The media storm surrounding a rare albino deer may spare it the same fate as the bear gunned down in Saxony, writes Jess Smee

It scampers about and forages for food in the undergrowth just like any other young deer. But this creature is just a little bit different: it is snow white - and it is, unwittingly, a German media star.

The photogenic albino fawn has sparked an outcry. Hunters in the mountainous German state of Saxony say it should be shot, arguing that they don't want its genes diluting the pool of other, more conventional, mottled brown deer.

But public outrage has been gathering steam ever since the red-eyed deer first stole the front page of the best-selling Bild tabloid last week. Now Germans of all stripes are demanding that the "sweet little Bambi" or the "little Snow White" be spared the bullet.

The media have been full of the fawn's Persil-white form, contrasting angelically with the murky brown undergrowth. And it's worked in the deer's favour.

Now a nationally famous yodelling songstress has publicly announced a gig to raise funds for a local animal park where she hopes the misfit will find refuge from the hunter's bullets.

Meanwhile, Bambi fans plagued Carl Hanta, a restaurateur in the eastern city of Dresden, with angry calls after he sarcastically added white deer to his weekly specials menu.

And emotions are running high among animal lovers who are still in mourning over Bruno, a rampaging bear slain in Germany earlier this year.

Causing a media sensation, Bruno the bear's problems started in the spring when he took a wrong turn and left the Italian Alps for Bavaria.

There he went on a seven-week spree and was deemed a public danger for walking through villages, killing sheep and chickens and, rather strangely, sitting on a guinea pig. But his fun was halted abruptly: the Bavarian environment ministry controversially sent out a team of hunters to shoot him in July. And compared with this brazen brown bear wreaking his path of death and destruction, it is no surprise that within days, the innocent-looking deer has captured hearts, minds and headlines across the country.

The Bruno card has been played extensively by the deer's growing fan club. "New Bruno case? Hunt for White Bambi", the Bild railed recently.

What's more, zoologists have pointed out that it is rare - only one in 10,000 deer has the genetic trait that makes it an albino.

After the storm of negative publicity, the Saxony government has hastily argued that it does not back a Bruno-like fate for the fawn.

And that is not the only reason that "Saxony's Snow White" is likely to be left in peace. Apart from its cutesy value, the German hunters have superstitions forbidding them from targeting the deer.

Old hunter folklore says that anyone killing a white deer will meet a nasty end - the hunter, or a member of his family, will die within a year of the deer's death. And it's not for nothing that hunters quake in their boots at the thought of shooting the diminutive beast. Just look at the story of the former Austrian leader Archduke Franz Ferdinand, who was a keen hunter.

He shot a white stag in the autumn of 1913. Within a year, he was assassinated in Sarajevo.

Then one thing led to another, the Austrians declared war on Serbia and that kicked off the first world war.

Somehow, it looks as if Saxony's snowy Bambi will scamper its way to a ripe old age.