Black Forest woman survives deer attack

KRDO NewsChannel 13 spoke exclusively on Thursday with the victim of a deer attack at her home in Black Forest a month ago.
Judith Bourdelais, 72, was saved by a neighbor who heard her screams as the buck gored her with its antlers.

“She’s lucky to be alive,” Bill Vogrin, spokesman for Colorado Parks and Wildlife, said. “She really had no chance against an animal of that size and with those weapons.”

Bourdelais was taking out her trash on that fateful morning.

“I was walking down my driveway to the curb, as I normally do,” she said. “I didn’t see anything out here. It was quiet.”

But the tranquil setting suddenly changed.

“I felt something hit my back, like someone just poked me. I wondered who would do that. I turn around and came face-to-face with a deer staring at me.”

A buck with a full rack of antlers; strong, aggressive and in rut for the mating season.

“I didn’t know what to do,” she said. “I tried to walk quickly back to my garage, but the deer knocked me down. He started coming at me with his antlers and attacking me. I grabbed his antlers and tried to hold him off. I couldn’t get up because I have a bad hip. I was scared and getting tired. I screamed.”

Just around the corner, neighbor Rosie Apricio heard the cry for help, got into her car and drove in the direction of the scream.

“I could see she was lying in the driveway,” Apricio said. “There was a deer over her. I told her to try and crawl to the garage.”

Apricio said she honked her horn at the buck several times, and drove her car at it, before the animal finally wandered away.

“She threw her purse at it,” Bourdelais said of her rescuer. “I don’t remember much after that. I passed out or was in shock.”

Bourdelais reached the safety of her home and Apricio called for an ambulance.

“She was bleeding around her face and had lots of holes in her shirt,” Apricio said of her neighbor. “I could tell her wrist was really hurting.”

Bourdelais suffered a broken wrist, a lacerated ear, several serious bruises and superficial puncture wounds.

“What if kids had been out there playing when the deer attacked?” she asked. “That’s what I worry about.”

Wildlife officers found the buck that evening and euthanized it.
“Our analysis of the deer found no disease but a stomach full of corn — proving that someone had been feeding it,” he said. “So in addition to being in rut, it had lost its fear of humans and associated the victim with food. It’s exactly why we beg people to not feed wild animals. Don’t treat them as pets.”

Bourdelais said her brush with death was especially emotional because her husband and daughter recently died.

But she can still find humor in the experience.

“I told the nurses not to mess with me because I just messed with a deer,” she said. “One of them asked if she could have the meat.”

But Bordelais hopes it won’t take another deer attack for people to learn an important lesson.

“I have a new apprehension for deer,” Apricio said.