Deer in Shepperton! 11Deer in Shepperton

By Monica Chard

No, Prancer and Dancer have not done a runner over the festive period. There are deer living happily in Shepperton. I saw a post on Friends of Shepperton from an astounded Lisa Rollin who had come face to face with a startled Bambi near Shepperton cricket club. The post served to assure me that I had not been going totally mad when I had had a close encounter on Black Ditch a month earlier. It was around 8am on a misty cold autumn morning. I rounded a corner onto one of the paths and my jaw dropped as two majestic deer sprang out onto the path and scarpered. My dogs went crazy, so perhaps I wasn't seeing thing! The posts on Facebook revealed that in fact there have been several sightings: The back of St Nicholas school, the tow path, Dockett Eddy Lane and near the guide hall. I then spotted 3 on another walk along the back of Halliford Mere lakes one morning. I spoke to one of the anglers there and asked if he had seen any. “Oh yes. They have been around for as long as I have been fishing here and that is 20 years!”. So, clearly this is not new. The gentleman told me he had seen deer play with calves in the Mead Farm fields opposite the entrance to Halliford Mere. How incredible! Perhaps less surprising, there have been several sightings on Chertsey Meads too. They appear to be Roe deer. According to the British deer society, Roe deer are abundant in the UK and are strongly associated with woodland and copses, which would make sense considering where they have been spotted around Shepperton. If you walk around Black Ditch you might notice dainty pathways through the scrub, These are made by the deer. They change in colour during the year. In summer their coats can be rusty read and in winter they turn to a grey colour. They have a prominent white rump. If you want to spot them, they seem to be most active at dawn and dusk. During the day they tend to bed down to ruminate after a good feed. It seems that deer are becoming braver when it comes to entering areas close to towns. Since seeing deer myself, once on one side of Renfree way and once on the other side, it makes you think….they clearly cross the road. One post on the Facebook thread attested exactly that “one ran out in front of me on Renfree Way...it missed my car by inches”. So do be aware! I did contact our local Surrey County Councillor with my stories and suggested that there really should be ‘Beware of the Deer’ signs on Renfree Way. He was astonished and thought perhaps that these were domestic deer which had got out. The very large number of sightings locally certainly suggest they are well and truly part of our community and here to stay, so watch out and you may well spot them yourselves. We have a huge amount of wildlife around: red kites, which were almost extinct are frequently seen, along with kestrels. But I really did a double take when I heard rumour of Sea Eagles recently. With an 8 foot wingspan, that would be quite something!