Hi everyone,
This is actually a chipmunk question. I haven't found anything for chippys as promising as this forum, so I hope it's okay to post here. If I should be trying elsewhere, let me know.

This is a long tale, so the short version is this: my dad and I saved a drowning chipmunk baby. However, he ran away from his mom, who was searching for him but gave up at nightfall. We lost track of the baby in our neighbour's yard, in spite of a thorough search, and I'm wondering if there is anything else we can do to find and reunite the baby with its mom.

Here's the full version: Yesterday at supper time, my dad found a baby chipmunk on the pool steps, head above water but very exhausted and scared, struggling. He lifted the baby out with the skimmer, and placed him in the grass to recover in peace. We then went inside and stood guard at the window for about thirty minutes before we realize that Mom Chipmunk (with baby #2 in tow) was frantically searching along the pool's edge for her lost baby. The baby sat curled in the grass, alive but too exhausted to move).

This went on for about an hour. The mom didn't know to look in the grass, and only went to the spot where the baby was last seen. My dad decided to reunite them by putting on some gardening gloves, and transferring the tired little critter over to the hole where mom kept emerging from. To our surprise, the tired baby had more energy than we suspected, and when dad tried to pick him up, he bolted under the fence into the next backyard.

At this point, the sun was going down, and we were heartbroken to see that the mom was still looking for a while, but eventually stopped coming out. I grabbed a big flashlight and hopped the fence to see if I could locate the baby in the final minutes of sunlight (neighbours are away for the weekend), but after a very long search, I found nothing. There is a deck to hide under, but it's not very grassy or welcoming (mostly tires and level dirt). There are also low shrubs and rhubarb that he could have gone under, which I couldn't completely search without tearing the place apart. It's possible he came back under the fence and found his way home without us seeing, but I stood watch at the window until night came and never spotted him.

My question is this: is there anything else I could do? How likely is the baby to make his way back into our yard and home again? Is the mom smart enough to broaden her search? I've seen no sign of mom or baby today, and I feel terrible. I'm tempted to check the neighbour's yard again, but maybe I'm being crazy. I just hate the thought of the little guy all alone because of me and my dad interceding.

If you have any ideas or advice, I'd really appreciate it. Thank you for reading!