Naughty Squee! Please help!

[Missycoo]

Hi all... I'm hoping some of you remember me :D I have a female grey that's a little over a year now. We found her orphaned in the spring of 2015, bottle fed, and went through the release process. She was our second baby after we lost our first one, Chubbers, the year before. She is our LOVE... we adore here and she's stayed in our yard since her release and gave us 2 beautiful babies that are making their home in our yard too. She lives up in the oaks and is completely self sufficient. We live in town on a very busy street so I try to keep her treats and blocks centralized in the yard so if she decides to bury, she will hopefully not go across the road from them. Anyways, here's my issue. The little twirp generally comes for a visit every day and she always jumps up into the window sill or on the deck just to let us know she's there. She will jump up on my husband or myself and be happy with a couple of ear itches and then she's off. Sometimes she stays and begs for a treat. BUT SHE IS NAUGHTY!! Omgosh is she naughty!! She is terrorizing my flowers, jumping on all of our window screens. If I plant anything and look over 5 minutes later, she's dug it up. I feel like we have a toddler running rampant. We put up red, white, and blue lights in our tree for the 4th of July party coming up and she literally chewed every string 1 foot at a time and plucked off only the big blue bulbs. My husband and I tried to blame the chipmunks because we just couldn't believe our sweet little angel would do that, but then we caught her carrying the bulbs and burying them all around the yard. I could go on and on about all the bad trouble she gets into, but it would take more than a paragraph. Do any of your have little terrorists and is there anything I can do about it? I've tried making a 'special tree' of toys, but she only wants my things... ooooofffff... any advice would be more than appreciated.

BTW, she did have a neck injury awhile back... and a HUGE THANK YOU to Nancy for helping with dosing/medication! She is healing just fine!! I think that the little ones must be very hard on the mama's and that maybe slowed up her healing process, but the wound is closed and fur is starting to come back :D

[TubeDriver]

Eh....She is a squirrel! :grin2


But joking aside, perhaps you could try to make a "feeding" station in your back yard away from your house? Only feed her there so she will not jump all over your house? As for digging up your plants and stealing your Christmas tree bulbs, I can't think of real good, safe way to keep her away. She is a squirrel and your yard is HER territory! You could try spraying the plants with a pepper/water mix to see if that discourages her? I would be really careful about hanging electric lights in your yard, you don't want her to get an electric shock which could hurt or kill her.

[Missycoo]

Oh I know... it's a pretty dumb question because she IS a squirrel, I do have her feeding station away from every thing and centralized away from harm, but she's never even messed with the Christmas lights so it was never an issue. But the pepper spray is a good idea maybe even fox urine my son suggested...he uses that when he hunts to cover his human smell. Just around that tree.... oooooffff and she is very territorial. She spider monkey'd another grey who came into the yard to eat at her feeding station... She'd demolished all the bird feeders etc. So I guess I have to resign myself to the fact that we're a one squirrel yard. No birds, no chair cushions, no fun lights or pretty flowers. I live in MN so our season to enjoy this is short and I'm very passionate about the yard while I have it.

[Rocky1]

Does anyone have a recipe for pepper spray? I figure that the type of pepper and concentration is IMPORTANT as I have read either rumors or facts about squirrels blinding themselves with pepper that gets on their hands, then they rub their eyes. I think using the correct recipe may be the solution.

Another thought, if you have the time, is to monitor during her most active hours. If she starts doing something naughty say, "Missy: NO," in a firm disapproving tone while looking right at her with a grumpy face. Repeat this until she stops. Or, if she doesn't stop, say it while slowly getting up and moving in her direction (ideally with disapproving body language) until she stops. My experience is that when that is done, squirrels learn what you don't like, and often times stop bad behavior. The downside is that it can take a while before they stop.

(If necessary, for any super bad behavior - the top level of bad - I would consider removing her snacks and ignoring her by going inside without her for 30-45 minutes, then returning them back. To me, that's just long enough to make a gesture but not so long they forget and just consider you mean. I have ONLY used similar tactics when my squirrel jumped on my stove - to me that's the worst possible bad behavior because it could seriously endanger my buddy who I love if done in someone's house who actually used the stove - I don't cook with buddies around.)

[Daisey007]

LOL... I know exactly how you feel! :Love_Icon However, often times we have to make concessions and/or sacrifices when we decide to love a squirrel and encourage them to live partially in our world. After all, the lights and plants will be there when the squirrel is gone. Make your yard safe to her, and enjoy her while you can.