My new deer friend

The day before we had the huge snow storm here in New Jersey, I went to a park in Somerset, NJ,
that I had not been to in a couple of years. Unfortunately, they are currently dredging their 2 larger
ponds. There's little water and cranes are digging up the mud.
So, although there are usually a significant amount of waterfowl and other water related mammals,
there was next to nothing that day there. Near the parking lot, there was one mockingbird, who
was apparently too cold to fly away. Thus, I he patiently posed for me.

I did spot one great blue heron. But, he just looked angry that his feeding pond was a horrible mess.
Nonetheless, I ventured around the current huge mud pit to get some photos of him on the sunny side of him instead of from across the huge muck depository.

On the way there I encountered a herd of 11 deer, who initially ran away from me, but didn't run far at all.
Several years ago, I was essentially functionally part of their herd. I accomplished that with frequent visits
and the initial visits were literally running through the woods to catch up with them repeatedly,
while letting them get comfortable with my presence gradually. I would never get too close to violate
their personal space. But, I convinced them, they they could not shake me from catching up to them
and when they ate leaves I would act like I was eating leaves. Little by little they accepted me and
would not run away from me when I approached and gradually allowed me to get closer.

Years ago I got lots of great pictures of them. But, it has been several years. So, I was not surprised,
that they may have forgotten me. However, they didn't run far from me and when I encountered them again on my way to the great blue heron, they did not run again, despite me not running initially after them.
I got within 15 yards of them. There was the matriarch, who is the boss of the herd, and she paid little
attention to me, so the others did the same. There were a few yearlings, male and female fawn from earlier in the year and 7 does from earlier years.

There was one young doe, who I figure was almost 2 years old. She became very curious about me.
If I could read her mind (which I can't), it was something like, "that's a human. Why isn't the herd
running away ???" So, she slowly intentionally walked up to me, sort of acting like it wasn't me
she was curious about, but a leaf here and a branch there, without taking her big brown eyes off of me
and getting progressively closer. At one point she was standing perhaps 10 feet from me.
So, despite it being in the forest, I took a lot of photos of her while softly speaking to her.

After this encounter, I walked away and found the heron again and took a couple photos of that bird.
However, the heron was partially hidden by brush on it's sunny side. So, those shots were less satisfying.

When I went to walk back to the car, I encountered the deer herd again. They did not run away at all
and again, the same doe came walking up to me and stood only 10 feet away. I thanked her for being such a lovely wild model, and left very pleased, that perhaps the herd may have somewhat remembered me after about 2 years.

There are 3 other herds that are closer to me, that know me well. I see them frequently and vice versa.
But, this Somerset herd was the first one that I attempted to become a herd member and successfully achieved that. I successfully applied what I had learned to the other herds.

Here are some photos from that day, including one of the mockingbird, a mallard drake in a stream that ran off of one of the lakes, and one of the heron.
The rest are of the doe I mentioned, which I named Curiousity.