come in too?’ I said, ‘No,’” Jones recalled. “It was so funny.”
Other than simply browsing the shelves in search of a bargain, it is unknown why the deer showed such interest in this particular shop.
Unsure why they were here, Lori didn’t want to be too friendly since they were still wild, so she did the same thing she did with the mom.
She grabbed another peanut but and lured the group to the nearby fields, and with a clap of her hands, sent them running back to the forest.
“It was just a lovely thing to see. The population of wildlife here is just astounding. We have mountain lions, bighorn sheep, deer, raccoons — you name it. They have to fend for themselves. That’s nature. But I think they’re all wonderful.”
