Friendly loveable Squirrels..

[TonyK]

The squirrels seem to keep their distance and I do the same. Hopefully we continue to show each other respect. It's been this way for years so I'm good with it.

[NOBLNG]

7 hours ago, OldTrucker said:

We live in a 55+ housing that has 4 triplexes. They posted a notice to stop feeding the squirrels. We never have, I still concider they rats with bushy tails.

The lady that lived next door woukd feed them all the time but she recently passed away.

The squirrels would sit on the porch of her emply apartment and jump up and hang on the screen looking in for her really tearing it up.

New lady has moved in and one squirrel would sit on the porch rail and bark at her every time she came out the door and she would shoo it away.

Well last week it was sitting on her rail screeching really loud and when she opened the door to shoo it away it jumped on her and bit her on the cheek and ear! Took me an hour to chase it out of her apartment while my wife treated her wounds.

She went to the doctors office abd got 4 stiches in her ear.

They just seem to get more destructive every year that goes by.

Rarely see red squirrels anymore and that used to be what most were around here.

 

After attacking someone…this is what they need.?

[A modeler named mike]

A couple of days ago while feeding the squirrels I had one misjudge the nut for my finger. As soon as he grabbed it he let lose and then grabbed the nut. Leaving no blood or even a mark. Lucky? Maybe.. I think it realized it wasn't a nut so it didn't follow through with biting harder to take it. 

As to the above story above.. I hope the lady faired well from the attack and was able to deter the problem.

We had squirrels at my other residents that would jump from the deck railing onto the kitchen window screen to alert me they were there to eat. I ended up removing the screen since we never open the window anyway. That stopped the jumping. Now that I'm not there 97% of the time and cannot feed them they stopped coming to eat. My wife is still there and has never been bothered by the squirrels coming back. The fact that I had a 60 plus foot silver maple tree removed from our backyard may play a role in the lack of squirrel activity too.

 

[bobthehobbyguy]

In the case of the lady attacked by the squirrel this is what happened when you start feeding them too much.  The lady before her established a dependency on food. That's why I don't feed them. They gather food for the winter months.  The squirrels schred a lot of pine cones to store food before winter. I can get a feel of when winter will start by this activity.

[ChrisBcritter]

This works well too. Bye-bye:

[bobss396]

Mine are very used to seeing me outside. If I go out to shoot some primer, they stay on the deck rail and keep eating. I know where they live, nests in the trees. I see them coming in for breakfast.

Then there's the bluejays. I must have at least 15 of them. They sound the dinner-bell cry when I step outside. There is a couple of real fat ones. This is the bird that was all but eradicated by pesticides. By 1970, they were simply not around. It was around 1996 when I heard a familiar racket and saw an easy dozen of them outside in a tree. Then, not a one until I noticed them in large groups around 2016. My girlfriend got me feeding them every morning.

[espo]

13 hours ago, ChrisBcritter said:

This works well too. Bye-bye:

I bought something on this order to try and keep the Tree Rats out of the bird feeder. Sort of a Bunji Cord affair when the squirrel jumped on the feeder it would launch them in the air. Bad thing is they started thinking this was a Disneyland type squirrel ride.  

[NYLIBUD]

Don’t feed any wild animals.Most animals were here long before we were.And God i love that bunji cord video,made my day.??

[bobss396]

I back up to the causeway that heads to the Great South Bay. There are 2 stop signs between me and the ocean and about 8 minutes. 

We get everything from fox, possums, raccoons, deer, rabbits and a few turtles now and then. Lots of shore birds too. We know the weather is turning snotty when I have seagulls up by me. The fox keep the rabbits in check. Raccoons and possums I see at night. If it snows, I see tracks on my driveway and deck.

I have to be careful about putting anything with food on it in the recycling can. Last summer I found a young raccoon in my big trash pail, no idea how he climbed in that high. He must have been inside in the heat all day. I tipped it over and he took off. 

[A modeler named mike]

After many failed attempts I was finally able to earn the trust of this little guy. A few chipmunks come to eat but only this one will regularly take peanuts from me. 

[bobss396]

Since I moved here in 1986, I have seen ONE chippie. The north shore they are all over. Maybe they don't cross the Expressway? 

I had 5 squirrels about a year ago. Then one got clipped by a car and another drowned in my pool. So 3 it was for a while. A few weeks ago I started seeing smaller ones... and mine are generally well fed. So I count... I had 6 of them out there. 

[Mike 1017]

My Squirrel  story. One morning I am down in my basement's family room. I hear this noise and I start looking around. Staring back at me through glass fireplace doors is a squirrel. Now what am I going to do? I grab my welding gloves and put them on. I open the doors just enough to get my hand into the fireplace and grab the squirrel. It clamps down on my thumb and I pull it out of the fireplace. Now what am I going to do? Break its neck or drown it the utility room sink? I went outside and thew it over my neighbor's fence glove and squirrel. The neighbor's dog just happened to be out in the yard, and it went nuts. That squirrel had a very bad day. Later that day I climbed onto my roof and repaired the damper and put on a new chimney cap. I am so glad that I closed the fireplace doors before going to bed.

