Fallow deer: spotted, but hard to see.

It's been a long winter for the female fallow deer. But now it's spring; life will lie easier. Still, she must be alert for danger. Her newborn fawn--in hiding for hours as the mother feeds--can think only of rich, nutritious milk.

The fallow deer is one of the few deer species to keep its spots as an adult, helping it to hide in the shadows and dappled sunlight of its woodland home from predators like the European lynx.

Called fallow for an Old English word meaning reddish yellow, the deer was native to southern Europe and parts of the Middle East. Fossils show that it was present in Britain even before the last ice age, but then died out. Reintroduced in the Middle Ages, the Fallow deer has been anything but unproductive--it is now Britain's most widespread species of deer.