Pennsylvania Game News - January 2020 - 63

small holes. At 2 a.m., I heard a squirrel
run atop my bedroom ceiling. But even
though the bait container was gone,
the trap didn't spring. I was beginning
to think we had Einstein squirrels in
residence.
That evening, Troy came by to check
his camera and learned that not only
gray squirrels, but a flying squirrel and
a short-tailed shrew had been coming
to the trap.
I wasn't too concerned about the
flying squirrel. According to one
researcher, southern flying squirrels
sometimes live in attics, gaining access
through windows or other openings.
But they don't make the noise gray
squirrels do.
The short-tailed shrew, on the other
hand, was a puzzle. While these burrowing animals eat food including corn and
beechnuts during the winter - and, judging by our attic shrew, peanuts as well
- they aren't known to live in houses.
The weather worsened with cold and
snow, and we declared the attic war a
stalemate.
Troy's last check of his trail cams
showed only one flying squirrel left
in the attic. We hoped his latest repair
would deter any more destruction by
gray squirrels.
But the squirrel war outside continued. After an 8-inch snow on Jan. 19,
followed by subzero temperatures the
next day, both birds and squirrels were
desperate for food.
It was only slightly warmer on Jan.
21, then temperatures climbed above
freezing and it rained for two days
before the thermometer dropped to 22
degrees. Our feeders and the ground
below became crowded with 15 bird
JANUARY 2020

species, and at least seven gray squirrels
and a cottontail rabbit.
To better allow ground-feeding birds
a chance to compete with the squirrels,
I threw birdseed on the opposite side
of the house. This worked for a couple
days until the squirrels caught on and
managed to dominate both feeding
areas.
Similar snow, rain and freezing characterized most of February, and conditions continued to draw gray squirrels
to our feeders, though most seemed to
return to their tree nests in the forest
each evening. The two most aggressive
squirrels, however, stayed close to the
food.
One lived beneath our generator, near
the back porch, and the other stayed in
the juniper tree, even when it was snowing hard. I wondered if they were the
same squirrels that had lived in the attic.
By Feb. 23, we counted 11 gray
squirrels attacking our two tube feeders. One squirrel pulled out the plastic
guards around the holes of a new metal
feeder and ate all the seeds. Another
climbed up our back-porch storm door
in an apparent attempt to get inside.
Never had I fought such determined
and bold squirrels.
Finally, I removed the tube feeders,
leaving only a much-larger, relatively
squirrel-proof feeder to feed the birds.
Still, they mobbed the porch, and when
I threw out pounds of mixed seeds for
the birds, the squirrels ate most of them.
Our outdoor squirrel war continued
into mid-March, and I acknowledged
utter defeat when the 11 squirrels never
left until the snow melted.
On the other hand, we never heard
or saw another gray squirrel in the
attic, so you also could say the war
was a draw.
63

Pennsylvania Game News - January 2020

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