A normal Saturday turned into a mess of shattered glass and shredded lace for Curvaceous Lingerie in Lansing, Michigan, on Nov. 4. A young whitetail buck crashed through the store’s glass door, took out a few mannequins, and leveled two merchandise displays. The owner of the lingerie boutique posted security camera footage of the incident on the store’s Facebook page on Sunday.
In the first clip from outside the front door, the buck sprints across the street in front of moving cars and lowers its antlers as it crashes through the front window. The next clip from inside the store shows the buck flying through the window and sliding across the tile floor. One employee runs to get out of the deer’s way while other employees and customers try to avoid it.
After colliding with the mannequins and apparel displays, the buck runs around the store, behind the register, and then crashes into a few other fixtures. It ends up trapped in one corner of the store as it tries to break through another window to get back onto the street. Pedestrians watch from the sidewalk, unsure of what to do. Eventually, the buck turns around and walks out the open door.
“Everybody remained somewhat calm and just stayed out of the way,” store owner Lauren Palmer told WILX10. “This was a big buck. This was not a small doe by any means. We were not going to mess with this deer.”
The store is immediately adjacent to the Grand River on East Cesar Chavez Street, a busy east-west road in a north Lansing neighborhood known as “Old Town.” Lansing has multiple suburban parks and green spaces, and suburban deer management is a challenge. Lansing reportedly held a “secret deer cull” in January 2023, which residents only learned about after calling emergency services to report gunshots at night.
The last week of October and first week of November always bring chaos to areas with high deer densities. That timeframe typically aligns with the rut, when bucks become more aggressive in their search for receptive does. This leads to more vehicle collisions, more break-ins, and more negative encounters with humans and pets that can result in injury and even death. For example, a buck crashed into the law library at the University of Michigan on Oct. 27, and another one busted into a Virginia seafood restaurant on Nov. 2.
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The Old Town community rallied to help clean up the mess at Curvaceous on Saturday. While Palmer said business has been slow and the incident came at a bad time, she has also taken the opportunity to make a few jokes about the situation. At least one commenter also picked up on the irony of a rutting buck choosing this particular store to visit.
“The rut is on,” they wrote. “Can’t blame a young buck for wanting to pick something up for that special doe.”