dog deer drama

London's tube strike created a mid Sunday morning atmosphere away from the city centre today. There were plenty of professional looking office types out for runs, sitting in cafes and whizzing about on bicycles. The power of the virtual office.

I was amongst the cyclists, and caught up in an unexpected stampede of wild animals. It was simple enough. Someone had let a small dog off its leash (despite warnings to the contrary) and the dog had gone runabout near to a large quantity of red and fallow deer.

The deer were not too impressed and decided to move away, attracting others from the herd in the process.

The dog's owner then appeared in the far distance and yelled at the dog, which started running around again, some 200 meters from its owner.

The deer decided to get even further away and my handlebar camera picked them up crossing the road ahead of me and a few other cyclists. I'm guessing there are at least a couple of hundred deer. Excuse the slanted angle; I wasn't planning to make a movie and its easier to see what is going on with the video in full screen.

We cyclists all stayed well back, applying the 50 metre rule and aware that the deer could also turn and chase the dog if further provoked.

Fortunately once the deer had crossed the road, the yappy dog ran back to its distant owner, who picked it up and walked rather swiftly away in the opposite direction.