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Akula
02-02-2007, 08:41 PM
Hi everyone,

as you might imagine, I like to feed squirrels (as well as a few hundred birds, including Coopers and Sharpies, every day). I have a squirrel who is still in the tree in the front yard where I feed them and it's 9:35 pm and about 10 degree F. It's going to get colder yet tonight and it's not in a nest or anything, just sitting in the crook of a branch. Is this squirrel sick or something? I always thought they retreated to their nest at night to escape the cold and wind. We're under a winter storm warning (we're supposed to get another 6-12 inches of snow tonight) and there he sits :dono

Is it ok to feed them peanut butter? I feed them a HUGE jar of it every week. I'm not sure what else to give them other than black oil sunflower seeds and whole wheat bread, bagels, crackers etc.

BTW, has anyone ever seen a blond squirrel? I live in an area where we only get fox squirrels (with an occasional red) and I just started getting a squirrel that is the orangish/tan color all over its body. It's really strange.

Thanks!

Mars
02-02-2007, 08:43 PM
The one in the tree, how high up is he? Can you reach him? You are right this is not normal behavior.

rippie-n-lilgirlsmom
02-02-2007, 08:43 PM
He may be frightened, he could be in a frozen mode are there any cats nearby? He should be ok as long as a predator isnt after him.
Good things to feed would be wallnuts or pecans still in the shell.

island rehabber
02-02-2007, 08:47 PM
Hi everyone,

as you might imagine, I like to feed squirrels (as well as a few hundred birds, including Coopers and Sharpies, every day). I have a squirrel who is still in the tree in the front yard where I feed them and it's 9:35 pm and about 10 degree F. It's going to get colder yet tonight and it's not in a nest or anything, just sitting in the crook of a branch. Is this squirrel sick or something? I always thought they retreated to their nest at night to escape the cold and wind. We're under a winter storm warning (we're supposed to get another 6-12 inches of snow tonight) and there he sits :dono

Is it ok to feed them peanut butter? I feed them a HUGE jar of it every week. I'm not sure what else to give them other than black oil sunflower seeds and whole wheat bread, bagels, crackers etc.

BTW, has anyone ever seen a blond squirrel? I live in an area where we only get fox squirrels (with an occasional red) and I just started getting a squirrel that is the orangish/tan color all over its body. It's really strange.

Thanks!

Akula that is troubling behavior on the part of your squirrel. He may have been booted out of his nest by a more aggressive squirrel, or for whatever reason he is afraid to go back there. Or, he may be hurt or ill. Can you get a closer look at him to see? (I know, it's dark and it's 10 degrees...sorry!) Short of providing some shelter for him temporarily and luring him in there with food, there isn't a whole lot you can do.
As for feeding them, nuts in the shell, dried corn and even cut-up sweet potato would be better for your squirrels than too much peanut butter and crackers. Lots of sugar in those. You've got me worrying about this little guy now....please let us know it goes with him!

rippie-n-lilgirlsmom
02-02-2007, 08:51 PM
Do you have a small cardboard box that you could stick up in the tree to get him a little shelter? Not saying he would go in it?

Sissy
02-02-2007, 09:03 PM
:Welcome to the board, you've came to the right place for answers!

LynninIN
02-02-2007, 09:33 PM
Welcome to the board Akula. In your profile you mentioned there were Hawks around your home. Is it possible the squirrel was scared or injuried by a Hawk? I learned the hard way that squirrels can freeze when scared. They don't move anything for a very long time. Does the squirrel look like an adult or young one?

I hope you are able to help the little fuzzer.

Sissy
02-02-2007, 10:30 PM
:dono What happened with the fuzzy in the tree......? I'm worried sick about him, now I'll not be able to sleep thinking about how cold that poor little guy must be. I need to get my magic carpet fixed so I can fly up there and give him a warm fleece blankie. I hope he's ok. Poor little baby.

Timber
02-03-2007, 06:47 AM
Well, Sissy, I would lend you my broom but it puttered out after Halloween. But it is rather nippy and hard to hold on to in this cold weather. Sure hope that little fuzzer made it through the night though. Like you I sure wish I had a way to get up there (ever so briefly in 10 degree weather) and rescue it.

Akula
02-03-2007, 11:35 AM
Hi everyone, and thanks for the replies.

