Scarlet was in trouble.

The doe Jane Patrick had seen with her Mother’s Day fawns many times from her Port Townsend balcony was limping in the field across the street last week.

Patrick entered the field and to her surprise the deer not only stayed put but she repeatedly raised a leg.

“She kept lifting it up as if she was saying, ‘Look, look, look!’ “ said Patrick, who named the doe Scarlet on account of a scar that runs across the deer’s right side. 

The source of Scarlet’s distress was apparent: A hunk of metal grasped Scarlet’s right hoof like a trap.

Unsure what to do, Patrick posted “Doe needs help” and a brief description on social media. Suggestions flowed. Jane elected to call the WildComm phone number provided by the Washington Department of Fish and Wildlife.

WDFW Wildlife Conflict Specialist Cole Janowski took the call. “It’s been a long, busy summer,” he said when I asked. It was about to get busier for him. 

Seems like a lot of deer are getting caught in things these days, Janowski said, before mentioning his recent rescue of a buck in Port Angeles with its head wrapped in chicken wire and a buck on Stretch Island with a tomato cage around its neck.

Soon he hoped to help Scarlet, but when he met up with Patrick the doe was nowhere to be found.

Janowksi and Patrick, a retiree who recently moved to Port Townsend from Vancouver, Washington, exchanged phone numbers. In the event they didn’t find Scarlet, Janowski asked Patrick to share his number with neighbors with instructions to contact him if they saw the hobbling doe and to send him photos of Scarlet that showed her location.

“Deer have a pattern,” he told me. “They like to go from point A to B every day, especially in Port Townsend, where there’s no real reason for them to go anywhere else.”

With photos of a stricken deer taken at multiple locations, Janowski can usually track it down.

For four hours Patrick and Janowski searched for Scarlet, Patrick on foot and Janowski in his truck.

As if she’d heard his comments about deer and their patterns, Scarlet appeared under some trees next to the field. It was a place Patrick had seen the doe and her two spotted offspring numerous times.

“I gave Cole a call,” Patrick said, and he was on scene within five minutes.

The conflict management specialist carries with him two drug-delivery systems. One’s a pistol, the other a rifle. Both propel syringes loaded with immobilizing drugs using a CO2 cartridge like a paintball gun.

Janowski chose to use the pistol, because he felt he could get close to Scarlet and because the rifle can hurt an animal with the amount of force its darts pack.

As hoped, the first shot caught Scarlet in the hind quarters. A booster shot put her into a deep sleep.

It took hearty tugs from both of Janowski’s hands to get the unknown device off Scarlet’s hoof but it hadn’t caused a life-threatening injury, he was pleased to report, just a tender area.

After putting a small tag on Scarlet’s left ear to inform hunters that Scarlet been drugged, Janowski gave her a reversal drug that quickly woke her.

“She got up all wobbly like a new fawn and made a soft moaning sound,” Patrick said. “Immediately her fawns were right behind her. Then the three walked past us to the shady place under the trees—you know, to their safe spot.”

With Scarlet returning to normal, Janowski was free to continue doing what he loves—rescuing animals and educating people about them and the work that he does.

Patrick returned to the Nextdoor app and wrote:

“Update: Thanks to Cole from Fish and Wildlife, the metal piece around this doe’s hoof was safely removed and she is now reunited with her fawns.”

At the time this was written, more than 2,100 people—roughly a fifth of Port Townsend’s population—had clicked on the “love” icon under the post. And the love continued to pour in.