RRROOOAAAHHHHH!!!!

What a nightmare. They continue to come from the trees, creeping onto the lawn and up to the ledge... eating our birdfood. We have finally given up. Those darned squirrels cannot be stopped! It has been going on since last fall. First it was just the one big guy, later dubbed "Psycho Squirrel." We had tried all winter to scare him away, banging Ash's little kitchen pots against the window, running out and hollering at him. Nothing seemed to faze him. It was as though he found it amusing; watching us from our living room screaming and banging on the window. We must have looked like such fools. He spread the word to his fellow squirrel, even expanding the population with some little ones this spring! They have all made their way to our feeder, feasting on it before our eyes. Some would creep up in the wee hours of the night and eat it down to the last specs of seed. I fell for it, thinking we could scare them away. I continued to fill the feeder, as I didn't want to deprive our beautiful collection of birds that had made that their location to feed. Blue Jays, Cardinals, Woodpeckers, Sparrows, it was amazing how many different species had found their way to our window. They were Ashley's birdies. And now the squirrels were trying to take that away from her. I can't have it, no.. I WON'T have it!



We borrowed a gun from Rob's buddy a couple weeks ago. The only problem being that we live in such a visual area. DeVos's in our backyard over the hill, their workers across the street, Brendan's school across the street, the trail running up our street, people driving by, our list goes on and on. How were we going to attack this monster. without being noticed? We decided to just take it in stride, and when the opportunity arose... we would be ready.



The first one we took out was, indeed, "Psycho." He was a fighter. We thought it would send a message to the rest of them. Instead, they seemed to team up and gather their kin. The next day our feeder was empty, and the front lawn was covered in squirrels, big and small! I decided to keep a little pot by my chair so that I could be ready to throw it at the window at any time. Brendan and Ash were always on the look out and would run to the window to yell at them and bang on it to try to scare them, but they were growing less and less fearsome of our antics. Another night we had cooked out on the grill, and there were about 5 of the little monsters in the tree in our backyard. Rob went for it, grabbed the gun and was able to take 2 more out. Again, they came back and ate the feeder down to its last seeds.



And now, here we are. Months and months of squirrels, eating our precious seed. Antagonizing my integrity. Pushing the limits. I have given up. I took down the feeder, and now our poor birds are flying up to the ledge and eating what's left of the seed along it. I can almost hear their tweets, asking us what they did to deserve this. It isn't them... It is those monsters. The squirrels.