Trail Camera Captures a Deer Chasing a Black Bear Carrying Her Fawn

A trail camera has recorded a striking scene of predator and prey: a black bear running through woodland with a fawn in its jaws while the young animal’s mother races after it.

The footage shows the bear carrying the fawn as the animal cries out. What makes the sequence so unusual is the reaction of the doe, which follows the much larger predator in an apparent attempt to recover her young.

The bear runs from the doe

At the start of the recording, the bear appears to be fleeing from something while holding the fawn by the neck. It pauses briefly beside a large tree, seemingly checking its surroundings, before continuing to run.

Moments later, the doe comes into view, running hard in pursuit of the bear and the fawn. The scene underlines the risks female deer will take when a newborn is attacked by a carnivore.

Club de Caza has previously reported similar cases involving other species, including a roe deer confronting a fox carrying off its kid and a wild boar attempting to defend its young from wolves.

Black bears and fawn predation

The episode reflects a well-documented part of deer ecology in North America, where newborn whitetail fawns can be highly vulnerable to predators during their first weeks of life.

Research cited in the original article, including the study Survival Rates, Mortality Causes, and Habitats of Pennsylvania White-Tailed Deer Fawns, found that predation was the leading cause of recorded fawn mortality in the study area.

According to those findings, predation accounted for 46.2% of all recorded deaths. Among identified predation events, black bears were responsible for 32.7%, while coyotes accounted for 36.7%.

The study also found that most fawn deaths occurred during the first weeks of life. The Pennsylvania Game Commission has likewise noted that bears and coyotes place heavy pressure on fawns early on, although overall survival is generally sufficient to maintain stable deer populations. In deer older than six months, predation represents less than 1% of recorded deaths.