SQUIRRELLY

Mona Lisa called and said, "You should re-tell about Gerald trying to outsmart the squirrels." The following is a Sue's News article from 2011 detailing Gerald's attempts:

            OUTSMARTING THE SQUIRRELS

Gerald had built a birdhouse and placed it in the back yard for Mother to enjoy watching the birds eating. The birdhouse was located approximately 20 feet from the garage. One day, Mother looked out the window just in time to see a squirrel scamper across the garage roof and alight onto the birdhouse, scaring away all the birds, and happily eating the bird feed.

After that we had a Thurber-esque series of Gerald's attempts to outsmart the squirrels.

He first ran out and shooed away the squirrels. Of course that lasted as long as it took Gerald to return to the house.

He put a plastic shelf on the platform of the bird house, where he'd had a wooden one, thinking the squirrel would slip and slide off the plastic. The squirrel landed on the plastic and immediately dug a bunch of seed out of the feeder to spread around him to keep from sliding.

Gerald moved the bird house further away from the garage. Mother saw the squirrel jump from the wisteria bush UP and and onto the bird feeder.

Gerald, an old Navy man, built a contraption resembling a "Rat Trap" on a hawser, the device which kept rats off ships. You've heard of rats leaving a sinking ship; in this case the squirrel grabbed the edge of the rat trap and swung around over the edge and up to the feeder.

Gerald moved the bird house again.

The same day the squirrel was shimmying up the pole and joyfully feasting on the bird feed.

Gerald put an aluminum cone shield under the bird house but the squirrel climbed OVER and AROUND the shield.

The next day Gerald put metal around the wooden pole to keep the squirrel from having traction to climb the metal-laden pole!

The squirrel was undeterred. Gerald sprayed the pole with silicon.  Finally, victory!

What Gerald considered his succes d'estime the rest of us considered his "Pyrrhic victory"!