I expected to wake up this morning and find him dead at the base of the tree, but it looks like he made it through the night (I'll go out and dig through the snow at the base of the tree to make sure though).

He was really high up in tree and the lowest branches are too high to reach so there's nothing I could do for him. He was up there at 1:00 am when I went to bed last night and we are under a blizzard warning here. It's bad enough that major highways are shut down all around me because of the multiple car pile-ups. We are being hammered with snow and wind. We're having some of the worst weather we've had in decades. The weather will be below zero over the next several nights. It's pretty much a white-out outside and it's hard to tell if snow is raining down on us or being picked up by the wind and blown.

I took some of the advice I read here about feeding them sweet potatoes etc. I cut some up and put them in and around their feeders (I had to clear off their food because it was completely burried in about 8-10 inches of snow that fell during the night). I have some very healthy whole wheat bread
($6.00 a loaf Zingerman's) that I can put out for them also. As for the other suggestions, that will have to wait until this blizzard is over and I can get to a store.

I have a recipe for pumpkin soda bread that has raisins, coarse stone ground corn meal, walnuts, and canned pumpkin. I'm thinking about mixing some of it up without the baking soda and other baking ingredients and putting it out for the critters. Sort of like a cornmeal-pumpkin-fruit gruel. I may try to bake it a little though. The critters might enjoy a warm meal in the midst of a blizzard.

As for the hawks, they are Coopers hawks and they aren't big enough to take a squirrel without suffering a lot of damage to themselves, so they leave the squirrels alone. I've seen several squirrels around these hawks and the only time the hawk does anything threatening is when the squirrels get too close to them. And then they only put their wings out as a gesture. The hawks weren't even in the front yard yesterday evening at all and the other squirrels came down alright. Although there was another one up there with him that came down much later in the evening than it should have.

I watched for cats last night, as I do every night, and there weren't any around until many hours after dark (I feed stray cats also. So many idiots in the city get sick of their domestic cats and toss them outside to find for themselves :nono ). I always try to make sure the cats stay away so that the squirrels can get down safely, and the cats weren't out much last night anyway given the weather conditions.

I notice that a lot of squirrels spend all day in the tree in the front yard when the weather is bad. I think they know that they've got a food source there and come down to take advantage of it throughout the day rather than having to cross streets and dodge cars to return to it several times during the day.

I wonder if he wasn't kicked out of his nest by another squirrel, but the fact that another squirrel sat up in the tree with him way past his bedtime is bothersome. I wonder if all the people out shoveling and snowblowing (especially) might have caused them to seek the safety of a tree.

I have a plastic storage container that I can put out in the backyard. I'll try to put it up in a tree or nestle it in an evergreen with an old towel inside and put some critter mix by it. Other than that, there's not much I can do.

I don't have a camera with zoom lens but I may buy a disposable one to take pictures of the hawks and a few of blondie the squirrel. If I get a few picks of him/her, I'll post them here. I've never seen a squirrel with its coloration.

Thanks again!

rippie-n-lilgirlsmom
02-03-2007, 11:56 AM
Do you have any wood laying around you could build him a little nest box? Nothing fancy with a 3-4 in diam. hole he could get into? He very well may use that! Any veggies or fruit (think anything that comes natrally from the earth)or unsalted nuts would be good for him, unsalted pumpkin seeds also.

Akula
02-03-2007, 12:25 PM
I don't have anything I can nail together, but your suggestion made me realize I do have a small desk drawer that's left over because the desk broke into pieces when I tried to move it down the basement steps. The drawer is deep, but not long, rather square in fact, so an animal could easily use it as a nest. It's a matter of positioning it somewhere off the ground, away from my dog who loves to chase squirrels in an attempt to shake the stuffing out of them, and out of the wind.

I guess I could face the opening upwards like a regular squirrel's nest. Toss some leaves inside that I bagged up this fall, and throw a shredded towel in there. I have a weeping willow in the backyard that I may be able to reach a lower branch on. I'll let you know how it goes. As for now, I have to put on my thermal long johns on and start layering the clothes on and brave the cold. The squirrel that was stranded in the tree probably won't be the one to use it but it may free up another squirrel's nest for him or another homeless critter.

I can't wait to see how they take to the pumpkin gruel mixture also.

