Puppy started barking hysterically at some unknown intruder at 2 a.m. I forced my eyes open, found a flashlight and staggered to the door and out into the rain to see what the problem was and if it needed fixing.
Puppy was barking and yelping at a mass on the ground underneath the maple tree. I couldn’t see it clearly in the dark and rain, but sincerely hoped that it wasn’t a hornet nest. Then I could hear squeaking noises. Awwww, damn. It was a nest.
I opened up the Spanish moss to confirm, and there were 4 little pink squirrels with areas on the head that were getting darker where hair was beginning to grow. According to the squirrel rescue website I checked this morning, they were between 10 days and 2 weeks old. They were unharmed thanks to the thick padded nest that surrounded them.
I knew Mamma squirrel wouldn’t come to get them at night, so where could I put them to keep them from harm from dogs, cats, and nocturnal animals until she searched for them in the morning? Oh, no, NOT in the house, they had lil’ critters on them that were happily transferring to my hands as I checked them. I put the nest in a bucket, told pup “NO!”, put it on the patio out of the rain, and returned to the porch for my stepladder. While I was taking the stepladder off the porch, Odie slipped off the porch and away in the dark unnoticed by me. After I got the ladder put up, the light rain had stopped, so I put the squirrel nest on the patio roof and added a small bottle of warm water to the nest because they were chilled, made sure they were well covered with Spanish moss, and got back down, removing the ladder so the cats couldn’t climb up. I figured they were safe from carnivores there and mom squirrel might even be able to find them in the morning.
It was then about 3 a.m. and I was ready to go back to bed where SwampMan was slumbering peacefully, not even noticing I was missing. If I had fallen off the ladder screaming all the way to the ground, SwampMan wouldn’t hear or even notice that I was missing until he woke up in the morning and, even then, he’d figure I was out feeding something and probably go back to sleep. If I hadn’t cooked his breakfast by about 10 a.m., he’d grumpily come outside to find out why I was neglecting my duties of taking care of him. Puppy might stay faithfully beside my body unless/until he was distracted by a branch, butterfly, or mud puddle that needed jumping in. The kitties would probably say “oooooh, BREAKFAST!”
I went back on the porch and then noticed Odie was missing. Awwww, damn. His health has been failing lately. His hearing is bad. His formerly keen eye has a cataract. He sleeps unless I’m outside, and he usually stays by my side except lately, alarmingly, he’s taken to wandering again like he did in his youth. He can still find all his escape routes through the fences but can’t find his way back. I searched for him until 4 a.m. and shined the LED light out into the woods hoping that he would be able to see it and find his way back, but saw and heard nothing.
Yesterday morning when I was feeding chickens and let Odie off the porch for a pottie break, he had gotten out of one of his hidey holes and headed out into the woods, taking Sam. Sam returned immediately on command. Odie, who KNOWS he isn’t supposed to do that, lay down in the neighbor’s ditch so I wouldn’t see him. When I continued heading toward him, he turned tail and ran into the neighbor’s back yard where he had another hole under the fence that led to the horse barn. He showed up at dinner time, pretending that he had never been gone and it must have been some other dog that was in the ditch and ran away so he wouldn’t get in trouble. I’m hoping that he’s hiding out from retribution now and that he didn’t head off somewhere because he was getting called by the Dog Reaper.
Anthropomorphizing about Odie? Nope. When Odie was a younger dog, I was driving home and saw him out trotting down the road. He turned his head when he heard my truck and took off running flat out towards the wooded area in front of our property. When I drove up, I saw him apparently snoozing peacefully on the front porch. He stood up, stretched and yawned, then headed toward me, tail wagging, as though he had been on that porch all day awaiting my return. I would have sworn that I had been mistaken if Odie weren’t a *very* uniquely colored dog with one bright blue eye and one missing eye. That’s kinda hard to mistake.
He’s done that to SwampMan, too. SwampMan has come home and asked me if there were another dog in the neighborhood that looked EXACTLY like Odie.
“No.”
“That’s what I thought, but I was out driving down the road and thought I saw him in the neighbor’s yard. When I turned into the driveway, he was sleeping on the porch, so it couldn’t have been him.”
“Sucker!”
Since I was ready to go back to bed, I had to put Sammy back in the kennel. Sammy is allowed out of the kennel at night when he can run and patrol to his heart’s content. As long as Odie is on the porch, he won’t attempt to find Odie’s escape hatches. If Odie is wandering, however, he may get out and wander, something I don’t want him to get in the habit of doing. Odie usually snoozes in the shade of a tree or on the front porch during the day in peace while pup is kenneled. If pup is out, he wants to play, and frequently knocks poor Odie down. So, I try to give ’em each about 12 hours out and 12 hours of confinement daily.
