Amada: This blog is a little late to be celebrating Mothers Day but not too late to be celebrating mothers. The above is a photo I took over twenty years ago of my first horse Windhill Amada and her foal Navarro when we lived in Groton, MA. I had Amada from the time she was four months old until the day she died at age twenty-one. I still miss her acutely and there is not a day that goes by that I don't think of her.
Fortunately, she lives on in her now twenty two year-old son who resides in Saratoga Springs. Navarro is treated by his owner--and now my good friend-- Jennifer Symon as the king he is. She continues with his dressage and Navarro still performs all grand prix movements. I will be staying with Jennifer when I go to Saratoga in a little over a week and am looking forward to seeing Navarro once again.
Mother Nature Takes On My Trailer--Again!
In previous springs there have been times when it has been difficult to use my trailer. Mother Nature has caught me napping and allowed birds to build their nests inside it. Once, I actually had to borrow a friend's trailer so I wouldn't have to terminate a nest of newly-hatched barn swallows. Another time it was a nest of robins,
but that time I wasn't scheduled to go anywhere so they stayed until after they had fledged.
Last year I simply removed a robins' nest and that seemed to convince the parents that they needed to find a more hospitable building site elsewhere. But this year's pair was more tenacious. I had to remove the following and its two subsequent facsimiles:
I just couldn't bear to keep frustrating them, and I found it distressing to keep leveling their home. Once I wasn't quick enough and there were already two beautiful blue eggs. A different form of deterrent was in order:
'Wesley the Owl', named after the real Wesley in Stacey O'Brien wonderful book by the same name, and who normally stands watch by my fireplace, did the trick. I don't know whether it was his predatory (sort-of) appearance or his rather prodigious self that thwarted Mr. And Mrs. Robin, but they did go elsewhere. In fact, I believe it likely they are the robins who built a nest in a bush growing next to our deck. Two cardinals have also decided to raise their young there. Both nests are within easy access of our two felines who are now furious to find they have been relegated to the temporary rank of "indoor cats".
We've also been fortunate to have a number of Baltimore Orioles arrive this spring. They are so very pretty and their song seems a constant celebration of life. Here is one I took with my long lens with an added Photoshop filter:
Mother Nature's Orphans
And then there are always the motherless babies that occasionally come our way. This teeny squirrel was delivered to me by our next door neighbor. She and her husband run a popular restaurant here in Acton, and she found some of her employees trying to dispatch it with a broom. It had been feebly attempting to climb into their dumpster obviously in desperate need of sustenance.
That same squirrel four weeks later enjoying life in a ferret cage outfitted with sleeping bag and heat lamp:
And two weeks later:
I became very attached to this little critter who I named "Reese", (Japanese for 'squirrel'). And I like to think she liked me. Whenever I worked in my study I would let her out and she would run all over. I had to keep a close eye on her though because--as you know--squirrels love to chew. She liked to take paper from the waste basket back to her cage. She would tear it into small pieces and pad her little hammock with it. I did have to interrupt her diy efforts once when I saw her heading toward her cage carrying a twenty dollar bill she'd confiscated from the top of my bureau.
But wastebasket paper and twenty dollar bills didn't hold a candle to her love of chewing plastic. I often had to interrupt my work to wrest ballpoint pens from her clutches. Once I left my room to take a phone call and came back to find wet blood-red splotches all over the carpet, tables and chairs. It seemed a scene from a teen horror flick. I was in a panic: With all that blood she had to be dead or certainly ready to be dead. Then I saw her curled up on a towel on my bed. Reese and the towel were drenched dark red.
