We have two windows in our kitchen, and through one of them, by the kitchen table, we can see the bird feeder Bruce built long ago when our kids were small. For my birthday, a few years ago, my brother Steve gave me a second feeder to put up so I could watch birds from the other window; the one I look through every time I am at the kitchen sink.
When he went to the bird feeder store, the salesperson showed him several nifty designs to discourage squirrels from eating the seed.
If you Google “squirrel proof bird feeder,” within 16 seconds you will have 210,000 results. I guess keeping squirrels away from bird feeders is a pretty common problem. But as my brother explained to the helpful clerk, squirrels are just not an issue for people on Little Cranberry Island. We have no squirrels. At all. None. (No chipmunks either.) The sales clerk could not believe it. “I want to live there!” she exclaimed.
Sometimes, when I look out at my bird feeders, I have to remember just how lucky I am not to have to deal with squirrels.
Barbara S Fernald Jewelry 
I’ve always wondered how those feeders work. We don’t have many squirrels in my neighborhood because it’s a relatively new development and doesn’t have a lot of mature trees. But we do have alligators in the lake across the street! I’d much rather have deer. I love the expressions on their faces.
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If I had to choose between deer and alligators, I would choose deer too! But do they have to take a chomp of everything green on their way to the bird feeder? I have a Japanese maple that has never grown because they trim it every spring. I even put a fence around it until the leaves come out. When I take the fence away…chomp. Bambi Bonsai.
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i wouldn’t mind seeing the squirrels go, but i LOVE chipmunks, even tho they burrow EVERYWHERE!!! those deer are so cute!
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I’ll trade you some deer for some chipmunks!
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I hate deer when they eat all my plants, as well. One time I counted 11 deer in my front yard at dusk. We do have squirrels and chipmunks. They are cute, but the chipmunks do burrow and that’s a pain too!
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We have to have a fence around the vegetable garden. Having a hunting season on the island helps keep the numbers down…a little…
Okay. I’m glad I don’t have any cute chipmunks to contend with!
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Wow! Genuine deer-in-the-headlights look. I’m thinking venison stew……
XO
Stevie
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Pretty funny look. They knew I was in the kitchen. Wish I liked venison, but I don’t.
xoxo
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Loved your post and all the responses. Had a poetry group here this a.m. and we watched a red tailed squirrel trying desperately to get over or above Chris’ rig and he couldn’t make it. I think we have finally succeeded! We used to get eaten out of house and home by the deer on GCI but we’ve been lucky for a while. Probably shouldn’t have said anything!
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The deer left a note this morning. They are swimming to Great Cranberry this afternoon to check out the other feeders. I haven’t seen them all day!
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You made us laugh! (plenty of gray and red squirrels and chipmunks here.)
Recently I was in a public place and got in a conversation with two other people about having squirrels in the house/walls and how to trap them. One woman talked about how they has success at trapping, and then they drop them off at Wolfe’s Neck Woods State Park. I said, “Oh, how nice. I live just up the road.”
Hope to see when I make another visit to the island this Thursday – Saturday.
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Keep those squirrels out of the house! One of the worst things I’ve ever smelled was a dead squirrel trapped in the walls of someone’s house. Blech. I’m glad we don’t have them. Though, I wonder if mink have ever tried to get into a feeder…..
I’m off the island on Saturday, but will be around the rest of the time. I hope we run into each other.
xoxo
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Hahahaha about the deer swimming to GCI! xoS
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