At 6:30 a.m., I’m back up and outside feeding the mare. No Odie. I fed the chickens. No Odie. I checked the barns. No Odie. Only then did I remember the squirrel nest on the roof (oops), climbed the ladder, and they were still there, chilled and unhappy. I carried them down and showed SwampMan, who told me they were going to die, and I shouldn’t even THINK about bottle feeding them. I think maybe SwampMan is having squirrel flashbacks.
The last baby squirrel that SwampDaughter and I (successfully) bottle fed would happily climb up our legs and back to reach our shoulders and snuggle underneath our hair. If SwampMan walked in without warning, she became demon squirrel bent on ridding the planet of the intruder into her territory. She’d run up SwampMan’s back and start viciously slashing any portion of him that she could reach with her razor sharp teeth, drawing blood with her sharp little claws, while he was flailing around yelling “GET THIS LIL’ BASTARD OFFA ME OR I’M GONNA EAT IT FOR DINNER!” I think maybe he’s just overly sensitive at the thought of FOUR squirrels swarming over him, slashing him with their sharp little teeth while they protect their momma/food supply from the eeeeevil intruder. I’d be laughing so hard at the sight of Man Mountain’s ass being kicked by tiny little squirrels that I’d be of little help rescuing him, just like with the last squirrel.
So, I put the nest on top of a Rubbermaid container underneath the maple tree, went inside and filled the bottle with more warm water, opened the nest so the babies were visible, put the squirrels on the warm water bottle, and sat back to await the arrival of Mommy Squirrel and to keep the kitties from having squirrel for brunch.
Fifteen minutes later, no Mommy, but the little squirrels were desperately trying to nurse the water bottle. I was sitting on a bench about 5′ away from the tree, intently staring up through the leaves. Damn. No squirrels in sight. I didn’t want to feed baby squirrels every 2 hours! One of the squirrels crawled out of the nest while nosing about for food, fell off of the Rubbermaid container and started crying loudly. I didn’t see a response in the tree, so I picked the lil’ squirrel up and put him back with his siblings. I went and told SwampMan that he was going to have to come outside, sit on the bench, and watch for momma squirrel while making sure kitties didn’t munch on the little ones while I went to the store for Ensure or Enfamil. He did not look happy. He was thinking about an angry momma squirrel running up his shorts leg, no doubt.
I went back out to the nest and picked up another baby. It nuzzled around looking for a teat and then started crying loudly. I heard leaves rustling and looked up. Momma squirrel was cautiously coming down the tree, looking for her little ones. I put the squirrel back in the nest, and called to SwampMan.
“Hey, Mommy Squirrel is here, so you don’t have to come sit with the babies while I go to the store!”
“I don’ see no squirrel. Where is it?”
“Over there at the bottom of the maple tree!”
“DAMN, get out of there so you don’t scare her away!”
“She’s not going to be afraid of me!”
Mommy squirrel came down the tree, touched the strange texture of the Rubbermaid box, and jumped away, back up the trunk of the maple. Then cautiously coming back down, she climbed on the box, immediately grabbed a baby, and scampered up to the top of the tree. About 20 seconds later, she was back down picking up another baby. All of the babies were tucked away at the very top of the tree in about a minute. I was *VERY* happy that I didn’t have to feed little squirrels every 2 hours for the next several weeks.
After the last little squirrel was tucked away, Mommy Squirrel came down the tree and advanced half the distance toward me, then stopped and sat there just looking at me, flicking her tail a couple of times. My scent was all over her babies. She didn’t look at all like she was threatening to kick my ass, though. I KNOW what that looks like! I stepped in her direction, and she retreated to the tree, but only to the first branch. She sat there on the branch, looking at me. Maybe she was wondering where the corn was because when I throw corn to the chickens, the squirrels come down from the trees and join the chickens eating the corn. I scattered corn on the ground underneath the tree and tossed some up to where the large branch joined the trunk. She chirped once at me, then ran up the tree to her nest.
Maybe she was showing her appreciation that I took care of her little ones when they fell out of the tree at night. Or maybe she was telling me that she’s going to chew every wire underneath the hood of my vehicle AND eat holes in all my pumpkins again this year.
No Odie.
A1A South 