The dead of winter

Strolling along Oak Lane on the levee, I came across a deceased mule deer, a young male, probably only a year or so old. It had washed up on the side of the levee, which was curious to me because I know that deer are excellent swimmers. I once witnessed a dog chasing a four-point buck across my neighbor’s property and then across the lake. The buck was swimming powerfully in the lake about 10 feet away from the dog when the dog dove into the lake. But the buck rapidly outdistanced the dog and by the time the buck emerged from the lake on the opposite side, he was about 50 feet ahead of the dog and then he disappeared into the blackberry bushes and oaks.
So, back to the dead deer…How did this young male deer come to such an untimely end? Was he hit by a car, mortally wounded, and then stumbled over into the lake and died? Did he jump into the lake to escape a predator and then get his legs tangled in the pond weed, only to drown? We’ll never know.
There was another creature interested in the dead deer, too, a turkey vulture waiting high up in an oak tree to feast on this delicacy once I was out of the way. He began to make himself look bigger by spreading his wings...
...wider and wider.
I must have gotten too close to him for his comfort as I walked past the carcass because I heard a sudden swoosh of large wings as the vulture swooped up overhead to another oak tree farther away.
photo by B Katzung

He'll come back with friends, I'm sure, for a feast. There is a pecking order, though, of whose turn it is to eat.