I touched her with my hand. Nothing. I touched her again. This time Reese sprang to life, ran up my arm and sat her wet little body on top of my head. She seemed fine, but how could she be?! Then I saw lying next to the towel--a Bic pen that had been chewed in half. Only a trace of its red ink remained. Arrghh! My panic and sympathy immediately shifted from Reese to me. After a good washing with doggie shampoo and an unwanted encounter with my blow dryer, Reese was restored to her natural immature gray. I caught myself in the mirror and saw that my hair now had swaths of red running through it. I looked like some misguided mom who was making a dismal attempt to bond with her "Goth" daughter. I hopped in the shower for my unscheduled shampoo. But it would take several months before my study lost its "chamber of horrors" look. As for Reese--she spent the remainder of the evening sleeping off her colorful adventures curled up in the pocket of my bathrobe.
As Reese got older--and she became more and more frenetic--I realized I had to do something. Perhaps I could have her neutered and then she would calm down. But that was against Massachusetts law. In fact, just having her was against Massachusetts law. I called my brother Pat on Long Island who knew Marc Marrone--you know, the pet guy who frequently guested on Martha Stewart's show before she was sent to the slammer. He called Mr. Marrone up and asked about the suitably of a squirrel being a pet. This was his response, "That squirrel is going to kill your sister!"
Then, in the mail, came a dvd about squirrels I'd ordered while Reese was still nursing from her eyedropper. Maybe it had some relevant advice. I popped it into the player. My husband Jim walked into the room just as the first scene flashed on the screen: It was a beautiful Victorian home going up in flames. Then the narrator's voice, "The majority of house fires in the U.S. are caused by squirrels."
"Ainslie, I'm sorry--that squirrel has got to go."
So the next warm day I opened the window to my bedroom and placed a tree branch against it. It was a ten foot drop. Reese ventured in and out several times before deciding to curl up for the night in her hammock in the ferret cage. I closed the window.
The following day was also warm. Once again I opened the window: Reese happily scampered out. After several hours she still hadn't returned. I left to run errands. When I got back I opened my study door to find not one, not two, but three squirrels running around bouncing off my walls. (No doubt they were looking for twenty dollar bills and Bic pens.) But as soon as they caught sight of me two of them launched themselves through the window. The third--I presumed it was Reese--paused on the sill a few moments, gave me a nano-second of a glance, then rushed out to join her new-found friends. I closed my window and pulled the curtain.
I saw her--at least, I was quite sure it was she--several times afterwards. I got to within touching distance but if I held out my hand, she was off. I was glad her wild genes were kicking in.
Not many people would react well to a squirrel landing on their head.
More baby squirrels came the following years but by then I had found a squirrel rehabilitater two towns away. She had a great set-up--several large out-door cages in which she would over-winter the babies. Then in spring, she would give them what's called a "soft-release." She'd open the door to the cages during the day and, if they were back before curfew, they were closed in safely for the night. In time they forsook their cages to permanently make new homes in the forest. She told me I'd been lucky with Reese. Squirrels are highly territorial but, from the way I described it, she thought perhaps Reese had just had her first heat cycle. Hence, the two playful and congenial friends.
Anyway, here is what to do if you ever find a baby squirrel:
1. Put it under a heat lamp.
2. Hydrate with lukewarm Pedia-lyte or Gatorade.
3. Twelve to twenty-four hours later give it puppy formula.
4. Then, don't do what I did with Reese, but call a
rehabilitater. A large veterinary hospital with a wildlife department should be able to refer you to one in your area.
I have to admit, I do miss Reese--her swinging on the end of towel, perching on top of my head to survey her environs, and her little pocket naps. I hope she has been able to keep off the roads, stay away from the predators, and enjoy an unending supply of acorns. I also like to think she misses sharing Snickers bars with me.
FOX NEWS!
Mother Nature has playing a few not-so-funny ironic little jokes on me. The robins were but the first. Last week I had to take my trailer in to my mechanic to be serviced. It also had a flat tire. It wasn't on the rim yet, and I didn't want to pay to have it towed. I would take the risk, but I had to drive the four miles to his shop super slowly or things could heat up--literally. So I got up at five a.m. to avoid infuriating commuters. As I was brushing my teeth I glanced out the window to the chicken coop below to see a mass of white feathers.
