Let’s get back to the hate speech.
Target: squirrels.
When I was a young child, before I knew they were assholes, I thought squirrels were cute. Then one summer day, as I played innocently in the back yard with my best friend Jenny when we were about 9 years old, we became aware of a hostile chirping sound above and behind us. Jenny quickly located the source and cried out, “Ooo! It’s a cute little squirrel! Let’s catch him and raise him as our own!”
Thinking that was the best idea I’d heard in a long time, I agreed and together we crept towards Mr. Squirrel. He was on a tree branch about five feet from the ground. We’d seen Bambi. We knew woodland creatures were kindhearted and loving; you just had to gain their trust.
Softly we cooed, “Hello Mister Squirrel, we won’t hurt you, here’s a walnut, come on, come to your new best friends!” We promised Mr. Squirrel we would not harm him or his kin, and we would feed him all the nuts he could fit in his fat little belly. We were SURE he’d acknowledge our good will and frolic adorably down the tree trunk into our arms.
He did not do that. That is not at all what happened.
Instead he chose to answer our heartfelt pleas with more hostile chirping that really is better described as demonic barking. He mocked us, scampering to and fro on his branch, stopping at each end to turn to face us, stand on his hind legs, and BARK insolently at us.
Once it dawned on Jenny and me that this little son of a bitch hated our guts and was trying to run us off, our feelings were genuinely hurt. You may conclude that the moral of this story is that little girls are ignorant, naive, stupid, misguided, and confused (none of which is untrue) but do you know what a better, more satisfying conclusion is? Squirrels are assholes.
As the years passed, I’ve grown to heartily loathe the little bastards. They’re rats with fluffy tails, so it’s said, and while I can’t agree with that completely - rats are just NASTY - it has some merit since they are dirty little scavengers. I could write an opus about squirrels in my birdfeeders, hanging upside down, flinging seeds all over the place, scaring off the birds, in general being the little assholes that they are.
I’ve seen them digging in trash and I’ve seen them terrorizing people inside their own houses. I’ve heard mysterious, disturbing rumors that they will actually eat parts of your actual house. They will taunt your cats, your dogs, even your children. I knew a boy once who was viciously bitten by a squirrel and had to have five stitches. Bastards!
Seriously though, back to that birdfeeder thing. Never have I felt such an urge to murder an animal as I feel it when I see a squirrel dangling from a birdfeeder - even the ANTI-SQUIRREL birdfeeders. They’re just that crafty. And crafty usually means evil; we all know that. I will even admit that I have broken the law in the past because of squirrels, when I used my ex’s pellet pistol within city limits to shoot squirrels down from our birdfeeder.
I never killed one but there is only one reason for that and it’s that I wasn’t strong enough to pump the pellet gun enough times for killing velocity after factoring in the distance from my window to the target. All I could get was about five pumps in that thing, only enough to stun the little fuckers.
Another good reason to concur that squirrels are assholes is that dogs believe it with all their hearts. Maggie is on a personal Vision Quest to eat a squirrel; the only thing holding her back is the pane of glass between her and the front yard. The squirrels don’t come into our back yard so maybe they’re smarter than they look. Smarter than possums, for sure. Sunny, the laziest dog on earth, will pursue a squirrel and I’m telling you, THAT SAYS SOMETHING.
I think this is such an open-and-shut case of Assholedom that there’s really just not much more I can say about it, except that squirrels are such assholes that they even hate each other. I have supportive evidence from the internet:
(Seriously, that video contains some of the freakiest shit I’ve ever seen. The way that one little asshole “walks” on his hind legs while chirping freaks me out!)
I feel this post was unfair to rats in the comparison, as rats are both cleaner in their personal grooming habits and MUCH smarter than squirrels. (Did you know they don’t remember where they bury their nuts and just rely on a general supply of surprise nuts in the ground due to the larger population of brain-dead squirrels? Truth.) You can’t even use the “plaguebearer” tag to give it to the squirrels, since they carry plague too.
It may please you to know that Kang has killed five of them so far. Your squirrels may be smart enough not to venture into the back yard, but ours sure as hell aren’t.
August 25th, 2008 at 5:45 pmSquirrels rule! Dogs drool!
August 25th, 2008 at 5:45 pmJust for you, Rachel. If I knew how to embed it I would.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6CFaUlPHSY4
August 25th, 2008 at 5:48 pmIf y’all can’t shoot ‘em, then use ‘em for entertainment via the ‘Squirrel Catapult’!
http://www.killsometime.com/video/video.asp?ID=870
jhans
August 25th, 2008 at 5:50 pmBoerne, TX
Some differences between squirrels and possums:
1. Squirrels taunt the living hell out of anything, especially dogs. Possums pretty much prefer to run away.
August 25th, 2008 at 6:01 pm2. Squirrels often carry nifty diseases like plague. Possums are plague-free because of their lower body temperature.
3. Squirrels raid your garden, bird feeder, and trees. Possums eat snails and cutworms.
4. Squirrels are mistaken as cute by little girls. Possums… not so much.
Well - you finally did it! I don’t get many laughs these days and I just can’t stop after the squirrel thing. $20.00 hit your paypal account already. THANKS!!!
August 25th, 2008 at 6:01 pmThe scary thing is, I know people JUST like those squirrels in the video. Enough seeds lying around for both of them to have more than their fill, but they prefer arguing and fighting over just enjoying the feast…
August 25th, 2008 at 6:03 pmSquirrels learn early on how to taunt dogs. Just ask mine.
Squirrels are especially fond of patio furniture cushions. Ask me how I know.
Many years ago our dog Sheba was busily licking an object between her paws while lounging on the couch. The length of time she had been doing this caught my attention. It was a squirrel head.
After flipping out and yelling for my husband to do something with the head, I calmed down and things returned to normal in the household for a few minutes. Then this thought occurred to me: Now just where might the rest of that squirrel be?
The muddy carcass was on our bedroom floor. (I feel fortunate that it wasn’t on the bed.) There was dirt everywhere. We’ll never know if Sheba actually caught the thing or if it just keeled over while in the yard.
August 25th, 2008 at 6:05 pmTotally made me laugh.
Oh GOD do I hate squirrels. HATE HATE HATE.
I’m here to tell the world that they absolutely DO eat houses. They’re eating ours. HUGE trim pieces, insulation, lead boots on the roof. They’ve eaten wiring in the cars (making actual NESTS in the engine compartments; and FYI, baby squirrels are UGLY! UGLY! UGLY!).
