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So, we had storms last week, not a lot of rain, but during the night the wind was tossing the trees around. I live up in the mountains and we are surrounded by pines.
The following morning was a fine day and I was heading out to the car, intending to go down to the beach for a walk by the sea. And there, by the car was what I first glance, I took to be a baby rat.
This isn’t too unusual. I have three dogs, of who one is a sort-of terrier and another is a Podenco, a Spanish hunting breed. So, I am regularly presented with little gifts. The last eye-catcher was a pine marten dumped at the bottom of the steps.
On closer inspection I realised it did not look very ‘ratty’, but it took me a minute to realise that I was looking at a dead baby squirrel.
Poor little thing….
I picked it up, intending to bury it somewhere out of the way when it, just, moved in my hand. A moment later realised I was about to walk on a second babe. And next to them is a mess of twigs and palm fibre which I had taken for just wind-blown detritus, but then now saw was the demolished remains of a nest.
The wind had huffed, and it had puffed and quite literally blew their house down, with the two babes in it. I did cast around to see if there were any more, but I could only find the two.
I’ll not bore you with the details except to say that around here, oddly enough, the supermarkets do not stock squirrel milk, so I settled for goat’s milk instead. I’ve since received lots of (conflicting) advice on what to feed them but since they seem to be doing nicely, I am disinclined to change their diet.
I didn’t name them at first until I was reasonably happy they were going to survive, but they seem happy enough and are doing well, and so I decided it was time to name them.
They were going to be ‘Peanut’ and ‘Popcorn’, however, at the insistence of one of my readers (thank you Janice) they are now to be ‘Charlotte’ and ‘Richard’.
I’ll let you know over time how it goes with ‘Charlie’ and ‘Dick’ lol!
Buy me a coffee?
You are too much, a heart of gold.
Thank you, Mae, but who would walk by?
Thank You Simone, it will be nice to see & hear how they are doing as I am recovering
Hugs Janice
I’ll be sure to keep you up to date Janice. Hope your recovery proceeds well. Keep in touch 🙂
So adorable and the names fit perfectly! They can be your writing buddies lol.. 🙂 Can’t wait to see and hear more about your new additions..
I’ll be putting up more posts on their progress 🙂
They make interesting pet’s, mine were Baby and Dolly, when they were old enough to survive in the wild I turned them loose. But they came to visit for awhile!!!!!
lol! The visits must have been fun. My plan with these two is to get them past the first couple of weeks, but find somewhere they can either have a permanent home with a decent sized enclosure or be rehabilitated to the wild. I don’t have the facilities here, or the expertise, to teach two squirrels ‘how to be squirrels’. What I do have are three dogs (one of whom is a Podenco, a Spanish hunting dog) and a cat, so I wouldn’t dare let them loose around the house. So I’m on the look-out for a wildlife rescue centre not too far away.
Glad they are doing great…….why not Elizabeth and Richard? lmao
lol! – I was ‘leaned on’ for the little girl to be Charlotte, but it’s kinda hard to see a four inch long squirrel as a James or a Michael and i wasn’t going to condemn him o being Ben 🙂
How wonderful!! Thanks for the update and good luck with your new discoveries <3
Thanks Rhonda. Yes, I’ll be posting updates 🙂