There was the squirrel that peed from a height on an ascending tree surgeon, whose only purpose was to inspect the tree for preservation. So swears a friend who is also in that line of business. Moreover, the same expert was bitten by a squirrel, as he groped around a trunk or branch and unfortunately stuck his hand into a hole or crevice which contained one. In both cases, they were the greys, not the reds.
You'll remember the story in this space some weeks ago, where a lord across the water was trying to induce people to eat squirrels in order to help him keep their numbers down. They tasted like rabbit, his gamekeeper was quoted as saying, but at the time of reporting, the lord had not yet indulged in the stewed, roast or spitted grey. For the grey is always the villian, the red the cosy little thing; the real native, in fact. The grey was introduced from America less than a century ago. (For the record, the red is protected, the grey not.).
But do the greys wreak such damage as is laid at their door? A friend found that a plantation of young beech had been topped in many cases by the squirrels. Though very upset at the time, he took no aggressive action. Today, as you roll up his drive-way, you see a few munching or lepping about. The young plantation, from memory, picked up again. Our bird-feeding correspondent reports that, with the coming of spring, she once again has three greys daily, and sometimes twice or three times. They raid her many feeding devices. They don't get much, but are ambitious and persistent.
The biggest feeder is a perforated air ventilator out of a lorry. It was cylindrical, but the end has been flattened to hold the nuts. The squirrels constantly gnaw at the corners at the bottom, hoping to cut through the metal and see a cascade of food pour out. You have to admire their persistence, and can understand the frustration with which, when unsuccessful, they sometimes turn their spite on the tough old hawthorn tree from which the feeders hang, and rip off a few strips of bark. But why shoot them or drive them off? They even divert the dog. And in many years of planting, have topped no young trees that can be found.
But our correspondent should be careful, when she works her feeders, to look up an make sure that no squirrels is directly above her.