Do you find deer adorable? What about the deer that bows to you in exchange of crackers?!
Awesome news! Nara deer park is a great place to spend a day with about 1000 deer. It is located in a Japanese city named Nara. Nara is in fact famous for its respectful and cute deer. You can feed them crackers and pet them if they seem calm and friendly.
How to find the deer park in Nara?
Well, we were staying in Osaka and were able to commute to Nara in about 40 minutes with public transport. There is a train that goes directly from Osaka to Nara. Google Maps did a good job of leading us to this wonderful park.
As you approach the deer park you will start seeing deer signs and deer caricatures everywhere. When you arrive you will see deer even before entering the park, roaming freely on the road and the cars patiently waiting for them to cross the road.
What to Expect from the Deer Park?
The deer are literally everywhere and it was pretty crowded with tourists mostly. They sell crackers for the deer for about 300 yen (japanese currency) per pack. One pack has about 8 crackers. Initially, we got 5 packs. I would recommend bringing a clean plastic bag just to store the crackers because when you open the packs and you want to store them they crumble into your bag.
Are the Cracker Harmful to the Deer?
The crackers are made of rice bran and wheat flour. I was initially curious if these crackers were harmful to the deer but they contain no additives and sugar in fact they are produced by Nara deer preservation foundation.
My curiosity peaked again when saw that these deer go absolutely crazy over these crackers they will grab the crackers out of your hands, pull your clothes with their mouth, chase you to get the crackers.
But, why are these deer so into these crackers? Their natural food is grass, leaves and acorns mostly. The answer is that these deer have been around humans for generations and by social conditioning they figured out that these crackers are equal to food. Young deer observe the older deer to also learn how to bow and get these crackers.
Are the Crackers Becoming the Only Food Source?
However, during my visit I realized the grass was scarce especially in areas with tourists. This had a few reasons, there are about 1200 deer in the park and they hang out where tourists are because tourists equal to food. They overgraze and also another reason grass doesn’t grow easily where its stepped on too much. Since there is quite a bit of crowds there was a scarcity of grass especially in overly populated areas with tourists.
This made me wonder if deer are becoming dependent on the crackers. This actually happened in covid 2019 where there was a significant decrease in tourists. Initially, the deer struggled and they went to further areas like parking lots or roads looking for food. But they eventually reverted to grazing and eating leaves. So these crackers are more like a treat for deer not their food supply. Currently, they are overly conditioned to see this as a food source as well.
Do deer really bow down to visitors?
The deer bow down to visitors only if you have a cracker or you pretend to have a cracker (until they notice you don’t). Just before eating the cracker they will bow down and if you have more crackers they will stay around and keep bowing until they get all your crackers. Once they know you don’t have more crackers they move on to the next person with crackers.
I realized that deer see humans as a food source. They don’t like to be touched that much other than eating cracker from your hands. Some are pretty chill and okay with being pet but some despise being touched and will not let you.
Are the deer aggressive or friendly?
Well, you might have seen some videos on social media where deer are acting a bit aggressive with the visitors like biting them, head butting them or chasing them for crackers. In fact there are signs around the park to show that deer are wild animals that can be aggressive. Especially, this sign below was pretty interesting showcasing all the ways that a deer can attack you.
They can bite you, kick you, butt you or knock you down. In fact, when I visited I had been bitten and kicked by one deer. However, I would not like to discourage or scare you because I had no issues other than this one incident. I felt adored and loved by 10s of deer, well, when I had the crackers at least, sigh. So if you stay in the touristy areas the deer are more docile there.
We also moved further and went to less touristy areas of the park and I had the deer incident there. Luckily, I haven’t been head butted or knocked down. Also if you notice on the upper right of the sign you can see the warning not to touch the baby deer as this can lead to abandonment by the mother or result in an attack from the mother.
The Baby Deer of the Park
The baby deer are very shy and scared so they usually keep a distance even when you offer crackers. But they have also learned how to bow. They will approach you very slow and they will bow down before getting the cracker.
Overall, some deer are pretty friendly and chill and some could be aggressive. For example, I have petted this deer who was pretty calm and just sitting down and chilling on the ground. But some deer started chasing and pulling my clothes when they noticed i have crackers. One deer kicked my leg when i was sitting down and i had crackers. His bite didn’t lead to bleeding or didn’t hurt a lot. Also, as i mentioned before keep your crackers out of sight because soon an army of deer will form around you if they see you having crackers. I would recommend to keep them in a bag and let the crackers out one bu one as you feed the deer.
Final Words
The baby deer are extremely shy. I have observed male deer (the ones with the horns) are more aggressive . But sometimes female deer can become aggressive as well. Overall, we got 10 packs of crackers and at one point we sat down to feed the deer and a flock of deer who saw the crackers started coming towards us. We were keeping the crackers in the bag and one deer just pulled out a pack of crackers and started eating it :D. This was an amazing and unforgettable experience!