Uh-oh, this didn't look good. I ran out the door to the coop. My little white Cochin hen was nowhere in sight. But, standing less than twenty feet away from me, was a fox! Usually, foxes will usually bolt at that sight of a human. Not this one--she was on a mission: She had come back for yet another chicken.
"I'm sorry, you need to go. You can't have anymore!" I had to wave my arms before she trotted off. I'm pretty sure it was a she. She was small and reluctant to lose her place in this drive-up "McNugget" window I'd provided her.
My coop was under repair so the chicken wire was missing. It was surrounded by a four foot typhoon fence but that's nothing to an
agile fox. And I had forgotten to shut the little door that leads into the chickens' interior roosting area. It wasn't her fault--it was mine. I felt sorry I had let that little chicken down.
And speaking of potential fox targets: Before the Concord fox kit family relocated I often saw this red squirrel just feet from their den. Once, when she hung upside down and faced out with her belly, I saw her swollen teats and knew she was feeding her own babies. I was relieved on her behalf when the fox family relocated.
It has been interesting and a little disappointing to see how some people react when they see my fox pictures. I showed one woman in a pet store a photo of the vixen. "Oh, nasty!" she observed. But the vixen was simply yawning in the sunshine. Maybe it was those exposed canines. Another friend mentioned a fox on her property and right away was told the best way to dispatch it was a shotgun. In Japan's Shinto religion the fox is a creature of veneration. I've often wondered if this deification had anything to do with the essential role the fox played in controlling the mouse population in the rice fields of ancient Japan. Rice is vital in Japanese society--nutritionally, of course, but it also has spiritual dimension.
One shouldn't blame a fox--or for that matter a coyote, raccoon, or a hawk--if it kills something you have. Protecting your pets and your livestock is your responsibility. I ought to know--I have failed my own critters on several occasions. Once--years ago--a fox killed fifteen half- grown chicks I had running around the barn. I'd just let them out and gone on to feed the horses. A mere forty-five minutes later I was having coffee in my house. I happened to glance out the window--inert little feathered bodies lying everywhere! And just next to the barn a fox--carrying one of the chicks in its mouth--headed across my pasture towards the woods. I tore outside, scooped up the remaining live chickens, tossed them into a stall and shut the barn door. There were but seven left.
I was upset and angered by this excess. Why couldn't she have taken just one? That I could almost live with. Everyone has heard what happens when a fox gets in a hen house--an utter and complete massacre. Still too upset to pick up the dead chicks, I went back into the house. Then, through a window I saw her again. I knew my other chicks were safe so I just watched. She took two little bodies in her mouth and trotted off. But she was back in fifteen minutes and took yet another two. The trips continued until all the dead chicks had been removed and taken, no doubt, to her den and grateful kits.
I got on the computer and read about foxes. Well, they don't kill to excess. If they have more than needed at the moment they will larder their food for later. There is no excess killing in the hen house. If the fox hasn't taken what it has killed it's because it has been prevented by a more fortified coop or increased human activity.
To cap the sad events off that night my friend Alison was planning to arrive with Chinese take-out. Jim was off on a trip and my children were sleeping at friends' homes,so it would be a fun "girl's night in." But when she arrived I didn't see the tell-tale grease stains on the brown paper bags.
"Where's the Chinese?"
"I decided to stop at the supermarket instead." She pulled out a large roasted chicken.
"Alison, put your coat back on. We're going out to dinner!"
Fox Family YouTube
And here is my third YouTube video of the Concord Fox kits with lots of photos of their brave hard working mother.
Next Sunday we'll have an update on the horses, including, of course, Dolly.
At least, that's my plan. I just can't train well in this mud mess--not even in my normally well-drained dressage arena. And Saratoga is the weekend after this! Can anyone still remember how to spell "sunshine"?
Well, griping aside, I will see you in a few days. And thank you for reading The Windflower Weekly.
Ainslie
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