This Hunter Found a Wounded Deer and Carried Her Nearly Two Miles to Save Her Life

Sometimes, compassion comes from the places we least expect it. For example, Carol and Julien Pearce were once award-winning goat cheese producers of over 20 years who transformed their dairy farm into a sanctuary for goats and other rescued farm animals. You would think, of all people, that a hunter would not extend any feelings of compassion to a wild animal in need and yet when Volkan Bal, a bird hunter came across a wounded deer, that is exactly what he did.

Bal had been hunting with a group of friends when they heard the sound of a roe deer crying out in pain. Though their population is steadily increasing, roe deer are an endangered species, so Bal and his friends were interested in seeing one with their own eyes. They followed the sounds of the crying to a mother deer with a bloodied leg lying next to her baby. According to Bal, “the deer we found had most probably jumped off a high wire and injured its legs heavily.”

Rather than leave her to fend for herself, Bal stopped the bleeding, then lifted the mama deer up onto his shoulders in a fireman carry and walked nearly two miles to the closest Directorate of Nature Conservation and National Parks. We hope they brought the baby, too, since we can’t imagine any mama deer, wounded or not, allowing a human to carry her away from her child. Luckily, the deer survived the trek to the center where she received the appropriate veterinary treatment. If it weren’t for this group of hunters and their compassion for this helpless deer, it is likely that she would have suffered for quite some time.

Hopefully, she’ll be back to her home-sweet-home in the forests of Turkey as soon as possible!

Lead image source: IHA