Robot Claw

Several months ago we hung a suet feeder in our backyard to give the birds a little something to snack on during the final weeks of winter.

It didn’t take long before the birds noticed, and started snacking:

This didn’t bother us in the slighest because
a) We both love squirrels, and
b) You have to respect such drive and industriousness

But even though we were used to the wily ways of these furry little garden kings, imagine our surprise when one day we found the following scene:

If you’re having trouble deciphering that image, it shows the suet feeder right up at the branch level. Something had apparently reeled it in using the chain until it wasn’t hanging, but simply available right at the branch. In other words something was apparently tired of going to the suet, and instead chose to bring the suet to himself.

I like to think this is the culprit:

That photo was taken three days ago. It shows a big fat squirrel reclining in the sun, flying squirrel style, on the edge of our patio. I observed this while chatting on the phone with SFL, and was so amused/intrigued I had to snap a shot. It was such unusual squirrel behaviour I was a little concerned and tossed out a snack for him, which he immediately ran over to and ate. So he was just resting.

Sadly, yesterday we found the same squirrel dead in our yard.

He was in a similar position, just sitting on the grass. No sign of trauma, no sign of discomfort. He was a big guy, heavier than I ever thought a squirrel may be. And so soft. We both had a cry yesterday when we realized he was dead. Yeah, yeah ‘circle of life’ and all… but the fact he was in our backyard made him almost a pet.

So in tribute we went out and purchased two new squirrel feeders as a treat for the many other local squirrels. Here they both are:

Real corn and fake corn. One at the back of the yard, and one near the house. Both seem ‘squirrel proof’ in the sense that the squirrels should only be able to take the food, and not the entire device. But we shall see. Hopefully they will come soon and start eating, and hopefully we can once again have a squirrel we can think of as our very own 🙂

I put some batteries in our wildlife camera the other day, and tinkered with it to see if it was actually working (doubts existed in my mind for some reason). I couldn’t get it to test at all, and feared the worst. Even so, I placed it in the downstairs room and left it there to see what would happen.

It did work, and although my placement was arbitrary and far-from-ideal, the camera chronologued the actions of our cats as they visited the french door for a bit of wildlife appreciation.

Here’s a sample photo (click to enlarge):

That’s about as dynamic as they get. Daisy can be seen looking out of the window, and Stropping is approaching from stage right. This photo is a daylight shot (no flash), but nighttime shots were far, far more common. Like this one:

Or this one:

Similar aren’t they? Well the truth is terrible indeed. The camera functioned (based on the timestamps on the photos) for a little over 4 days, and took 285 photos in total. About 260 of those photos showed Emi, either heading toward or away from the window. Here is an example, consecutive pair:

If the above is typical (and it seemed to be), Emi made over 100 trips to the french doors, averaging about 15 minutes a time.  That’s 25 hours in total, or about a quarter of her life during the time the camera was functioning 🙂

I’m not kidding either. Of the 285 shots only about 10 had Daisy in them, including this stunningly disturbing image…

And only one single shot had Yossie in it!

And she is the cat who used to live for looking out those doors!

I’ll leave with one of the atypical Emi images. Taken at night, this shows that Emi does indeed have a secret life of her own 🙂