Deer, dear?

From time to time, I like to stand in the garden and take stock, check the flora and fauna. See what is flowering, inspect the pond for wildlife and see how many different types of bee there are. This week we are away and our 'garden' is several acres of landscape and woodland. As the seasons are all to pot, I thought it would be interesting to take notes on our sunny walk around the wooded area, over the river. Almost immediately we realised it was an abandoned garden, with lumps of mossily-overgrown worked stone and random, hidden ponds making walking difficult. Snowdrops were everywhere, sprinkled with blue muscari, yellow primroses and one or two Corsican hellebore. Daffodils just beginning to open while ransoms were only a green ground cover with barely a hint of garlic. Trees that should be bright green had few buds, branches dark and bare as if it were still mid-winter. Some beetles and ants were at work in the leaf litter - eyes were to the ground to avoid stumbling in the mud and debris. Also signs of conkers, hazelnuts and beech mast from autumn. Fir cones, some nibbled, indicating the occasional visiting squirrel. Then a clearing, sun slipping through the canopy, rustling in the undergrowth. Deer? (Small, so could only be munkjac) or rabbits? A bit further on we surprised a cock pheasant and then the hen ran out from a tree stump - do pheasants nest on the ground? After that we lost the path and slipped over some muddy ground, grasping at the many sprouting rhododendrons with their tightly packed buds. Staggering up a sandy bank (lots of holes, so I think what we saw were bunnies), we eventually found the path again. Apart from wood pigeon, no more wildlife. Spring not quite here yet.
P.S. That was yesterday - today it snowed!