Random Thoughts, Facts & Quotes

On occasion it becomes necessary to deter, with extreme prejudice, a squirrel from eating all the bird food we put out. We like the birds because they look nice, sound pretty good and eat lots of bugs*. But when a squirrel (aka tree rat) performs their acrobatics to get to the feeder I turn to my trusty pellet rifle. At first I scare them by shooting the feeder itself, which of course causes a fairly loud "pang"! The feeder is about 15' off the ground, which I thought might have been a deterrent. But squirrels jump right off and land, no problem. If the squirrel returns more than 2 or 3 times on a given day, and I'm there to see it, well, its time comes to an end. This time I was the unwitting accomplice to another's hunting mission. I shot said squirrel, it jumped to the ground and then, no more than two seconds later, a red-tailed hawk flew in front of me across the yard. Swooping and returning he then landed atop the injured squirrel and held it tight to the gr...

We had no idea how much of an instant nuisance these birds can become, quickly. For some reason a few if them picked our home as their new home one day. They discovered the small openings at the end of the gutters, where the gutter "helmets" stop. Within two days there were a dozen of them at 5 different locations. We feed birds year-round, but this was the first time in 12-years we even saw a Starling. They are loud. They poop all over the place. And the 1st two that arrived originally had enough nesting material in one section to start a colony. So, I had some metal mesh leftover from a tile flooring job. After cutting several pieces I climbed up on the roof and, after cleaning out the nesting materials*, I installed the mesh "caps". The birds hung around for another day after that, maybe hoping they would be able to get back in, but now they are gone. Crisis averted.  Advice : don't have any openings anywhere!  If they do arrive act immediately to det...