Dinner with Deer, Dessert with Otter

In the late afternoon, as library hour ended and dinner hour started, our keeper said she heard a scraping at the sliding screen door that looks out on the canal. She looked up and locked eyes with a deer which was starting to make its way through the partially opened door. She invited the doe in, but it was clear that the food was better outside. So the doe grazed the young shoots surrounding the yard until she disappeared back into the woods.

Then, after dinner an otter visited the reeds by the dock, munching his way through the lilies down there. He was camera-shy, though, and swam away once he realized there might be paparazzi.

With the sunlight and drying air, the geese and the ducks paraded their babies up and down the canal, with little swallows flying in canopy formation up above. "Who needs movies down here?"