Man versus Squirrel

I really don't mind feeding the local squirrels as well as the birds that visit our garden, but I do resent it when they monopolise the feeding station, as the presence of even one squirrel on the feeders will prevent any birds from visiting (though squirrels feeding on the bits dropped underneath the feeders do not deter the birds at all).  So I have put in a number of the supposedly squirrel-proof solutions to the problem.  The sight yesterday of a squirrel standing on the squirrel baffle (which supposedly prevents the animal from climbing up the pole from which the feeders hang) in order to reach inside the squirrel-proof cage around the feeder, made me a bit cross.  I chucked a piece of kindling wood at said squirrel, as there was a pile of it by our back door. To my surprise, it hit him, though not hard, as it was some distance away. He looked round at me, seemed to shrug his shoulders in a disdainful fashion, and carried on eating. Defeat duly admitted by disconsolate human.

Mind you, things are hotting up in the squirrel world just now, prompted no doubt by the comparatively mild winter we've had so far. Later in the day any number of squirrels - well, seven or eight, anyway - seemed to be engaged in something of a running battle through the treetops behind our house. Much shouting and screaming, and amazing agility as the creatures hurtled through the trees. It's my own fault, I suppose - they are now so well fed, and they have so much energy to work off. Certainly, it was amazing to watch them!

In fact, feats of agility of this sort are a feature of the mating season, which for grey squirrels is now in full swing. Squirrels produce two broods in a year, and the first of these is in the early spring, so mating - and no doubt fighting over possible mates - happens right now, whenever the weather is mild enough to encourage it. It's been mild nearly all winter so far, though the storms and rain over recent weeks won't have encouraged the squirrels. This week, though, things are much calmer meteorologically, and therefore, it would seem, considerably less calm in the treetops!