They taunt Dogliness, too.
The other day 14 of them PARADED in a line on the driveway while flipping me off. The little shits. They’re UGLY. And useless.
When my Mom was 9 she tried to BEFRIEND one and it latched onto her finger and wouldn’t let go. The adults had to grab her arm as she screamed and screamed. They actually had to FLAIL the little fuckhead to death while it was still attached to her finger. It would NOT let go. It was a jihad squirrel. Left a scar on her hand.
I’ve been to all the anti-squirrel websites seeking eradication methods, er I mean group hugs. I HATE SQUIRRELS SO MUCH. Now I know I’m not alone. Thank you Rachel, for letting me vent. I hope someone tells us to get a grip.
Oh. I watched the video you posted and was seriously bummed at the end — they didn’t kill each other! I mean, what kinda SHIT-ASS ending was that??? Fuck!
August 25th, 2008 at 6:07 pmSquirrels are nothing but rats with fluffy tails and good PR.
August 25th, 2008 at 6:16 pmUh…uh…how could you SAY that about squirrels? There’s a squirrel I regularly see around my workplace who I’ve named Mr. Fluffytail, and let me tell you, Ms Lucas, just because squirrels don’t like you doesn’t give you the right to call them assholes.
And my stepdaughters from my previous marriage kept rats as pets. Much more of this abuse of rodents and I might have to stop visiting your site. Not that YOU’D care.
I agree with you about Obama, though. He’s a total asshole.
August 25th, 2008 at 6:19 pmI’m going to be contrary and say that I actually don’t loathe squirrels. More specifically our squirrels.
They leave my dogs alone and chase the neighborhood cats away, which pleases me. I hate cats more than squirrels - so I find them tolerable. Could be just the squirrels that live around here though.
I’d probably hate them too if they were eating my house and tormenting my dogs though, so I get the squirrel hate.
August 25th, 2008 at 6:21 pmThose video squirrels have ADD. The fight isn’t enough to hold their attention, so they EAT between rounds.
August 25th, 2008 at 6:29 pmSquirrels are just rats with good PR.
August 25th, 2008 at 6:30 pmI love squirrels. Or, more accurately, I acknowledge that they are good for something: In terms of sheer poundage consumed, I’ve eaten more squirrel meat than venison in my life.
Give yourself a challenge. Get a blowgun and/or a Wrist Rocket and do a Google search for squirrel recipes.
August 25th, 2008 at 6:50 pmOh yes, squirrels are malevolent. Picture a little family having dinner together; suddenly their attention is drawn by movement outside the window–Oh, a squirrel! On top of the screen enclosure over the pool! One of God’s little creatures going about his day…but wait—God’s little creature is looking intently, fixedly, hatefully at the little family. And what is Squirrel Nutkins doing now? Why, look, a stream of yellow piss is descending from said crappin’ little bastard, 15 feet into the pool below. On and on it goes. Tinkle, tinkle, tinkle. Piss, piss, piss. The demonic grin on that rodent you would not believe. The only thing missing was the double-barreled flip off. Hate: It’s a two-way street.
August 25th, 2008 at 6:54 pmWe, too, are victims of the insidious squirrel invasion. Do not let down your guards, my friends, for they watch. They wait. They torture my dogs by getting up on our newly topped trees and heckling them. So I do my own version of waterboarding. Those hose sprayers kind of make you feel like you’re in the Old West, if you know what I mean…heh heh heh…
August 25th, 2008 at 6:58 pmNow Rachel, I know this is a dog blog, but let me ask you to make a little room in your heart for my now-deceased cat Casey. Here’s my rationale:
Growing up in Minnesota, I vividly remember on multiple occasions opening the front door and finding a pair of hind legs that belonged to an ex-squirrel on our welcome mat. This would happen pretty regularly as our yard was blessed with towering oaks which served as squirrel central year after year.
It was kinda gory in a way, but it was also pretty cool how Casey just wanted to share his bounty of a-hole squirrel meat with the rest of us.
Casey + squirrel = good times. R.I.P. buddy.
August 25th, 2008 at 7:05 pmAs my friend Gradual Dazzle has repeatedly pointed out: Skwerls are evil.
August 25th, 2008 at 7:10 pmMy house is made out of aluminum, so it’s not getting eaten. But they do taunt my fat retarded cat.
PatHMV already pointed out what I was going to.
evvybuns’s story is gross.
dogette made me LOL
My neighbor parked his car too close to the tree last winter, and the ENTIRE engine compartment was filled with nesting material. He didn’t say anything about finding babies, so apparently they trashed the car (ate enough electrical wires that the mechanic couldn’t get it back together, and had to sell the van) and then just left. ASSHOLES!
I think some birds in the back yard are on my side though. I found a demolished scuirrel nest below a tree. Every couple of minutes another twig would come down. It was beautiful.
August 25th, 2008 at 7:13 pmSquirrels will also eat their own. I’ve seen a stretch of highway up by the Utah-Wyoming border that was always full of flat squirrels; every time one got hit, two or three would run out and start eating it, which got interesting when another car would come by. Those little bastards used to chow down on each other all the time.
August 25th, 2008 at 7:15 pmThis is the classic squirrel catapult video that made the email rounds several years ago, complete with evil laughter.
August 25th, 2008 at 7:21 pmNot only are squirrels assholes, they can be dangerous assholes. I once come about two feet from being killed by a squirrel.
I was out backpacking with my dad when I was about twelve when we started hearing stuff falling through the branches and thudding onto the ground. We found out it was squirrels dropping pine cones when one missed my head by about two feet.
Have you ever seen how big a pine cone can get? Especially on an old grouth fir tree? They can be almost a foot long and when they are still green they weigh about 2-3 pounds. Now imagine if one of those suckers landed on your head from over a hundred feet. It could kill you.
So yes, I agree. Squirrels are assholes. Assholes with devious and maliciuos intent.
August 25th, 2008 at 7:21 pmThe Squirrels’ Motto: “Live fast. Die young. And leave a flat patch of fur on the highway.”
August 25th, 2008 at 7:38 pmSquirrels are rats with tails. Evil rats with tails. Very, very tasty evil rats wiht tails.
August 25th, 2008 at 7:43 pmI’m surprised no one has yet linked to the story about the demonic squirrel who almost killed a motorcyclist and possibly some police officers.
It is one of the very few things in my jaded decades on the internet that still causes me to laugh out loud and possibly snort a carbonated beverage.
