LIAM LAWLER, a reader from Ballymore Eustace, in Co Kildare, wanted to add to the response to Deirdre Davys's walk, on November 14th, in Camaderry, Co Wicklow
We were walking on Camaderry with two relatives who were less experienced in hillwalking. We were delighted to catch sight of some deer nearby and hoped we would get a better view as we got higher.
On our final climb from the northwest we heard the roar of stags. They appeared to come from opposite sides of our route up ahead. Visibility was becoming more difficult the higher we went. Then the roaring stags became visible above us slightly to the left. We expected them to go off as soon as they caught sight of us, but they didn’t. Then we remembered your report in October of a man being attacked on Camlough, in the Mourne Mountains, by an angry stag. Another stag, with attendant females, appeared to our left, and the stags up ahead, still roaring, were edging closer. We looked for some kind of cover – a rock or a bush – but there was none.
Trying not to alarm our companions or the stags, we continued on a diagonal path away from the stags. They began to descend to a patch level with us and slowly get behind us. Eventually we were aware that they were moving away from us as we disappeared into cloud or misty rain. The howling winds and rain were a relief from the anxiety we had experienced.
I don’t know how threatened we were, or whether we were in any danger at all. All I know is that we were quite scared.
We were very interested in the ploys mentioned in Go over the past few weeks to deal with threatening stags in the rutting season. All we felt was that we would have preferred to be elsewhere.
The other day we were in Glendalough and came across some grazing stags. They were much closer to us than the Camaderry ones, but we were in no way anxious as they watched us, looking bored. That is our usual experience of the deer in Wicklow.
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