A sad tale and sorry tail

We had two young squirrels that frequent our garden and provide my father with a challenge in preventing them from eating the birdseed. He's called them Boris and Ken.

On Friday morning we woke up to find a squirrel tangled on the strawberry netting. At first we thought he was just looking for a way in, but he kept thrashing about and we were eating breakfast we realised he was definitely stuck.


At first we decided to wait and see if he could free himself. I needed to nip outside and as I did, realised that he was well and truly tangle by his rear paw. Mum and I decided to don some heavy duty garden gloves. The plan was that I would hold him and mum could cut him free with some scissors.

No chance, all the little fellow wanted to do was try and take my arm off and growl. He was understandably upset. he had trashed around so much the netting had cut deep into his foot. In the end, I let him bite my glove while mum cut around the tangle foot (he wouldn't let her cut the netting clean off). He scampered off across the lawn to hide under the shed - chased by our cat, Merlin, who had come to see what the fuss was about.

I went to work thinking that we had done all we could, even if he did get munched by a fox. But on my return, bad news. Ken, or Boris, had been last sighted dangling in the top branches of a silver birch at the bottom of our garden. He had exhausted himself trying to untangle the netting on his foot which had by now become loose and re-tangled in the tree. By the time I got home it was all over.


He's still swinging there now, but it hasn't stopped his partner in crime from pinching what was left of the strawberries. Dad found him in the fruit cage today but he managed not to get tangled and made his escape before we could catch him.


I'm not sure what to think - they're pests but it's not nice to see an animal die like the first one did. Perhaps wouldn't have been so bad if we could reach him for the bbq...

Mine's a Carling...

After years of just having a bird table, my old man has gone all out lately to find the ultimate squirrel proof bird feeder. He's tried all kind of different hanging contraptions and poles but the pesky grey critters always seem top find a way around things. Dad's got quite close to the squirrels during all this and named the two young ones Boris and Ken.

He has eventually settled on a pair of cage balls and something that looks a bit like a spaceship which stops them from getting up the pole. It's quite fun watching the Boris and Ken trying to climb up and just sliding straight down again. I'll try and get some video footage to post!

No Nuts

Went for a walk with Rosie on Sunday, back from the Three Horsehoes to her house through the hazel nut grove. Picked loads of nuts which the Squirrels seemed to have left, only to get home and discover that they were either hollow or gone off. Left it a few weeks to late I think, even though all the books said mid-September onwards. We also found this little fellow (below).