It’s also evidence that supports your thesis.
Sig
August 25th, 2008 at 7:45 pmAn oldie but a goodie….
Rats. With fuzzy tails, better agents, bigger egos, and bad attittudes.
Skwirlz r evil. The proper way to deal with a skwirl is a .22 or a 12ga. After being properly dealt with, they can be skinned and cooked, if you really need the protein. Skwirl does NOT taste like chicken. Skwirl tastes like rat.
You do not want to know how I know that.
August 25th, 2008 at 7:48 pmMy girl dog Trixie hates hates hates squirells. She practically dragged my wife down the street one time in pursuit of one of the evil little bastards.
(Speaking of Trixie, when the picture going to be published? Nudge nudge wink wink.)
August 25th, 2008 at 7:50 pmI hate the damn tree rats. I just had my entire roof replaced, repaired all the places they chewed into the attic and the electrical wiring they chewed the insulation from. And they’re trying to get in again.
I just got some .22 Colibri ammo for my revolver - it’s a .22 Long Rifle with no powder, just the primer. Short range and almost as quiet as a pellet gun. Haven’t seen a damn one of the things in the back yard since I got the stuff. They’re all hanging out in the front where I can’t shoot at them.
My mom has been battling them for years at her place; most years she doesn’t get any harvest from her walnut trees at all because what they don’t knock down before they are ripe, they destroy. She catches them in a Hav-a-hart trap… and then drops it in the rain barrel.
August 25th, 2008 at 8:11 pmI had blocked these incidents from my memory.
A few years ago, we discovered that squirrels were chewing through the wiring of our outside Christmas lights. Too bad the goddam things didn’t do this when they were lit. ZZZZZst!
One of my joys in life is reading under a large tree on a lounge on our back patio. What in the world would motivate a creature to chew twigs and allow them to drop on me? A vereh dee-mented creechah!
August 25th, 2008 at 8:16 pmFound somewhere (Don’t have anything in your mouth)
August 25th, 2008 at 8:32 pmMom and son make squirrel melts
August 25th, 2008 at 8:56 pmDie, bastard, die! Eat fur and choke! Take that tail and shove it straight up your - ooh, sunflower seeds!
August 25th, 2008 at 9:24 pm(Trackback)
Rachl Lukis Hates Skwerls Too…
August 25th, 2008 at 9:25 pmIt is all I can do to be civil to people who say such stupid things as “I want to move to a house away from the city. Then we can put out feeders and feed the squirrels! They’re sooooo cute.”
OMG - I want to shake them until their teeth rattle. Yes, they are rats with big furry tails. Not the domesticated variety, but the city sewer variety rats that you see in dumpsters.
They ate the vinyl siding on my FIL’s house, they would sit up in our trees back when we were in the Chicago area and throw nuts and twigs at us. One got in our house (the evening before Thanksgiving!!!) and tore up an entire room where we had him trapped before we could get him.
I hate them - they are loathsome creatures. My motto - death to squirrels.
And to anyone who thinks they are cute… go right ahead and feed them. Try to make them into “pets” - see what happens. I’ll just watch and laugh at you as they start destroying your place. heh.
August 25th, 2008 at 9:37 pmAS regards the furry little thieves and bird feeders; try a feeder called the Yankee Flipper; the rail the squirrels have to hold onto to get to the seed is motorized and revolves quite quickly when anything heavier than a bird rests on it.
They have a wonderful promo video, but I’ve only ever seen it on video tape in pet and birdwatching stores.
August 25th, 2008 at 9:39 pmReminds me of a ‘just desserts’ story. While waiting for the school bus one morning, we heard a large BANG and everybody ducked instinctively. No shrapnel, fire, etc WTF????? Shortly thereafter, a power company truck comes rolling up, and extends the cherry picker up to a nearby transformer. A squirrel had gotten across 14Kv and failed. Large. They flicked his lifeless, stiff carcass off the transformer and it fell to earth. If there had been a cartoon sound effect when it hit the pavement, it would have been like a coin on a coffee table. Every hair was standing staight out, just like the tail, all 4 legs, and each toenail. PFVVVVT! *flick* k’dink, k’dink, k’dink, sprawwwwwwwl, clink.
August 25th, 2008 at 9:39 pmMy parents once owned a house that backed onto a small forest full of squirrels. They also had a Manchester terrier, somewhat advanced in years. The squirrels had worked out just exactly how fast the dog was, and they would run away just fast enough to stay out of reach.
August 25th, 2008 at 9:49 pmOne day, the dog died. My parents liked the breed, so bought a pup. And one day, the pup spotted the squirrels, instantly recognizing them for the degenerates they were. Dad opened the door, and the squirrels began to saunter off at the leisurely pace to which they had become accustomed. Then, as the dog suddenly began to close the gap, they had to kick in the afterburners.
Alas, they did get away. Still, a good time was had by all, as we watched them scatter in a blind panic.
We don’t have a squirrel problem ours is a chipmunk problem. Waterboarding is exactly how we heard you should solve it, a five gallon bucket half full of water and a board. Just add birdseed. You will probably need a bigger container for squirrels though.
Not that I would do anything like that.
August 25th, 2008 at 10:01 pmOh, by the way 7.
August 25th, 2008 at 10:02 pmGuys—
Electric. pet. fence.
FFFFIIIIZZZZZTTTTT, POP!
End of squirrel problem.
You can use those little yellow insulators and put the fence ANYWHERE.
You’re welcome.
August 25th, 2008 at 10:15 pmHubby hunts squirrels. Tasty with some barbeque sauce. (The squirrels, not the hubby.)
My inlaws’ electric fence went out one day. While they were investigating, they discovered a squirrel hanging from the fence with the fence wire between his jaws. Tough way to go.
August 25th, 2008 at 10:16 pmThe Yankee Flipper is an awesome feeder.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bv9wTYMw5iA
Little bastards can’t hang on to the thing. I’ve seen footage of one of these feeders actually flinging squirrels into the surrounding shrubbery.
I also used to covet a bird feeder that delivered mild shocks to squirrels, which I find even more hilarious than the Flipper. Can’t find the thing any more, though.
August 25th, 2008 at 10:24 pmMy only question: does the Yankee Flipper make teh evil squirrels dizzy? ‘Cuz if it does, the Big Dog may stand a chance at running one of ‘em down.