Mike

[bobss396]

We had a squirrel come down the chimney and got stuck in the damper of the oil burner. My dad heard the racket, went down to look. He got the squirrel out, it ran all over the place leaving black soot on my dad's wood working projects. He opened a window and the squirrel made his exit.

[TNT]

We have had 2 squirrels. They where nuero is the only reason we kept them. We are in farm country and there is about 5000 acres of woods behind the house. My mom lived these critters. She lived her last months at our house. Shortly after she passed wife n daughter was in our bedroom and heard a noise out side the window. There laid a baby squirrel. Not sure how he got there i doubt any of the cats did it. So we figured mom placed him there. There was a drey in a tree out front and the mother had 3 babies. I figured mom pushed him out of the nest. Being a runt or sick and to save resources for the other 2 babies.  I told them we are not keeping a squirrel. So after buying supplies and a big cage he was ours. The little fuzz butt bonded to me. When i walked in the door from work butters would climb me like a tree and run around me like they do no tree trunks. He was the best pet ever.

 

Bought him a little critter bed. He loved it.

 

 

Put his bed on the floor at the back door.

 

Cover him up and he would nap.

 

 

If i had anything to eat he had to taste it. When he passed the whole family was saddened. But it wasn't long before we where asked to adopt a foxxer. Drove 300 miles to save this guy. Lady seen him fall. Took him home but could not keep him because of work being busy.

 

Kamikaze. Or kaze for short waking up.

 

 

 

he could not stand so he would lean on stuff, but if you touched his head he could stand.

 

 

He was a happy critter after we got him cleaned him and started interacting with him.

 

 

Nuts and corn are very bad for squirrels. They can cause M.B.D. metabolic bone disease. 

 

He spent most of his time laying down or on his back. He was afraid of heights. But i did get him to the point where i could pick him up. He did have a long happy life with us. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[bobss396]

When I was growing up, the kid next door found one that must have fallen from a nest. He was about 10 (the kid...) and took good care of the critter. He had it in a bird cage in his room. Eventually he let it outside, but it came up to him whenever he went out. Some of my smaller ones will get close to me to pick up nuts I drop for them.

[TNT]

2 hours ago, bobss396 said:

When I was growing up, the kid next door found one that must have fallen from a nest. He was about 10 (the kid...) and took good care of the critter. He had it in a bird cage in his room. Eventually he let it outside, but it came up to him whenever he went out. Some of my smaller ones will get close to me to pick up nuts I drop for them.

They are cool critters. When i was plumbing a customer had one  he kept in a cage. Meanest rhing ever except to him. Dang thing screamed and jumped all over its cage. 

[A modeler named mike]

Yesterday I was sitting outback playing on my phone and paying no attention to one of the little guys I hand feed. I guess someone became impatient and decided to self serve. Trusting little guy..

[TNT]

10 hours ago, A modeler named mike said:

Yesterday I was sitting outback playing on my phone and paying no attention to one of the little guys I hand feed. I guess someone became impatient and decided to self serve. Trusting little guy..

Funny. See them little critters run across the road. All you see is a blur going 100 mph with a tail straight up.

[bobss396]

7 hours ago, TNT said:

Funny. See them little critters run across the road. All you see is a blur going 100 mph with a tail straight up.

Like I have said, on the south shore of Long Island, my son saw ONE in my yard a year ago. On the north shore, they are all over. When I camped in New England, they were all over. Give us a 99¢ bag of peanuts and it was fun for days with them. My son one time brought out some peanuts onto the deck and went in the pool. I saw from inside the house... the bluejays went to town on the peanuts but left him just 2.

[Tom Geiger]

In one of my rental houses, I had a tenant named Doug Keller.  He was an animal guy.  He had a blind pet squirrel he named Helen.  Let that sink in! 

[A modeler named mike]

11 minutes ago, Tom Geiger said:

In one of my rental houses, I had a tenant named Doug Keller.  He was an animal guy.  He had a blind pet squirrel he named Helen.  Let that sink in! 

My brother once had a 3 legged dog he named Tri (as in 3)

[TNT]

13 minutes ago, A modeler named mike said:

My brother once had a 3 legged dog he named Tri (as in 3)

A friend of ours had a 3 legged blk lab they named tripod. 3 legs did not slow him down.

[A modeler named mike]

My new little buddy the chipmunk or is it more than one and they're playing me for a pushover? Either way I'm enjoying it and apparently so is he/she... ? no they're not that.

[mk11]

You'll never guess what happened here....

Friend with an old farmhouse found this on the floor one day; knocked off the bookcase at the bottom of the stairs. Looked a little further and sure enough, evidence of something making laps around the kitchen.

They're such calm, collected little critters. Imagine one on a toluene high...

Investigating further, he found they'd chewed through the drywall in the attic into a closet and commenced touring the house.

He picked up a rat zapper to place at the bottom of the stairs and six visitors later, peace was restored

 

Edited July 5, 2024 by mk11

[bobss396]

Mine are still around, I had 6, see only 4 as of late. I hope they are okay. I went out to put out nuts and seeds this morning, found a dead Bluejay just over the deck rail. These are notoriously tough birds.