Friday, May 01, 2009

Sweet Squirrel Show

This morning I was cheered up by some furry fellas. The greasy ball with seeds is meant for little birds like the Blue Tit, but sometimes an adventurous squirrel makes it down the long string to the ball. He is awkwardly big though, however agile he might be, and cannot sit there for very long before it gets too difficult. Look how he bends his tail round the ball to keep his balance. He soon jumped off to go for a safer option.

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The easiest option is to have some left-overs, seeds discarded by birds on the feeders. Visiting squirrels help keeping the ground tidy under the feeders and the ball, and they normally come alone or in twos, but this morning I had a real treat. Three of them turned up and put on a wonderful show. They ran around, jumped around, sat quietly and nibbled, ran off and hid, came back again, and I just kept snapping. Squirrel show in the morning sunshine made for a good start to the month of May.

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(Photos taken through glass patio door. Click on them to enlarge.)

9 comments:

janet copenhaver said...

I'd like to say they are cute, but my experience with squirrels, makes them look like rats to me. Glad we don't have many in westcliffe.

swenglishexpat said...

Janey - The red squirrels we have on the European continent have become very rare in the UK, which has been invaded by the big North-American grey squirrel. And they are very aggressive; they have out-muscled the little red ones nearly completely, so I can understand they might be a bigger nuisance in the US sometimes.

oreneta said...

I do miss squirrels honestly. Cute.

swenglishexpat said...

Oreneta - And it is great fun watching them chasing each other among the trees at the bottom of the garden. Who needs TV?

Zuzana said...

Amazing pictures! I love brown (red) squirrels, they were native to the mountains where I was born. They got so used to people, that they would come all the way to take nuts from ones hand.
In North Carolina, at Duke, the grey squirrels were running around the campus in hundreds. It was fascinating at first, but one quickly got used to them.;) I think they considered almost an annoyance there.

swenglishexpat said...

Protege - These are really wild squirrels, and they disappear very quickly if disturbed. In fact they are very "nervous"; if one of them makes a quick movement, the others think there is danger and they all vanish in a split second!

Gutsy Living said...

Your photos in sequence should be called the "Spring Squirrel Sprint," how's that for another tongue twister?

Rositta said...

Darn, I've been having trouble commenting on your blog recently. Anyway, managed this time. As cute as squirrels are we try to discourage the here. We spent two years getting them out of our attic. They still try from time to time to find a week spot....ciao

swenglishexpat said...

GW - Oh no, not another one! My tongue is still hurting.

Rositta - They are best from a distance. If they move in, they have to pay rent! ;-)