August 25th, 2008 at 10:58 pmI used to think squirrels were cute. And then this year I planted a garden for the first time. I dreamed all spring of red, vine ripe tomatoes. Weeks passed and just a few tomatoes were starting to turn yellow, just ready to turn red. I plotted their progress daily. Then one day, the biggest, the most almost ripe tomato went missing. The next day, another one.
It’s the squirrels. They are eating my tomatoes. I have had to resort to picking them while they are still mostly green in order to get any tomatoes at all. They are still tasty, but I have been livid over the loss of my dream.
Based on knowledge gleaned from these comments, though, next year, I’m getting me an electric fence. That’ll fix the little monsters.
August 25th, 2008 at 11:02 pmWe don’t have squirrels in New Zealand, so the first time I saw them I was quite enchanted. We were filming in New Hampshire and I squeaked excitedly to the cameraman ‘Look! Cat! Dog! Rabbit! I mean squirrel.Film. Quick!’
4,567 squirrels later the novelty had worn off.
August 25th, 2008 at 11:08 pmNow, I love to watch crows and ravens. I understand many hate crows for their noisy habits and roosting. Why, even in the middle of Los Angeles, we had enormous murders of crows, roosting in big eucalyptus trees, that made a huge ruckus before settling in for the night.
But even crows hate squirrels. I see them hassling squirrels in the neighborhood, pouncing around the insolent rodents, fighting over some prize or another. They find them aggravating in the extreme. Even the black birds whom some consider Harbingers of Death hate squirrels.
August 25th, 2008 at 11:21 pmA few years ago, when we moved to the country, one of the older dogs caught and killed a squirrel. Then the puppies got at it, and ran around the yard treating it like some meaty stuffed toy until I could catch them. It took a while (hey, it’s a big yard). I think the other squirrels were watching.
Since then, no squirrel has been seen within the fence line. Maybe putting their tiny little heads on pikes would have an equally deterrent effect.
August 25th, 2008 at 11:35 pmI had the greatest squirrel your dead and fucked moment while on the grenade range up here in Canada….Calgary to be exact.
August 26th, 2008 at 12:33 amThe newbie I was instructing in the fine arts of throwing a M-40 grenade. Let the bad ass go in a big ark almost to the center of the tires that littered the range that acted as an aiming point as well as something to absorb the blast. When a ground squirrel ran out of it’s hole to chase the grenade in to the tire the cocky bastard had just thrown into.
Well, long story short the last thing that went through that little grass eating shit was his mind.
You know who are assholes?
Google are assholes, that’s who!
Have you done a Google search today?
Have you tried in vain to make it stop doing that?
Oh well, at least I have a cure (for now):
http://gullyborg.typepad.com/weblog_archive/2008/08/i-hate-google.html
August 26th, 2008 at 1:28 amIf you want to work on your aim and solve your squirrel problem, Remington makes a nice .22 subsonic load that barely makes any noise.
Or you can just use snake shot and turn your .22 into a mini-shotgun.
You people down in Texas are basically born with firearms right? A .22 is kinda like a household appliance for you.
You could make a mini coonskin-like cap out of their fur and parade your dogs around wearing it.
August 26th, 2008 at 1:47 amI thought squirrels were cute, too, until I saw one up close.
My dog Sam hated squirrels. My yard was completely fenced in with stockade fence on three sides. Weirdly enough, the fences belonged to the neighbors on those three sides. When I moved in I had to have the front fenced to close the yard off for Sam. (I often wondered how bad the previous owners must have been to make all three neighbors decide to fence their yards.)
Anyway, the squirrels would run along the upper railings, which were on the neighbors sides, and stop sometimes and just sit there. Mocking Sam, basically. He’d bark and jump up, they’d move on down a little and stop again, he’d bark and jump up at them again. It was like a game they played.
Well, one day I hear Sam go absolutely ape shit ballistic. This was no ordinary Sam bark. There was something REALLY wrong going on back there.
So I go outside and what to I see? A squirrel stuck between two pickets of the stockade fence. You know how they come to a point at the tops? Well this asshole squirrel managed to get himself wedged between two of them. His ass tail end was on my side of the fence and all I could see was it’s big bushy tail and little tiny legs flailing about. It was screaming this ungodly scream that you only hear in bad horror movies.
Now, I still think squirrels are cute, mind you, so I decide I need to rescue this poor guy. So I grabbed one of my garden gloves (I’m not stupid, there was NO WAY I was gonna touch the damn thing). I get my hand up under the little guys flailing feet and tail and pushed up. He was wedged in there pretty good.
That’s when I got a really good look at it’s feet. Yikes! This squirrel had claws on it that were at least an inch long and were sharp as needles. I couldn’t see his front paws, but his hind paws looked like Freddy Krueger’s mutant twin.
The squirrel is still screaming. Sam is still going ape shit ballistic, and all I’ve got is a pair of thin cloth garden gloves between me and razor blades.
With one hand I sorta pulled the picket apart, and with the other I pushed up on the squirrel, and it shot off like a rocket.
Sam and I both ran in the house and closed the sliders as fast as we could. Whew.
August 26th, 2008 at 2:02 amMy parents’ dog, Rusty (part German Shepherd, part mutt) used to chase squirrels because those evil little assholes came and taunted him in his own yard. One day a few years ago, he actually caught one of the furry little bastards. My sister saw him tossing something furry into the air in the backyard and assumed that Rusty was playing with a mouse corpse that the cat had left behind as a trophy. It was a squirrel - a squirrel that was still alive. He had maimed it pretty badly, and my mother and sister finally were able to put the squirrel out of its misery. The squirrels now stay clear of my parents’ yard.
Conversely, we have a slightly crazy old lady who lives two doors down from us, who leaves Costco bags of peanuts out for the effin’ squirrels. The squirrels seem to think our yard is the perfect place to bury their ill-gotten gain. Assholes. We SO need a dog.
August 26th, 2008 at 2:34 amSqueaky squirrels on the deck. Weak beer,
Michele: wake up, wake up, Allen I heard something downstairs on the deck.
clomp, clomp down the stairs, snick… open the door. Oh crap bears.
August 26th, 2008 at 3:20 amBeeman R-1 with a 6-18 variable scope!
August 26th, 2008 at 3:59 amI may be the only person on here who doesn’t hate squirrels. I understand WHY people do, but they honestly never exhibited most of this behavior to me. But then again, that may be because I grew up out in the middle of swamp country and there were thousands of excellent squirrel homes, so they didn’t feel the need to invade the house.
