Nara month by month — at a glance
Hover each month for the summary. Click to pin it.
Nara is sold with a very amiable image: a flat park where tame deer come over to eat crackers from your hand. All of that is true and it is half the story. These are wild animals living free, they have an annual cycle, and there are months when that cycle makes them dangerous.
01 Fifteen hundred wild animals in an urban park
The population sits at around twelve hundred animals, and the 2025 census put it at 1,465. They are sika deer, protected as a natural monument, and they live loose in the park and in the streets around it, without fences or opening hours.
The injury figures help calibrate. In 2016 a record 121 people were hurt by deer, and across 2017–2018 the figure reached at least 164. Most are not dramatic attacks — shoves, nips and butting over food — but neither are they anecdotes.
Key moments at a glance
16.8 degrees and 71.2 millimetres. The rut fades, the leaves turn and the weather holds all day.
24.7 degrees and still without summer humidity. The last good window of the first half of the year.
The 7th to the 9th, the annual antler cutting. Good weather, but the year's worst month for incidents.
31.3 degrees, lows of 22.2 and 173.5 millimetres. The humidity drops neither by day nor by night.
02 Spring: the fawns and the mothers
The fawns are born in April and reared apart, in a dedicated enclosure, until they are strong enough to go out into the park, usually around June. That moment — June and July — is the first of the two periods when keeping your distance matters.
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The logic is the same as in any species: a female with young defends the young. Local advice is not to approach fawns or come between a fawn and its mother, however still she looks. The photograph is not worth it.
03 Autumn: the month of incidents
The second period is more serious and comes in autumn. Antlers start growing in April and by August the males have them complete, with several points. Then the rut begins, and with it competition between males and an aggression that does not distinguish a rival from a person walking past.
The warning signs are recognisable and worth knowing: a male stamping the ground, lowering his head or snorting loudly is saying something very specific. The correct response is to move away without turning your back and without producing food.
The tourist calendar says October. The animal's calendar says October is the worst month to be in its way.
04 A solution from 1672
This problem is not new, and neither is the answer given to it. In 1672 an annual antler cutting of the males was introduced with an explicit aim: to reduce the risk of their injuring people and other deer during the rut. It is still done every year, from 7 to 9 October.
It is worth being clear about what it is and is not. It is a wildlife management measure three and a half centuries old, not a show staged for visitors, even if it can be watched today. And it does not stop the rut: it only removes the male's most dangerous weapon.
After the cutting, in practice, the park becomes considerably calmer. That is why November and December are comfortable months: the animals are still in autumn but without antlers, and visitor numbers have dropped from the peak.
05 The other calendar, the weather one
The second calendar is more conventional and also rules. The city of Nara receives 1,365.1 millimetres a year, very unevenly spread: June brings 184.1 millimetres and July 173.5, in the middle of the rainy season, while January stays at 52.4 and December at 56.8.
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Heat adds to the water. August reaches an average high of 33.0 degrees and does not drop below 23.0 at night, with high humidity, and July is close behind. It is the worst time for a plan that consists essentially of walking outdoors for hours.
06 How to pick the week
November is the best month of the year without argument: highs of 16.8, 71.2 millimetres of rain, the males already dehorned and autumn colour in the maples. December is the second option if the cold does not bother you, with only 56.8 millimetres and far fewer people.
April and May are the spring window, with 20.0 and 24.7 degrees, good weather and the fawns still kept apart. Avoid June and July for the rainy season and August for the heat, and if you go in October keep in mind it is the year's worst month for incidents.
And one recommendation that holds for any date: if you buy crackers for the deer, hand them all over at once and show your empty hands afterwards. Most of the shoving happens when somebody keeps food in a pocket and walks off with twenty animals behind them.
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