Bruce Cameron

Feb 19, 20140

Editor’s Note: The following column was originally published in 2009.

Squirrel War One

This is the first in a two-part series in which I go man-to-man in a heroic battle of wits with a squirrel.

Now, I know what you’re thinking: not exactly a fair fight, my brain against that of a tree-climbing rodent. But don’t fret — to even up the odds, I had my dog helping me.

Some time ago, I put a bird feeder out on the balcony because I like to feed birds and not squirrels. Within minutes, however, a small, grey, definitively non-avian squirrel was sitting in it, busily stuffing its mouth with seeds. Two birds sat watching from a tree limb nearby, probably wondering why the man of the house had laid out food for the squirrel and not birds.

I put on a facial expression that communicated a clear message: I eat small squirrels. I threw open the door and charged out, yelling as if I were storming a machine-gun nest.

The effect was exactly what I would have hoped for: The squirrel dove off the railing, snared a tree branch like a trapeze artist and scrambled up the tree trunk. Unfortunately, the birds were alarmed as well, taking frantic wing to escape the howling madman hurtling out of the house.

The squirrel chided me from its perch, saying something like: “You scared me to death! I nearly choked on the food you put out for me!”

“Teach you to mess with the squirrel avenger,” I replied smugly. My then-6-year-old daughter was impressed with both the aggressiveness and the effectiveness of my actions, especially when I repeated them every two to three minutes for the next hour.

For some reason, the stupid rodent didn’t realize I was standing watch at the window, waiting for him to climb into the feeder so I could charge out again. My dog knew it, though, and was barking and running around in circles inside the house, so excited there was no hope of calming him down.

When I burst through the doorway like a SWAT team, the dog would charge out with me, usually getting entangled in my legs so that we’d both go sprawling. The squirrel would watch all this and then dive for the tree, though with each repetition its retreat became more leisurely, almost as if it were beginning to believe my dog and I did not pose a mortal threat.

My daughter drew a cardboard sign, “NO SQURELS,” but that didn’t help, either — the thing simply didn’t respect the law, even when it was posted. Eventually, the squirrel figured out that while my dog and I could rush out yelling, barking and falling, we couldn’t actually touch him, because the feeder was mounted on a post in the yard, eye level with me on the balcony but just out of arm’s reach.

From that moment forward, he just watched us with a bemused expression as I stomped and yelled and screamed and scared off every bird for 5 square miles. The dog would race into the yard, snarling, and then find a stick and bring it to me because, hey, free stick!

There’s a reason why we humans are smart enough to toil long hours at jobs so we can earn money to buy food, while poor dumb squirrels either eat what they find lying on the ground or are forced to wait for people to put out bird feeders filled with free seed: technology. We have weapons.

The next time the squirrel showed up for a snack, I had my son’s water gun, and was able to stand on the balcony and blast the critter with a long, drenching shot. This offended the squirrel, who thought we’d come to an understanding about our roles: He ate, and my dog and I provided the entertainment. Rodent dinner theater. You’re not supposed to spray water on the audience.

I sat menacingly in a rocking chair on the balcony, water gun across my lap, the squirrel skittering around in the fir tree overhead, thoroughly defeated.

And then he started pelting me with pinecones.

How I handled this unprovoked escalation from water cannons to sub-ballistic missiles will be the topic of next week’s column.

(Bruce Cameron has a website at http://www.wbrucecameron.com.)