Our squirrels (Fox Squirrels?) were MUCH bigger than the ones in the video, much longer tails. When I was young, there was one who was tame enough you could hand feed him corn, but I learned real fast you did not try to pick him up. Bloodshed would ensue, and absolutely no sympathy from my Mom.
Speaking of which, I think you would die at my Mom’s house. She has half a dozen squirrel feeders, and three cats. She has names for about ten of the several dozen that hang out back there. She also has about half a dozen bird feeders, which the squirrels don’t bother. (Blackbirds, on the other hand, are like avian locusts from hell).
You’ll take pleasure from one thing. Her oldest tom, a seal-point siamese named scooter, has made a specialty of hunting, killing and eating squirrels. They don’t taunt her cats; they disappear when they’re around.
August 26th, 2008 at 6:35 amI haven’t put bird feeders up at my house yet because I’m not sure I want to attract squirrels. My parents had feeders for years before they finally found one t keep the squirrels off. It’s run on batteries or something and if you were to touch two of the little perches at the same time it would shock you. I’m sad to report no one ever saw a single squirrel on that feeder ever. I don’t know if they could sense the shockiness or if they actually got on it, got shocked and we just were unlucky enough to miss it, but it was the only thing I’ve ever seen work.
August 26th, 2008 at 6:53 amSomeday I’ll be comment #1, but I’m late today…
Squirrels ARE assholes. There is NO way to deal with them except death. I had squirrels eat a hole through the side of my house and move into my attic. Nothing I did got rid of them. I patched the hole, they ate through it again. Eventually, I put some huge rat traps next to the hole. I killed 2-3 of them and the rest learned to avoid the traps. I shot a few with my pellet gun when they’d go outside. They multiply like rabbits. Finally, fearing complaint from neighbors, I took the glass out of my front door, sat in my living room for over 48 hours and picked the remainder off one at a time from inside the house. Squirrels truly are assholes, but there are 15 less of these dead assholes and when I repaired my house the third time, they never came back. They couldn’t. They were dead. I have every intention of continuing my quest to eliminate these demonic creatures from the planet, not that I ever will, but I’ll enjoy giving it a good try. Remember, if they ever infest YOUR house, the only solution is that somebody has to die, either you or the squirrels. I hate these little bastards.
August 26th, 2008 at 7:28 amMan can I tell some squirrel killin’ stories, but you probably don’t want to hear about how to finish off a mostly dead squirrel without wasting a bullet.
I don’t know how many of those little @$$holes I’ve personally dispatched. I used to have a hound dog named Xerox, because he copied everything the little mutt did. The little mutt we had was gun-shy. That’s the only behavior that Xerox didn’t copy.
Xerox was the BEST squirrel dog ever. He’d hit a tree and follow the squirrel as it ran and jumped to other trees. I’d blast the little limb-rat and put him in the sack. When I had a sac full or it got close to dark, we’d head home and the fun would start.
As I skinned the little suckers, Xerox would wait by my feet and I’d throw him the extraneous bits. He’d swallow the organs whole and crunch the skulls and feet like potato chips. Sadly, Xerox also liked to chase cars.
Just for clarification, Xerox didn’t climb the tree to follow the squirrels. He was good, but not THAT good.
August 26th, 2008 at 7:47 amoh fuck, that motorcycle story is HILARIOUS! “don’t have anything in your mouth” is right! That’s some scary shit! I hope the guy got plague shots after that encounter.
August 26th, 2008 at 7:49 amWe had squirrels in the attic of our first apartment. Nothing worked. Eventually we were the ones who moved. My wife, who is wise, had to stop me from going up there with a bat and a flashlight and doing battle personally.
August 26th, 2008 at 8:06 amI really want to find a pellet gun that is quiet enough for city-limit use and is still lethal. I have more than one species I’d like to get out of my yard: squirrels (of course), grackles (they are not around very often), hmmm… what else… probably bluejays (they’re messy and wasteful with the birdseed but so pretty!), I guess that’s all, only because there aren’t any magpies here. God I hate those fucking magpies.
August 26th, 2008 at 8:26 ammaya, check out the Gamo Whisper. It has a built in noise suppressor (yes, it’s legal). http://www.gamowhisper.com/ - you can also find some utube vids to get an idea what it sounds like, and there are a few folks out there who can tune the action on them to make them even quieter (check some of the air rile boards).
August 26th, 2008 at 8:48 amLate to the party again, I can only concur with the asshole designation, with one addition: ground squirrels. (Or as they’re variously referred to around our house: giant squirrels, fat bastards, woodchucks, wombats, chupacabras).
They dig holes in the lawn you could drop a cannonball down. They excavate their way under sheds and gnaw on floor beams like hairy 30-pound termites. And they mock…oh, how those fat assholes mock.
Interesting fact about them, tho, their night vision isn’t worth shit. If you’re wearing rubber-soled shoes and they’re anywhere near a sidewalk at night, you can walk right up to them, grab them by the scruff of the neck, and toss them over the fence. It won’t keep them out forever but eventually they seem to take the hint.
August 26th, 2008 at 8:50 am” never killed one but there is only one reason for that and it’s that I wasn’t strong enough to pump the pellet gun enough times for killing velocity after factoring in the distance from my window to the target. All I could get was about five pumps in that thing, only enough to stun the little fuckers. ”
a wrist rocket,firing .44 caliber lead balls,works GREAT against the little fucks
August 26th, 2008 at 8:55 amAbout 1 minute after I took these pictures of a squirrel pilfering from my bird feeder, I put a Chinese pellet into his belly.
I haven’t seen him since.
August 26th, 2008 at 9:12 amPlus, per Bore Patch, they sometimes knock out TV and radio for an entire fucking country. Evil!!
August 26th, 2008 at 9:18 amHey, Rachel, Squirrels do have their good points. They’re a preferred item on the menus of the red tailed hawks & bald eagles that cruise the friendly skies here in central FL. (Sort of an avian Happy Meal.) P.S. Looking forward to a post attacking those [bleeping] raccoons.
August 26th, 2008 at 9:21 amCheck out these assholes (the Nature Conservancy people, not the dragons).
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121963304805268235.html?mod=fpa_mostpop
August 26th, 2008 at 9:32 amMaybe solution/question for people about squirrels and bird feeders. I’ve heard birds don’t have the same or any taste buds as mammals. Is that true? If it is then I do have a possible solution to deter the squirrels. Mix in some Cayan pepper or other hot spice into your bird feed. Make the fluffy-tailed fuckers pay for their insolence.