Thanks for the suggestion!

Mars
02-03-2007, 12:36 PM
Better to face the openning into the tree itself creating a box rather than a draw. Leaving a crack as the tree curves for them to enter. It will give them more protection that way.:)

rippie-n-lilgirlsmom
02-03-2007, 12:40 PM
Like I said before even a cardboard box with a small opening will see him through for a couple days?

Akula
02-03-2007, 01:24 PM
I got it up in the tree, but it's only about 5 feet off the ground. I was putting it up in a very, very old and LARGE weeping willow so the base of the tree has a HUGE slant to it making standing on a ladder in the snow very trecherous. I opened up a 35 gallon bag of nice dry leaves and stuffed them in there and left the bag open in case the other squirrels want to do any nest repairs.

I opened up the pantry and started making them up a gruel mixture. I threw in some millet (the people variety) a can of 100% pure pumpkin, some peacans, walnuts, raisins, I'm boiling some whole grain brown rice, and I'm thinking of throwing some wild rice and flax seed in there. As for fruit, does anyone know if they can or will eat grapefruit or bananas? Are any of the abovementioned ingredients harmful to critters?

Thanks!

Mars
02-03-2007, 01:32 PM
I don't know about grapefruit but mine love bananas. They had banana chips for breakfast this morning. They like grapes, apples, pears, strawberries, blueberries, blackberries, raisens, currents, gooseberries, honeydew melon pretty much anything you would eat yourself. :D

Somebody's Mother
02-03-2007, 02:55 PM
Mine likes apples and grapes but doesn't like strawberries or tangerines.

Mrs. Jack
02-04-2007, 11:35 AM
there was a sale, so I've been sharing an avocado with mine lately. I don't know who's enjoying them more, the squirrels or me.

Buddy'sMom
02-04-2007, 12:08 PM
:Welcome Your squirrels are very lucky to have such a thoughtful and generous neighbor!! :thumbsup Just a suggestion -- don't buy too large a quantity of any of the treats people have listed (unless you also like them) because you may find that as soon as you do, they stop eating it, even if they gobbled it up the day before :D Apples seem to be a current favorite, but we stopped putting them out for a while 'cause no one touched them.

atlantasquirrelgirl
02-04-2007, 03:07 PM
Akula, Have you spotted this squirrel again? If so, do you have a Pet store nearby? You could check with them to see if they have a bird nesting box you can put up. Some of them have holes large enough (3") that a squirrel could get into it. (Make sure the lid is screwed down so predators cannot scoop the sleeping squirrel out.

There's also a nest box on Ebay right now for a decent price (item 170078091076). I can also refer you to a lady that build them if you are interesting in getting one.

Akula
02-05-2007, 10:27 PM
Hi,

not sure if the squirrel has been back yet or not. I get dozens of them here every day and the only one that's distinguishable from the rest is the blond one. Other than that, they all look pretty much alike. But as you'll soon read, that's a good thing.

It's strange in that every single squirrel that comes into my yard this year appears perfectly healthy. That hasn't been the case over the years. I took some videotape of some injured or seemingly sick squirrels in my yard the last few years. One had very little hair, another had a front paw that seemed to be broken at the wrist, many had one eye shut, one had one eye that bulged, one had a swollen, mis-shapen head, and last but not least, and to put it as delicately as I can, one had testicles that were jet black and HUGE as heck. He could hardly walk. I started putting out a lot more food last year because so many of the squirrels appeared to be in pretty rough shape. But this year I've seen the healthiest lot of squirrels in the entire 15 years I've lived here. A mild winter last year probably helped.

Thanks for the information on housing for them. I'll have to put a few things out when the weather gets warmer. Being on a ladder in the snow and ice isn't terribly safe this time of year. I haven't checked the desk drawer I put out yet, but I bet if I put it up a little higher in the tree when spring comes, some animal will make a home or nest out of it.

I had to go to the store tonight (the roads are still bad here but we can finally get out) and I picked up some of the food that people here suggested for them. They do seem to enjoy that pumpkin-fruit-nut gruel I mixed up for them. I put it out in tablespoon size lumps and it froze....so the little suckers treated it as fast food and just picked it up and took it home with them :rotfl They truly are the ultimate survivors.