I have an obligation to share a story. I lived in the country once, owned three horses. Well, we had hunters in our neighbourhood so the deer and the coyotes liked to hang out on our acreage because lots of room and we wouldn’t hunt them. One day, a deer came out and started grazing in our field. My family saw it and went ‘oh cool’ and went into our backyard to watch. What we didn’t expect was my quarter horse x pony cross going up to the deer. When she did, the deer took off running towards our fence and we thought ‘well so much for that that’s the end of it.’ But just before the fence, the deer swerves like a quarter horse in a barrel race and runs back to my horse. We thought ‘oh hey that’s cool the deer’s showing off’.
What we didn’t fucking expect was for my horse to start bounding around the field like a FUCKING. DEER. My horse was BOUNCING. They were playing, and showing each other they could do what the other could do. It was hilarious. Meanwhile, our other two horses were standing on the big hill a ways back, overlooking what was happening. The horses were eyeing mine like she was certifiably nuts.
I’ve seen that happen with horses and deer before, too! My neighbor’s horse Bill is like… friends with the local deer and they hang out and race each other regularly. It’s very strange.