August 26th, 2008 at 9:55 amI used to have a picture given to me by one of the utility guys of a squirrel who had tried to get only a power line by bridging the insulator. Hind feet on the grounded pole, fore feet on the live wire. Result? Cooked squirrel.
Same utility guy talks about a trial run they did of a cage-like device designed to keep the squirrels off the insulators. When they came back later, the squirrels had used it for nut storage and the cage was full. Major fail.
At the local university, a squirrel jumped into a transformer and shut off power to a large section of campus which shut down an experiment some researcher was running. They hadn’t made cooling provision for a prolonged power outage and the experiment caught fire. The entire building was evacuated and then contaminated with toxic smoke. It couldn’t be re-occupied for months.
August 26th, 2008 at 10:15 amAnd, boy, can the little assholes adapt!
http://mirisdad.blogspot.com/2007/10/think-you-have-problems-with-squirrels.html
August 26th, 2008 at 10:17 amAll this lovin makes me want a pellet gun of my own. Or to at least buy Wachel one.
August 26th, 2008 at 10:19 amAh, squirrel, the other (pick your color) meat. When I was a kid I used to go to the dump (back then our small town [population 350] had an open dump) and target practice. One day I saw a squirrel in a tree and decided to shoot it so I plinked away. The squirrel just looked at me and stayed put. I shot again, no reaction. This was beginning to bother me. Here was a squirrel within about 50 feet and I was shooting a .22 which I did fairly well and I was not getting anywhere. I had me a good rifle, it was a Marlin model 60 that I bought out of the Sears catalog (yeah, it came mail-order and yes that was a few years ago) and I was a decent shot and this was really beginning to irritate me big time. The squirrel just sat there not reacting while I kept shooting at it.
August 26th, 2008 at 10:22 amAfter I went through about a half a box of ammo I approached the tree and threw some rocks and the damned squirrel paid no attention to the rock throwing either. Now I’m seriously pissed. It’s bad enough the tree rat ignored my shooting, which for some reason didn’t seem to faze it, but now he was ignoring rocks whizzing right by him. I finally scored a direct hit on his head and he slumped to the side but didn’t fall out of the tree. I got a stick and whacked him like a pinata until he fell free. The bastard had dozens of holes in him, he was probably dead from the first shot and just had a death grip on the limb he was on. Damned squirrels.
Should have gone for headshot. you probably would have seen the head move and know you pegged him.
August 26th, 2008 at 10:32 amSquirrels have been known to maliciously run cars off the road. Haven’t you see the GEICO commercial?
August 26th, 2008 at 10:54 amI’ll bet you don’t enjoy that scene in “Christmas Vacation” when the squirrel gets loose and jumps on the guests, do you? Freaky business.
They’re fun if their claws and teeth are removed, though. Lots of fun.
August 26th, 2008 at 11:11 amOne of my uncles was bitten by a squirrel that was acting rabid when he was a kid. Turns out it was not, but he had to do the shots anyway. This was back in the old days when it meant 21 shots to the stomach. The pain was excruciating, and he hated squirrels from that point on. He even had a suppressor built for one of his .22s so that he could shot them quietly and not annoy the neighbors. He had a couple of them stuffed, my favorite kinda looked like the ones in the video, it was up on it’s hind legs with claws extended, moth open, and the tail was all bushy. I hope one of my cousins has it and they didn’t just throw it out when he passed away.
I used to think he was just weird till the squirrels, perhaps knowing I was related to Killer Of Squirrels, decided that my phone line was the tastiest thing in the world and made it their mission to eat it. For like six months the squirrels would chew on my phone line and cause all kinds of problems. The phone company hated me. It ended when I bought a crossbow and started shooting the squirrels. I shot pencils at them as the pencil would break on impact, and the impact would knock them off the line or out of the tree and into the backyard of the people behind me who had a pit bull that loved eating squrrels. No dart left behind as evidence, or to injure the dog. Win-win.
We have a damn family of squirrels that recently moved into the eaves of the house I’m in now. Little beady eyed guys barked at me this morning on the way to work, hanging upside down out of a hole in the eaves. That was the last straw. Roommate be damned, tonight? Tonight the little suckers die. I have a pellet rifle and I know how to use it. The only problem is that the hole is on the front of the house, and in plain view of several neighbors. Oh well, they all think I’m weird anyway.
August 26th, 2008 at 11:23 amPreach on, Kindred Spirit.
Yea, verily, we shall mount as an avenging force against this vile army of evil and filth, banishing them from our land with the help of comrades Daisy and Colt, perhaps even brothers Bushmaster or Glock.
Yeah. I hate squirrels, too.
August 26th, 2008 at 11:45 amWith numerous dogs and cats that roam the street I live on, there is no squirrel problem. I hardly ever see one. The few that are around there stay away from the houses, so they’re just cute to look at from a distance for us.
Jan - Have you actually seen the squirrels eating your tomatoes, or is that just the conclusion you came to? I ask because I’ve never heard of squirrels eating tomatoes, but deer certainly will. I went a whole summer without getting a single tomato because of the deer eating them. From FOUR tomato plants! Not sure what you could do if it IS squirrels, though, except to hide somewhere with a pellet gun.
August 26th, 2008 at 11:48 amfargus:
Thanks a TON, man! That site is awesome!!
August 26th, 2008 at 12:28 pmAs an unsuspecting camper once, I slept under what turned out to be a squirrel tree. Did you know that they wake up VERY early and don’t like people sleeping under their tree? They tell you so too, loudly, and with throwing of nuts & pee.
Despite that, I think it’s pretty funny to watch them fly through the air to get the bird feeders, and my husband feeds them ON PURPOSE, even looking for special food that they like. As if they were picky or something?!?
August 26th, 2008 at 12:37 pmSkwirlz have eaten my tomatoes. They’ve also eaten my apples and pears and bird seed and squash and beans. The only solution that worked was leaving the dog in the yard. He was quiet and stealthy, a fantastic bird dog, and he hated skwirlz with a passion. Or did he love them? You decide.
He would sneak up on them from a full lock-point in the most awesome slow-mo creep you’ve ever seen, taking ten or fifteen minutes to cover a few feet. The skwirlz would keep a wary eye on him, but since he always looked immobile at a glance they would soon begin to ignore him in their taunting little way, even get in his face to tease him. But when he reached striking distance or one stepped in just a hair too close in taunting, he would grab them in a flash and break their silly necks and gut them in a heartbeat. After a while all but the very tops of our trees were skwirl-free.
