Hi fellow squirrel lovers,

I have been the proud father of a young female flying squirrel for about a month, and I think she has slightly bonded with me, but we still have a ways to go. She will sleep in my clothing, take treats from my hand and will jump onto me and run around on my body. However, my room in my apartment is down a flight of stairs in the basement, and has no door. I generally only use 1 light, so it stays pretty dark and cool down there.

Everyday when I get back from work at 5, I take her out of her cage and put her in a pocket or lay her pouch close to me while I watch tv or play video games. After she wakes up, we'll hang out for a bit, I'll give her some treats and she'll scamper around my couch. After an hour or two, however, she gets this unstoppable urge to leave me and my room, climb up the stairs and mess around in my female roommate's closet. Shes also figured out how to escape from her cage and my roommate has found her up there several times while I thought she was in her cage.

My roommate has been pretty cool about it, but I can tell her patience is wearing very thin. My squirrel got out this morning before I came to work and I couldn't think of anything else to do but zip tie all possible escape routes in her cage shut until I get home. It has worked so far and I plan on getting her a larger cage that will be more secure today when I get out of work.

My problem is that she wants to go to my roommates closet rather than stay with me; I think if she was confined to my room she would want to stay with me, but I can't think of a way to block the stairs off from a flying squirrel, who can pretty much get anywhere she wants to go.

I could lock her and myself in the bathroom to keep her near me, but it's a very small bathroom, and my roommates would think I was a freak if I spent my time hanging out in my bathroom with a squirrel.

Should I get a tent or something?

Thanks for any tips or advice in advance,

Mike