When we were out in the field and he encountered a skwirl in a tree, he would stop and look back at me. If I shook my head no, he would leave it and go back to looking for birdz. If I said “Good boy!” he would follow the skwirl until I could shoot it, then he’d fetch it up. If it was still alive he would break its neck before bringing it back to me. Yes, you can eat skwirlz, but IMHO they’re entirely too much damn effort for the mediocre meat involved. I always gave mine to an elderly neighbor who loved them but had gotten too old to get out in the field anymore. In return he gave me walleye fillets. I though I got much the better of that deal.
The dog hated rats too. When we ran across one in the field he would run it down fast and give it the yard-skwirl treatment. Snatch, snap, disembowel. Elapsed time maybe a second or so–he had the method down cold. He didn’t fetch those back to me, just dropped them and kept going. Smart dog. Good dog!
Damn, but I miss him.
August 26th, 2008 at 12:43 pmWhen I was a wee lad, my family lived on base at Fort Belvoir, VA. Since our backyard wasn’t fenced, we chained our dog (a cocker spaniel-poodle mix…yes, he was a Cock-a-poo) when we let him out. Well, apparently, the squirrels determined how much play the chain gave poor little Butterscotch and would sit just outside of his range, taunting him mercilessly as he strained against the chain. My father, in his infinite wisdom, observed this taunting and decided to level the playing field. He took to moving the chain’s anchor point around the yard; Butterscotch killed two squirrels before the rest learned to leave well enough alone.
August 26th, 2008 at 12:50 pmCayenne pepper is good stuff! We had rats in our attic a few years ago. I found out where they were coming in and filled the hole with expanding foam stuff. The little shits ate the foam. When I refilled the hole I poured a ton of cayenne pepper in the foam and around the hole and all over the place. They left it alone.
Instead of hating squirrels for teasing my dog, I’m gonna be contrary and go the other direction. We used to have a dog that I detested, but my husband - who is so sweet and almost never asks for anything - adored her, so I was stuck with her. I would laugh my ass off when that old hound would try to catch a squirrel running across the yard. I loved it when critters teased that dog.
Yes, I am mean.
August 26th, 2008 at 1:06 pmI was having problems with these little shits eating my tomatoes. They’ve practically stripped the plants! So I set out some mole traps I had. You can see them here:
http://tinyurl.com/6ekam6
They are intended to go below ground, but I just set them on the ground with a brick on the back of them to hold them in place. I put a few peanuts in the shell out in front of the trap, put one just behind the kill wire, and one last one all the way at the back. That was the one that killed them. They go for that last nut, pushing against the trip wire to reach it. The trap snaps and the buggers die.
I put out two traps one morning, and when I came home a few hours later, both traps had squirrels. Since then, my tomatoes have been unmolested. Cool!
Mike
August 26th, 2008 at 1:09 pmPersonally, the creepy-crawly feeling I have for squirrels originates from my childhood.
Way back when the Sega Game Gear was still popular, Sega ran this one ad that freaked me the Hell out. It showed a fat kid (in black and white) playing a Nintendo Game Boy on a park bench on what was apparently a very hot day. In a desperate effort to see the game in color, he reaches down, picks up a DEAD SQUIRREL off the ground, and smacks himself over the head with it, causing his eyes to swim with bright colors. (No doubt he subsequently keeled over dead from a cerebral hemorrhage.)
The ad was supposed to advertise the fact that the Game Gear played colored games while the Game Boy did not (precisely what this added to the gaming experience I can’t say) but I couldn’t get the image of the dead, rigid, petrified squirrel out of my head for weeks.
August 26th, 2008 at 1:32 pmI totally agree, squirrels are assholes. They eat all the grapes on my vines! Still, when I’m out cycling and one darts in front of me, I swerve to miss it. I don’t want to hear its head cracking like a walnut.
Does that make me an asshole lover? haha
August 26th, 2008 at 1:34 pmI’m currently doing battle with one of the rats here in Phoenix. Its not the first time I’ve had to take a few of ‘em out. In MN, I had one chewing thru my fascia boards and nesting in my attic, just a few feet above my head. One morning, middle of Feb, it’s butt ass cold, I’m talking -15 F and I hear the thing out there chewing on the fascia board that i had just replaced that day. I get up, grab some ZipStrip (for stripping paint off my kitchen cabinets) and go out in my jammies, grab a ladder and coat about 15 feet of the fascia with this stuff. The next morning I saw this little f**ker up on my roof, growling at me and swaying. He had definitely eaten some of the stuff and by the time i got home from work, no more squirrel. A few years later I was having the same house reroofed, by this time an ALBINO squirrel had attempted to take up residence in the same location, chewing thru the same boards that I had replaced years prior. This time, I live trapped him using honey roasted peanuts as bait. Got him in 6 hours. Since I lived in the city limits my gun was off limits so I had to get creative, lets just say that he swims with the fishes. The very next year, I had 2 more of the friggin albinos in my neighborhood. My friends all teased me that they were the ghost of the one I got the year before coming back for revenge. These were smart enough to not try live in my house tho.
August 26th, 2008 at 1:43 pmNow in Phx, I’ve got one digging a damn tunnel under a rock feature next to my pool, flinging dirt in my pool every week or so, tried dumping poison in the hole and backfilling it, apparently didn’t get him. The next step is to sit in my bedroom with the patio door open and getting him with my pellet gun. Little bastard seems to be smart enough to dig when I’m at work. I’ll win eventually, be warned squirrel, I’ll win.
HATE those little fuckers!! Always digging holes in my lawn to bury whateverthehelltheycanfind! I need a pellet gun…
August 26th, 2008 at 1:43 pmHeh. Now there’s a banner ad for a squirrel feeder up there.
Irony. It’s what’s for dinner.
August 26th, 2008 at 1:49 pmNah, you need one of these.
Much more satisfying.
August 26th, 2008 at 1:53 pmFor mighty, with love!
That’s funny right there! I haven’t seen that in years! Thanks, mightysam — perfect lunch break material.
Personally, I’m quite fond of this squirrel ad!
August 26th, 2008 at 2:07 pmI can’t even imagine swerving for a squirrel.
Maya & Fargus:
Excellent site! Thank you. I must order one of those! I like where it says:
and especially
Heh!
1200 fps!!! OMG I’m so there.
August 26th, 2008 at 2:11 pmI can, dogette, if you are swerving FOR a squirrel : )
August 26th, 2008 at 2:14 pmmoar funny pictures
My father once told me “If everyone around you is an asshole…..then maybe it’s you.”
Pep
August 26th, 2008 at 2:40 pmI am dying at some of these stories. They are hilarious!!!
My old lady girl Quinn (rescued Siberian Husky who is too slow to hunt anymore) ran into the house one day with red just gushing from her nose. I started freaking out and hubby ran outside. He found a mostly dead squirrel. Quinn was SO proud and happy I could hardly slow her down to clean her nose wound (noses bleed a lot).
After that she killed another 6-7 squirrels and we rarely see them in the yard anymore. Though I know they are there…taunting her since she’s too old to hunt anymore. She was SO patient…she’d just lay there … stalking them … moving inch … by inch … by inch. Then WHAM! =) Beautiful. By the second one she’d stopped getting hurt in return.
August 26th, 2008 at 2:46 pmBe glad you didn’t catch the squirrel. They can be very dangerous.
August 26th, 2008 at 3:32 pmFor dogette, because girl, you’re just funny!
It’s raining assholes … on assholes!
August 26th, 2008 at 3:33 pmThose squirrels need Obama to solve their differences.
August 26th, 2008 at 3:37 pmI forgot to add this story.
In 1996, Hurricane Fran came through Raleigh and we lost a lot of trees. A LOT of trees. So one day at lunch, I’m reading the local lefty rag because it’s the only thing available. And yes, some moron over in Chapel Hill has actually got an ad in the community section promoting a “Squirrel Rescue Workshop” because of the devastating effects of the hurricane on the squirrel population.
August 26th, 2008 at 3:47 pmJust for the record, squirrels do not taste like chicken. They taste more like raccoon.
August 26th, 2008 at 3:47 pm14K: I love that last one especially.
August 26th, 2008 at 5:15 pmJust for the record, squirrels do not taste like chicken. They taste more like raccoon.
But they taste much more like rat than racoon. SRSLY.
August 26th, 2008 at 5:52 pmYou’re both wrong. They taste like spotted owl.
August 26th, 2008 at 7:48 pmI always hit squirlz; the sound as they dribble like little furry basketballs under the pickup is Good.
My dad had the squirrel tomato problem too; he had one tomato left, went out to get it for breakfast and it was gone. Goes out about an hour later, opens the car door, and the half eaten tomato bounces off the roof right in front of him…. That’s when the traps went out.
Fuzzy doesn’t like squirrels much; we had one in the front yard who knew I couldn’t get it with the truck, so it would sit there. That changed when I was bringing Fuzz back from the vet.
“Oh, sh*t, its equipped with a dog launcher!!!!!”
Fuzz then proceeded to prove that she who laughs last may not laugh the loudest…. cause her mouth is full of squirrel….
August 26th, 2008 at 8:32 pmI was going to recommend a Gamo in the 1200 fps range, but I didn’t know about the Whisper. Tell Rupert that is what you want for Christm… err, a Right Now Because I’m Rachel gift.
August 27th, 2008 at 10:24 amThe greatest thing about this post is the ad for airsoft guns.
We have open season on them because we have a pecan orchard and they obviously cut into our income from that. It’s more sporting to use a .22 but more satisfying to use a shotgun.
August 27th, 2008 at 11:37 amMike Huckabee said he once ate squirrel. At college. We smoked dope, mostly. But still, I’m not sure if I was attracted or repelled by the thought of eating.. squirrel. In the end, decided against voting for Huckabee.
August 27th, 2008 at 11:51 amSince I’m in the ‘urbs with no back fence, I stick to the garden hose with a needle sprayer; it will send water up 40+ feet, high enough for our tree. A wet squirrel is an unhappy squirrel. However they do spend the day at the bird feeder in revenge.
Options: Super Soaker squirt gun with ‘cat’ formula in it. That is about 5% white vinegar, 95% cold water. Works well on cats because they are driven to clean themselves (gag! Ack!) without causing permanent harm (remember, no fence, no private hunting preserve here). Also does the job for squirrels, but the vinegar does eventually mess up the seals in the gun so you need to replace it every few months.
August 27th, 2008 at 12:55 pmOkay, everybody keeps talking about eating squirrel.
You don’t eat tree rodents.
You eat squirrels that live in holes.
Like this one:
Eating tree rodents would be almost as disgusting as eating a magpie.
Just saying. I likes me some ground squirrel on occasion.
August 27th, 2008 at 1:29 pmhttp://www.byerly.org/intrest/hung_out_squirrel.jpg
August 27th, 2008 at 1:29 pmIn the video that you have up, it’s a chipmunk, not squirrel.
August 27th, 2008 at 2:11 pmSquirrels haven’t given anyone rabies since the 50’s and that was in Canada.
(I know this because I was bitten for the second time last month.)
The first time was when I was a little girl thinking “hey, free pet baby squirrel!”
They do carry plague, if you see a sick/dead one don’t go anywhere near it.
There are no shots for plague, but shot squirrels taste goooood.
OMG (and believe me, I never say that) you have to read this squirrel story. And it happens in TX, no less. (link munged a bit for safety)
h t t p : / / lifeisaroad.com/stories/2004/10/29/neighborhoodHazardorWhyTheCopsWontPatrolBriceStreet.html
Don’t mess with Texas (squirrels)
August 27th, 2008 at 9:39 pmJust had an epiphany, I think: has anyone else noticed the strong resemblence between Hillary and an especially smug squirrel?
August 28th, 2008 at 6:03 amGROUND squirrels are tough too.. (or at least stupid)
August 29th, 2008 at 1:51 amhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wEoEINTJEh4
Squirrels. I have heard such creatures, but I am sure that what you have here is the bushy-tailed tree-rat.
August 30th, 2008 at 9:15 pmMy folks in Houston have been plagued with the little rat b*****ds for years. The huge pecan tree in the backyard certainly doesn’t help. The squirrels sharpen their teeth on its limbs, and this has the predictable effect of dropping them into the yard. My dad finally had enough of this nonsense, and nailed a sheet of tin 2 feet wide around the trunk about 3 feet above the ground (because squirrels jump up onto the tree). This devious trap came into its own when our Weimaraner took the fluff off the tail of one of those varmints, in a scene straight out of the Matrix. Give Sunny and Maggie a chance, and change the field of battle. Bring a video camera too.
September 2nd, 2008 at 5:36 pm